ZeroRanger

If Undertale met Space Invaders, then this game would be born of such union.

ᴛʜɪꜱ ɪꜱ ᴛʜᴇ ꜱᴛᴏʀʏ ᴏꜰ ᴀ ꜰɪɢʜᴛᴇʀ ⠀⠀ᴡʜᴏ ᴡᴀɴᴛᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇᴄᴏᴍᴇ... [i][h1]⠀⠀Zᴇʀᴏ Rᴀɴɢᴇʀ[/h1][/i] [hr][/hr] [h2]INVASION[/h2] [h2]FROM[/h2] [h2][b]SPACE ![/b][/h2] [b]⠀⠀⠀"CATASTROPHE"[/b] [h2]⠀⠀⠀⠀GIANT[/h2] [h2][b]⠀⠀⠀⠀ALIEN[/b][/h2] [h2]⠀⠀⠀⠀FLEET[/h2] ⠀⠀⠀ "2ND [b]⠀⠀⠀⠀APOCALYPSE"[/b] [h2]⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ ⠀THEY[/h2] [h2]⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀SHOW NO[/h2] [h2][b]⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀MERCY ![/b][/h2] ⠀⠀⠀ "EVE OF [b]⠀⠀⠀⠀DESTRUCTION"[/b] [h2]AND THEIR[/h2] [h2][b]LEADER[/b][/h2] [h2]IS . . .[/h2] [h1][b]GREEN[/b] ORANGE[/h1] [hr][/hr] [h3]⠀ SYSTEM CHECK...[/h3] ʟɪꜰᴇ ꜱᴜᴘᴘᴏʀᴛ ꜱʏꜱᴛᴇᴍ.......[b]ᴏᴋ[/b] ɪᴏɴ ᴛʜʀᴜꜱᴛᴇʀꜱ...................[b]ᴏᴋ[/b] ᴍᴀɪɴ ᴡᴇᴀᴘᴏɴ......................[b]ᴏᴋ[/b] ꜱᴜʙ ᴡᴇᴀᴘᴏɴ 𝟣.....................🔒 ꜱᴜʙ ᴡᴇᴀᴘᴏɴ 𝟤.....................🔒 ʀᴇꜱᴛʀᴀɪɴ ᴅᴇᴠɪᴄᴇ................🔒 [b]⠀⠀ ꜱʏꜱᴛᴇᴍ ꜱᴜꜰꜰɪᴄɪᴇɴᴛ[/b] [h2][i]⠀ ⠀ READY ! ! ![/i][/h2] [hr][/hr] [i]Zᴇʀᴏ[/i] [h2][i]⠀Zᴇʀᴏ[/i][/h2] [h1][b][i]⠀⠀ZᴇʀOʀᴀɴɢᴇʀ[/i][/b][/h1] [h2][i]⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Rᴀɴɢᴇʀ[/i][/h2] [i]⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀Rᴀɴɢᴇʀ[/i]

You can buy the best game of your life for $11.99 on steam btw

This game is an extremely fun shmup that I actually do recommend you play. And then you should just not bother completing at the final level. ZeroRanger is another game in the infamous "developers fumble the bag right at the finish line" genre. Up until the very end, the mechanics of this shmup are extremely fun, and it really feels like the game wants you to complete it by converting your score into more permanent continues, plus you can restart the game from any stage, not having to play the whole game from the very start every time. It's a great setup for a shmup. And then the final level just throws all that out the window and stops respecting your time. Is it bad because it's hard? No, not really, I actually think the final boss is fine, and the second phase especially is a spectacular challenge that was really fun the first couple of times. But this final level has insane amounts of time wasting garbage that you have to wade through every time you want to re-attempt it, and that second phase is blocked by a first phase that is tedious and annoying. not actually even that hard, just annoying, and it takes a couple minutes to get through. And then once you do get to that very fun second phase, your enjoyment is ruined when you realize that you need to conserve continues for the true final boss, which converts your continues into lives, and if you lose all those lives, the game erases you save file (which you thankfully can back up), so you're just tilted and stressed which makes you lose all those continues you desperately need. The final level of this otherwise really fun game just fumbles the bag so hard at the end. It really is a shame. Don't waste your players' time, it's disrespectful.

Please ignore my playtime: i originally purchased this game as part of an itch.io bundle. It was just so unbelievably good that i opted to buy it a second time. Zeroranger is one of the best games I've ever played. It has one of the best soundtracks I've heard and it was composed using. i kid you not. Microsoft GS MIDI Wave-table. If you're not in the know, that's the default MIDI soundfont that comes with windows, It's usually regarded as so bad that most people immediately replace it with something else. This game took that and turned it into something that easily hangs out With the music of Undertale or one of the good RGG games. The Art of the game extracts such an absurd amount of detail and fluidity from 8 colors that any color combination of green and orange has become an inside joke with my friends. This game is so good it ruined COLORS for me. .. Or did it make them better? The enemy arrangement and bullet patterning is so engaging that Toby fox tapped one of this game's developers for Deltarune's chapter 5. It's so good that i think about it when i'm playing anything that remotely resembles a bullet hell. I had never played a real Shoot em' Up before this game, and now I've played every touhou and len'en game. And Zeroranger still holds up as one of the best. If you have any interest in the genre, I implore you to at least try the demo. It's difficult, but not inaccessibly so. At least to me, Zeroranger is a game about confronting impossible odds, and persevering through them. I think many people misinterpret it as being about Buddhism, and while it uses a lot of Buddhist iconography and ideas, I think it's in service of the game being about absolute determination, rather than enlightenment, The end game difficulty spike is entirely also in service of this, and if you have the patience, it's intensely rewarding to actually overcome Despair. [spoiler] While the save deletion point is extremely frustrating, it's worth knowing that you can get back to that point very quickly once you've gotten the game down well. [/spoiler] I can only wish there was more to play. An extra game mode has been in the works for years, but i don't have full faith that it will ever be finished. I do have my full faith, however, that Anything System Erasure makes is worth playing. (If only i wasn't horrible at sokoban, lol) [spoiler] You can Hold space bar and type "helpme" on the main menu to access the WIP black onion game mode. [/spoiler]

Just completed the game. After 39 hours of play time, this has become one of my favorite games of all time. The care put into every little detail is heartwarming and the game really feels like a labor of love and passion. This has been the first vertical shoot-'em-up I've ever played and, after this experience, I'm sure it won't be the last. I highly recommend this game to anyone who has considered getting it. I wish the dev team the very best and I will definitely be playing their other games!

ZeroRanger is such a unique experience and an incredible game within the shmup genre. It’s my favorite game in the genre and a true hidden gem.