Söldner-X 2: Final Prototype

[Elandyll]

SOLDNER X-2 : Final Prototype

The sequel to the side scrolling shoot em up previously available on PC, then ported to the PS3 (PSN) will this time be (or so it seems) exclusive to the PS3.

http://www.soldner-x.com/index.php?o...id=64&Itemid=1



I found the first one to be graphically excellent, but its level of difficulty somewhat turned me off (it was adjusted via patch later on I think).
I hope this one will be better fine tuned, but no doubt it will graphically (and gameplay wise) be very impressive.

[Icemage]

I hope they've taken the criticisms of the first Soldner-X: Himmelsturmer to heart. I really, really wanted to like the game, but there were many design decisions that made it frustratingly hard - and not in a good way. Too many cheap deaths, no sense of empowerment whatsoever.

- The weapon chain system was a cool idea on paper that never worked properly in practice. Instead of balancing the weapons against each other properly and giving the player the choice to use a specific one for any given situation, you're often forced to switch to something less than optimal at the most inopportune moments to avoid losing your chain combos (or just plain running out of weapon energy).

- The ship is way too slow for the amount of things trying to shoot/collide with you. It makes the gameplay feel sluggish - quite often you're hit by things you can see well in advance, but because of the slow movement of the ship, you simply have no way to avoid them in time to avoid a collision.

- Collision with the environment might as well be immediately fatal. Even after the patch, which did reduce the environment collision damage somewhat, you can still get caught behind some environment walls. A bit of repulsion to propel the ship away from anything it collides with would have easily fixed this problem, and they completely missed the boat here.

- Weapons are weak. Weak, weak, weak. There are often dozens.. sometimes over a hundred... enemies on the screen, and yet it often takes you multiple hits to destroy even one enemy. This is especially true on the asteroid level, where no matter WHAT weapons and upgrades you've acquired, you simply do not have enough firepower to carve a hole in the solid wall of rocks that floats across the screen for minutes on end.

- Some weapons are nigh on useless except in a few rare cases. The homing missiles basically only work on the first boss. The flamethrower only really works on the last boss (and to a lesser extent the second to last boss). Otherwise they are just excess baggage that screw you up when you're trying to switch to something that can actually kill the stuff attacking you.

The only thing I really like about the game is the colorful visuals, but even there it's often hard to distinguish what is a barrier that can kill you if you collide with it, versus something that's just in the environment and can be flown through safely.

[Septimus Prime]

Originally Posted by Icemage

The only thing I really like about the game is the colorful visuals, but even there it's often hard to distinguish what is a barrier that can kill you if you collide with it, versus something that's just in the environment and can be flown through safely.

Yeah, and that's a huge flaw. Foreground, background, and active objects all look the same, and your weapons don't even collide with active objects in any visually meaningful way (the beam will actually just pass right through objects), so you can never really tell what you're supposed to be avoiding. Add to that that walls are nearly magnetized, and you just end up with a bunch of deaths. And then there is the whole other issue of your weapons and your enemies' weapons having the same color, so you can't even see incoming attacks while you're firing away.

As for the weapons being weak, I can deal with that, but they even look and feel weak. Like, hitting enemies with your weapons doesn't even look like you're doing any damage until the enemies blow up, and it makes kills feel very unsatisfying.

[Kyo28]

The first Soldner X was so hard, it made grown up men cry in their mother's arms. I know old-school shoot 'em ups are notorious for being hard, but this was just ridiculous (I'm not even talking about getting all the trophies).

I hope the sequel will have a better dosage of difficulty level.

[Shin-Ra]

http://www.computerandvideogames.com....php?id=229159

[Icemage]

I see "chain energy lost!" in the last pic. That's not a good sign. It means EastAsiaSoft didn't listen to the complaints.

Unless these weapons upgrade after chaining, these guys are going to have to go fly a kite if they want me to buy another installment.

[Elandyll]

Maybe they reworked the way to do and maintain those chains?

That and the almost invisible difference between background and actual stuff that would hurt you (as in elements from the decor) made me hate the 1st game, which I did want to love for its graphics and music. Oh and the stupidly weak weapons too, which all combined made the game insanely difficult, and not in a good way.

Hopefully they learned.

[Grim Reaper]

i couldnt even finish the first one...

[Shin-Ra]

New press release and blog post if someone into this wants to sort through it.

[Elandyll]

Soldner X-2 is now available on the PSN. I downloaded it yesterday night, but haven't had the chance to play it yet. Any first impressions?

[Xerios]

Originally Posted by Grim Reaper

i couldnt even finish the first one...

got 1 trophy... and capped out

[Nielsb90]

Too hard for me!

[Groo The Perverted]

How bout the part where there's no save function so you have to do the whole game from start everytime you play it????


That's why I never play the 1st one anymore.

[Cplhicks]

I was interested in the first till I heard about its crushing difficulty. They claim they made it easier. Waiting to hear some reviews before I try. I don't want a game I can't play...

[Grim Reaper]

Originally Posted by Xerios

got 1 trophy... and capped out

the game is too f'ing hard!!!

[Icemage]

Well, I got curious about this game seven months after it got released, did a little digging, and saw that it got some quite glowing reviews(!).

So I picked it up, along with its expansion pack for a total of $15.

I have to say... I am pleasantly surprised.

- Game difficulty is now awesome. The game is way, way easier, and you never feel like you died for absolutely no reason. You can take many hits before dying now. There is a fascinating mechanic where your Rank slowly steadily increases as long as you don't take damage. from F to A (maybe higher? I don't know, never made it above A). The higher your rank, the more aggressively enemies attack. More enemies spawn, and they shoot more. When you take a hit, your rank bar decreases, so the game auto-adjusts difficulty on-the-fly to make sure you aren't overwhelmed.

- Graphics are much improved. Still super-beautiful, but it's now VERY clear what you can and can not collide with. Enemy shots are a blazing pink color and easily identified on-screen from your own attacks, so you're never wondering if that blob of color flying toward you is an enemy, an enemy shot, or one of your reflected shots. Your ship is now also noticeably more maneuverable and responsive to control, which is a joy.

- Weaponry is much improved. All of the weapons you have available are now fairly useful and no longer feel completely like peashooters. They also all cover a decent amount of screen real estate (some more than others). You can get weapon powerups which increase the damage your current weapon does (cumulative over every playthrough), and those powerups also slightly increase all of your other weaponry too.

- The chaining system is no longer related to weaponry at all. Instead, many enemies drop rings which you can fly near to collect, which power up your chain meter. Filling the chain meter releases an item for you (health, powerup, speedup, etc.).

- There are now three different ships to choose from, each with 2 unique weapons. One is locked at the beginning (I haven't unlocked it yet), but the other two play very differently from one another but feel balanced and strong.

- There are some trophy-bearing Challenges in the game which set you to do some crazy things like survive the first level without shooting anything exce[t the boss and not getting hit more than 3 times.

All in all, SideQuest Studios really did a good job at addressing the criticisms from the first game. I can now recommend this game in good conscience to shmup fans. It's a quality sidescrolling one-stick shooter.

[MOONPHASE]

Personally I prefer the shmup titles on PSN by Rockin Android. But of course the real shmup titles I would like are on Xbox 360 with most of them being Japan exclusives.