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Nanostray- The Nanothread
- Thread starter Mega Man's Electric Sheep
- Start date
Mega Man's Electric Sheep
Member
Ok I got it (via my preorder at eb). Impressions after beating 4 levels of the game: fun, awesome looking and sounding game. It has excellent music, particularly the asteroid belt stage. The graphics are awesome except for the slowdown, but it isn't frequent or game impeding (I only noticed it in one of the four stages).
The touch screen weapon selection is.....growing on me. It's hard, very hard, to get the hang of it, but I see how it could work well if you get used to doing it and memorize the weapon locations on the touchscreen. I've mainly been switching weapons during the boss battles, where it seems to be especially prudent to do so.
One cool touch is how the scoring works. You get less points at the end of the stage based on how much you've used autofire and how much you use the button to attract powerups to you instead of going to get them. Also, in the stages, if you collect a secondary weapon refill when your secondary weapon is full, each subsequent one you pick up will be worth more. Really encourages you to use your abilities sparingly and not mindlessly.
There are like 20 challenges, which offer things like playing the stage without smartbombs or beating a particular score. I believe beating them unlocks bonus content. Should be some replay there, as well as with beating the high scores and submitting them via code to the website.
I recommend checking it out (if you can find it). Grr at the review scores though.
The touch screen weapon selection is.....growing on me. It's hard, very hard, to get the hang of it, but I see how it could work well if you get used to doing it and memorize the weapon locations on the touchscreen. I've mainly been switching weapons during the boss battles, where it seems to be especially prudent to do so.
One cool touch is how the scoring works. You get less points at the end of the stage based on how much you've used autofire and how much you use the button to attract powerups to you instead of going to get them. Also, in the stages, if you collect a secondary weapon refill when your secondary weapon is full, each subsequent one you pick up will be worth more. Really encourages you to use your abilities sparingly and not mindlessly.
There are like 20 challenges, which offer things like playing the stage without smartbombs or beating a particular score. I believe beating them unlocks bonus content. Should be some replay there, as well as with beating the high scores and submitting them via code to the website.
I recommend checking it out (if you can find it). Grr at the review scores though.
good lord this game is awful. weapons that aren't strong enough to kill standard enemies are the classic indicator of a bad shooter. they're as present here as in iridion II. that the subweapons are ammo-limited -- and that the scoring system depends on not using them -- compounds the stupidity. the warped perspective, invisible walls, cramped screenspace, and oversized player craft are vintage iridion too. the asinine touchscreen weapon selection is, worryingly, the least of nanostray's problems. nanostray looked like an ambitious game that drew on a variety of healthy influences; i was hoping it'd realize iridion II's well-buried potential. in fact nanostray's only discernible influence is its immediate predecessor, and rather than shore up weaknesses in gameplay, shin'en have focused on graphics...which, incidentally, still aren't up to the polygonal detail or artistry of a decent ps1 shooter (e.g. raystorm). they nod tastelessly to japanese shooter tradition by periodically plastering the screen with big kanji. next time they ought to play a couple japanese shooters and learn from them.
on the bright side, it's 60fps.
on the bright side, it's 60fps.
drohne once again says stuff better than I could possibly say. I picked this up at Toys R Us when I heard it was gonna be really scarce... so far, the graphics and music are absolutely brilliant. It's the best looking 3D game on DS, bar none, and the music is throwback synthpop/electronica that I'm crazy about. The asteroid belt stage music reminds me so much of Gradius III it's not even funny! But, the warped perspective and the fact that you regular shots are too weak to kill certain enemies are extremely annoying. I usually use my power weapon to take these guys out, although you get penalized in the score for doing just that. I mostly stick with the default weapon so I don't worry about touch screen controls, even though using R or something to switch weapons would have been a marked improvement over shoehorning the game to utilize the DS features (and you wonder why lots of sane gamers can't stand the DS?). Still, it's nice to be able to play a shmup on the go. The 6.5-7 ratings the game has been getting is well justified.
Well, I completed a couple of the missions in challenge mode, and... um... they unlock low-resolution pictures available in higher resolution on the Shin'en site? Jeez, don't make me beat all of them, guys. The score challenges for the early levels seem frighteningly unreachable, unless I'm missing something.
I've seen people advising that you use the L button to fire. I wonder if the L button on their DS is less mushy and worthless for rapid firing than on mine.
Still, it is quite a bit of 6.8 fun.
I've seen people advising that you use the L button to fire. I wonder if the L button on their DS is less mushy and worthless for rapid firing than on mine.
Still, it is quite a bit of 6.8 fun.
I pretty much agree with drohne, but I'm getting some guilty pleasure anyways. The pace of the game is pretty much perfect for short bursts making it too convenient to throw out. I haven't had too many problems with the perspective and I managed to meet the score challenges on the 1st and 2nd levels.
I really need to order Mushihimesama to get me off of this shit. I've played everything else I got out.
I really need to order Mushihimesama to get me off of this shit. I've played everything else I got out.
MadOdorMachine
No additional functions
I've been playing this game quite a bit lately and thought I'd give some immpressions and remarks to drohne's comment:
My first impressions of the game were pretty much the same as drohnes. The game has beautiful graphics and music. Switching weapons with the touch screen was a nuisance and also, they were too weak. I beat the game the first day I bought it, so I put it down a couple of days thinking that was too easy and that its mechanics were broken.
I started playing it again a few days ago trying out the challenge modes and I'm finding all the problems that I had with it were intentional and actually make for quite good replay value. Your primary weapon is weak, but you have a secondary weapon that can take out any enemy (excluding a boss) pretty quickly. The secondary weapon is limited on ammo and a blue coin refills it. If you don't use your secondary ammo, the blue coins start multiplying in points. The whole point in the challenge mode is to make it past these enemies without using the secondary weapon, piling up the blue coins, thus reaching the high score. It's actually turning out to be quite fun and rewarding. It's changed my view on the game and I recommend anyone who bought it to give it a second try. I'm glad I did.
My first impressions of the game were pretty much the same as drohnes. The game has beautiful graphics and music. Switching weapons with the touch screen was a nuisance and also, they were too weak. I beat the game the first day I bought it, so I put it down a couple of days thinking that was too easy and that its mechanics were broken.
I started playing it again a few days ago trying out the challenge modes and I'm finding all the problems that I had with it were intentional and actually make for quite good replay value. Your primary weapon is weak, but you have a secondary weapon that can take out any enemy (excluding a boss) pretty quickly. The secondary weapon is limited on ammo and a blue coin refills it. If you don't use your secondary ammo, the blue coins start multiplying in points. The whole point in the challenge mode is to make it past these enemies without using the secondary weapon, piling up the blue coins, thus reaching the high score. It's actually turning out to be quite fun and rewarding. It's changed my view on the game and I recommend anyone who bought it to give it a second try. I'm glad I did.
Um, the whole blue coin mechanic makes your secondary weapon useless if you're playing for points, which is not good design. The challenges are rather cool (each challenge type requires an entirely different playstyle), but they don't quite make up for a normal mode that makes the pathetic peashooter primary weapons the only useable ones.
MrAngryFace
Banned
Didnt EGM give it like 5's across the board? lolz
Mega Man's Electric Sheep
Member
Yeah, but not by much. Now that the initial fuzzy glow of the visuals and the music have worn off, I see what an average game it is, but would bump it up to a 5.5/10 due to presentation. It really is a very clunky game with a stupid and annoying scoring system and absolutely horrible touchscreen weapon switching which I thought I would eventually get the hang of....but didn't. Very rarely do I do a 180 from my initial impression, but what can I say, it's a pretty game with awesome music, and it blinded me to the flaws. This game is lucky for any hype it got due to being hard to find, because aside from the presentation, it really kinda sucks.
The adventure mode is easy to complete for the first time on normal.. But then you get the real deal, try playing it on higher difficulty or arcade (which is by default on "Advanced" difficulty) for points. The challenges ar pretty hard to do and the reward for them isn't that great, you get an artwork pic from a level and music. The offline competition (with nanocodes) is motivating me to play it, to get a higher score. I'm happy with my purchase, i think we don't need to talk about graphics/sound cuz there's no doubt they're fine. Weaponswitching = crap.
Christoff Yurievich
Member
The challenges were keeping me interested until I got to some of the later ones. when I need a high score and the game is denying me the blue coins for no apparent reason, I quit. that's not challenge, it's bad design.
am i the only one who has no problem with the weapon switching? I can see why people would complain if they are using the a button to fire the regular shot. It works great when you use the L button to fire your weapon and put your right thumb between the touchscreen and the abxy buttons for easy access. The offline ranking is what has me playing this for hours on end. hopefully more shumps will grace the DS
I have a problem because i feel that touching the screen brings nothing new or useful to the awesome world of switching weapons in a game. It's actually slower, and more prone to errors other than just pushing a button, something that never usually fails.
or smear your screen.
or gets you killed by an incoming ship
or smear your screen.
or gets you killed by an incoming ship
MadOdorMachine
No additional functions
jgkspsx said:
No, you just can't use your secondary weapon until you get to the boss. The point is to make through the level without using it to build up your points. Then when you get to the boss, you can use it. It actually works pretty well.
Mega Man's Electric Sheep said:
I guess it's all how you look at it. I wasn't expecting Ikaruga or Gradius V greatness, but I think this game deserves an 8 out of ten score. There are still some things wong with the play mechanics, but once that is fixed, I could see their next game getting a higher score. I think a lot of people are just not seeing the main draw of this game. The adventure mode isn't the meat and potatoes, the challenge mode and arcade mode are. Once you start trying for those high scores, the game opens up a whole new purpose. I have this feeling EGM just tried the adventure mode and put it down like most other people. That's not how the game was designed to be played.
Oh! My Car!
Member
The fact the you need to complete an entire stage in Challenge or Arcade mode before it registers your score is fucking annoying. It's certainly a step up from previous efforts but the game mechanics could benefit from some attention.
Christoff Yurievich
Member
so has anyone completed a valor bonus challenge yet?