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The Toy Soldiers (Xbox Live Arcade) Official Thread

xbhaskarx

Member
mujun said:
Mortars are usually better value for money than howitzers I've found.

Only if you upgrade the mortars, though. The level 1 mortars have like no range. Although at least it's not as bad as the level 1 anti-aircraft which does barely any damage to planes...
 

GhaleonEB

Member
Finally played through the demo. I think the underlying game might be good, but I sure can't tell from the demo. If the goal of it was to teach me how to play, and make doing so interesting, the demo was an abject failure. It just plops me down into the game without any context for what to do. I fumbled through it and just when I thought I might have been getting the hang of it, the demo ends - on a timer, right in the middle of a wave.

I think Defense Grid did a masterful job of laying in the basics of the game mechanics and introducing the story, and then ending the demo right when it was getting interesting. This demo seemed like a bit of a mess. I found the controls both ungainly and slightly frustrating, and the camera angles never satisfying. I had no idea what I was doing through most of the demo, and the game didn't bother to tell me what I should be doing. I tried restarting the demo and found I didn't have the patience to try and slug through it again.

Pass.
 
GhaleonEB said:
Finally played through the demo. I think the underlying game might be good, but I sure can't tell from the demo. If the goal of it was to teach me how to play, and make doing so interesting, the demo was an abject failure. It just plops me down into the game without any context for what to do. I fumbled through it and just when I thought I might have been getting the hang of it, the demo ends - on a timer, right in the middle of a wave.
I'm guessing you didn't do the tutorial?
 

Joel Was Right

Gold Member
I just played a game where the only Offensive weapons were aircraft, and there were incidentally no Anti-Aircraft weapons. Well wtf is the point of that? Within two minutes My Toy Box was down to 9 and I couldnt stop it.
 

mujun

Member
Main the last boss kicked my ass. Takes so long to get your tank into position and he keeps shooting mini versions out...

Very complex level the last one.
 

Brakara

Member
BigNastyCurve said:
It's amazing how people complain about people who want to save 5 bucks.

Mainly because you guys (note: not necessarily you) shit up thread after thread with "Oh this game looks nice but $15???? Wah wah!" It's getting old quick. And it's just $15, not $150 ffs.

Back to topic: I can see why Ghaleon (and others) would be confused over the "tutorial" since it gives you the opportunity to check out almost every unit. The game begins properly after that, with just a few units available like in Defense Grid (then giving you new ones for each respective level). And as someone who loved DG, I have to admit I like the features they've added to the genre in this game. Being able to control your own turrets and units are great fun, and adds another dimension to your strategy.
 

mujun

Member
Brakara said:
Mainly because you guys (note: not necessarily you) shit up thread after thread with "Oh this game looks nice but $15???? Wah wah!" It's getting old quick. And it's just $15, not $150 ffs.

Back to topic: I can see why Ghaleon (and others) would be confused over the "tutorial" since it gives you the opportunity to check out almost every unit. The game begins properly after that, with just a few units available like in Defense Grid (then giving you new ones for each respective level). And as someone who loved DG, I have to admit I like the features they've added to the genre in this game. Being able to control your own turrets and units are great fun, and adds another dimension to your strategy.

Yeah, being able to control your stuff is what makes this game for me. I like tower defence games theoretically but when it comes to actually sitting down with them I'm sick of them within minutes.

This game on the other hand has me totally hooked. I've put 7-10 hours in already more than Dante's Inferno probably and I am totally satisfied with the 1200 points I spent.
 

jedimike

Member
My only gripe about this game so far is the elite difficulty. I want to earn the ribbons, but I don't want to have to manually fire each set of guns. Even when you use the D-pad, it just doesn't seem like you can win the round going from weapon to weapon.

Also, do you have to be on hard or elite difficulty to earn the rations? I killed every soldier with gas on the Tsar Tank level, but still didn't get the ration.

I'm still having a blast! There's just a few things I would have changed.
 
Has anyone managed to get the "Kill 50 enemies with gas" ration to unlock? I counted over 100 deaths to gas, but I didn't get the ration. I've tried it twice now. =/

Edit - lol... seems it might be bugged based on the post above.
 

xbhaskarx

Member
Okay so I finally destroyed the Rail Tank and beat the campaign, it was 12 levels.
Completing the campaign opens up Campaign+, 12 more levels played as the Germans.
That opens up Survival+, not sure how many levels that is or if that opens anything else.

Not sure what the "Armored Train Boss" is since it never came up in the campaign. Maybe it's in Survival+ or maybe it will be DLC...
Train-Boss.jpg
 

jedimike

Member
xbhaskarx said:
Okay so I finally destroyed the Rail Tank and beat the campaign, it was 12 levels.
Completing the campaign opens up Campaign+, 12 more levels played as the Germans.
That opens up Survival+, not sure how many levels that is or if that opens anything else.

Not sure what the "Armored Train Boss" is since it never came up in the campaign. Maybe it's in Survival+ or maybe it will be DLC...
Train-Boss.jpg

That's a lot of unlockable content! Does the German side have different weapons and stuff?
 

mujun

Member
xbhaskarx said:
Okay so I finally destroyed the Rail Tank and beat the campaign, it was 12 levels.
Completing the campaign opens up Campaign+, 12 more levels played as the Germans.
That opens up Survival+, not sure how many levels that is or if that opens anything else.

Not sure what the "Armored Train Boss" is since it never came up in the campaign. Maybe it's in Survival+ or maybe it will be DLC...
Train-Boss.jpg

If that is twelve new levels with extra content and they are not just cut and paste jobs then this game is a steal at 1200.
 

xbhaskarx

Member
jedimike said:
That's a lot of unlockable content! Does the German side have different weapons and stuff?

The Germans have the same basic units but they look different from the Allied units. See here.


mujun said:
If that is twelve new levels with extra content and they are not just cut and paste jobs then this game is a steal at 1200.

The Campaign+ levels have the same names as the Campaign levels, but they're definitely not cut and paste.
I just did the second level, Gheluvelt Chateau+, and the toy box was in the center of the map, with enemies attacking from all sides. Then I went back to the original version, and the toy box was on the side. And it was snowy unlike the original. Plus the enemy waves were more difficult, of course.
 
Just a heads up for people having trouble with that first tank level, I was getting demolished until I figured out you could change the Howitzer direction with Right and Left bumper. Totally destroyed it after that.
 
Hmm... what are the "bonus targets" it wants for one of the rations?

Edit - I've got it, they're the targets at the sides of the battlefield which you shoot with the aeroplane.
 

Caspel

Business & Marketing Manager @ GungHo
After playing a good portion of my day with Scrap Metal, Toy Soldiers easily bests it by all accounts. Scrap Metal has a few shining moments where it triumphs over TS, but in general, TS is the better game.
 

Pakkidis

Member
According to signal studios they are working on a patch to fix some of the issues. I just beat the campaign mode. I like it a lot but I find it more fun to take control of the plane and the tank then the actual towers. I find using the mortar or the howitzers to be pretty pointless as the AI does a better job killing things then I do.

Campaign + seems to have the same levels with a few variations, I've only played a few missions so far.

Overall, I think its a solid purchase.
 

xbhaskarx

Member
I'm through 6 of the Campaign+ levels and there are definitely all new levels. I'm not sure why they reused the names, but the full campaign is definitely 24 distinct levels of awesomeness.
 

Pakkidis

Member
xbhaskarx said:
I'm through 6 of the Campaign+ levels and there are definitely all new levels. I'm not sure why they reused the names, but the full campaign is definitely 24 distinct levels of awesomeness.

Thats not entirely true, some levels were identical in terms of design but had different gun placements or you had to destroy enemy placements with a tank etc.
 

Shamrock

Banned
Anyone else having problems with online?


I tried playing a private match with a buddy about 6 times in a row and each time the game became, I don't know, Unsynched?

What I mean is on my screen I was winning 17 to 8, on his screen he was winning 12 to 7.

On my screen it showed he had 7,000 dollars to spend and wasn't sending any units at me, however on his screen he had 200 dollars left and and had been sending units all game and had 3 in queue.

This happened about literally 6 times in a row. A few times it even said I won and put me back to the lobby while on his screen he was still playing me for another 10 minutes.
 

xbhaskarx

Member
Pakkidis said:
Thats not entirely true, some levels were identical in terms of design but had different gun placements or you had to destroy enemy placements with a tank etc.

The first three or so seemed similar to me (especially level 3: Tsar Tank), after that they appear to be quite different, no?
 

mujun

Member
Add me : beelzebubble

Started playing MP, love it though I've only played 2 matches. Not a big fan of the airplanes only level though.
 

Joel Was Right

Gold Member
Meus Renaissance said:
I just played a game where the only Offensive weapons were aircraft, and there were incidentally no Anti-Aircraft weapons. Well wtf is the point of that? Within two minutes My Toy Box was down to 9 and I couldnt stop it.

Anyone?

I really do not understand the Multiplayer facet of this. You start with a couple of thousand to spend on, and you get money by essentially destroying enemy units. So the natural thing to do is to atleast build a few defences. However the opponent usually always just builds offensive units.

Defender

Money - 4000

A mortar costs around 700, and upgrading them is a must. So in total you spend 1700 per mortar. You build two. So that's 3400 spent in total, the rest is useless until you destroy something.

Attacker

Money - 4000

He spends 90% of his money on offensives. Ideally 4 Tank groups, that's 3200 spent - plus maybe one defensive.

Who is going to win? The attacker. Two mortars are not enough to defend against that many tanks. If you have an airplane, you can try to do as much damage as you can do them before they get to your base or you can try to decimate his infantry. If you choose the latter, you probably won't get all of them and so you're looking at earning no more than 300 extra. And that money you will most likely use to repair your damaged mortars because you certainly can't spend it build anything.

After that first wave, you will have gone down from 20 to anything between 17 or lower whilst you haven't done anything to harm him other thna perhaps fly your airplane into his Box. You're in a cycle of trying to upgrade or repair your defences whilst hes focused on making this quick.

I don't understand how a strategy game like this can effectively see you lose games within a few minutes by doing nothing other than build, naturally, your defences. You need to to have any chance of earning money, yet the attacker is always given the upper hand even though his tactic will not get him any money.
 

mujun

Member
Meus Renaissance said:
Anyone?

I really do not understand the Multiplayer facet of this. You start with a couple of thousand to spend on, and you get money by essentially destroying enemy units. So the natural thing to do is to atleast build a few defences. However the opponent usually always just builds offensive units.

Defender

Money - 4000

A mortar costs around 700, and upgrading them is a must. So in total you spend 1700 per mortar. You build two. So that's 3400 spent in total, the rest is useless until you destroy something.

Attacker

Money - 4000

He spends 90% of his money on offensives. Ideally 4 Tank groups, that's 3200 spent - plus maybe one defensive.

Who is going to win? The attacker. Two mortars are not enough to defend against that many tanks. If you have an airplane, you can try to do as much damage as you can do them before they get to your base or you can try to decimate his infantry. If you choose the latter, you probably won't get all of them and so you're looking at earning no more than 300 extra. And that money you will most likely use to repair your damaged mortars because you certainly can't spend it build anything.

After that first wave, you will have gone down from 20 to anything between 17 or lower whilst you haven't done anything to harm him other thna perhaps fly your airplane into his Box. You're in a cycle of trying to upgrade or repair your defences whilst hes focused on making this quick.

I don't understand how a strategy game like this can effectively see you lose games within a few minutes by doing nothing other than build, naturally, your defences. You need to to have any chance of earning money, yet the attacker is always given the upper hand even though his tactic will not get him any money.

Same as the single player game when you get really efficient at it (from what I've found) with the difference being the AI has no ability to wipe out your defences with tanks and the like.

Best strat I've found in MP is to send out waves and destrop as much as you can with a tank. It means the opponent has wasted a bunch of money on building defences, you've got more money and when you spam offence they can't repel you.

That's fine by me though because everyone will just start doing what I've been doing and hold off on defence building until they've got enough money to build one or two spots they can protect with a tank or whatever and then it will become a game where the loser is the person who slips up. It's pretty intense and fun from what I've played.

Still early days though and it might turn out to be broken.

I know I'm not going to bother with quickmatch anymore. Everytime I start the game by lining up three waves. Wait till the opponent builds something then trash it with my tank. They quit a second later. Lame.

The planes only level sucks too so by playing private games I can avoid that shit.
 

jedimike

Member
There's a "tips & tricks" video on marketplace. I learned quite a bit from it. For example, you can actually control the speed of the mortars and howitzers. There's also a golden box hidden on each level.

And it seems obvious now, but manually controlled equipment is tremendously more effective than AI controlled units.
 
jedimike said:
There's a "tips & tricks" video on marketplace. I learned quite a bit from it. For example, you can actually control the speed of the mortars and howitzers. There's also a golden box hidden on each level.
I had a popup saying that I'd collected 2/X golden boxes (or something along those lines). I had no idea what it meant though.

Maybe I'll have to scour the levels to see what I can see.
 
acksman said:
Anyone having problems stopping the Railway engine? I have cleared out, but blasted those mini railway cars.
Two fully upgraded howitzers, two fully upgraded mortars by the side of the track and another by the tunnel the train comes out of. Then just batter the train with your tank.

It beat me the first time, not the second. :D
 

mujun

Member
acksman said:
Anyone having problems stopping the Railway engine? I have cleared out, but blasted those mini railway cars.

Which difficulty level?

On casual you can do whatever you want emplacement wise till the train is actually about to hit but just before it's about to hit you should be able to get by with lvl 3 mortars at the spot right near the tunnel mouth and the two to the right of the tracks near the tunnel. You will also need to have two level 3 howitzers on the two large hard points on the right side of the tracks. Make sure they are set facing the right angle. Finally you will need to also get a tank up there in time to hit it whenever it's out.

Should take it out pretty easily on casual or even normal difficulty if you do the above.
 

Hootie

Member
WOW, I just played the demo on a whim and this game is reaaally freaking fun.

I need to get some MS points so I can buy this baby.
 

mujun

Member
Shit is busted as hell online. Almost every game I've tried has ended in a disconnect in the first minute or so. Either that or it's laggy. Even against someone 2 kms away from me with both of us on fibreoptic it disconnected twice within the first minute. Pity, really love the game otherwise and would love to play multi.
 
FateBreaker said:
It's amazing how many of you complain about a 5-dollar difference.
I can tell you what isn't helping for me and that's seeing perfect dark at 800 and afterburner climax at 800, different genres I know but those two together also total up to 1600 points.
 
What a game this is! So much fun. I'm no Tower Defense vet so I played on Casual.
Tried a couple of levels on normal and got my ass kicked by the big tank. Not so frustrating so I'll keep trying.
Nearly 120,000 on the leaderboards. Not bad.
 

xbhaskarx

Member
Psychotext said:
"Complete the level using only your biplane"

...no problem, I'll just... wait, what? :lol

I never tried to do those level-specific challenges (I think I completed two or three just by accident), but 95% of those who are will probably give up when they reach that one.
 

Hugbot

Member
Psychotext said:
Yeah, even if only 100k of those are actual purchases, it's a solid opening week.
I've played the demo now and am still on the fence, but it's great to see it doing well. It's a damn solid game, even if I'm not yet sure if it's my cup of tea.

It's kind of disheartening to hear about the multiplayer problems, though, hopefully those are just opening week kinks that get ironed out.
 
xbhaskarx said:
I never tried to do those level-specific challenges (I think I completed two or three just by accident), but 95% of those who are will probably give up when they reach that one.
I just managed to do it on elite difficulty (figured that was best as you get 40 health on your toy box). Wasn't easy, but it's do-able for sure.
 
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