|
 20XX is a 2017 side-scrolling action platformer by Batterystaple Games and Fire Hose Games that's unafraid to admit it's a total Mega Man X clone. They've smartly taken it in a different direction by restructuring the game as a Roguelike: if you die the run is over, level layouts are randomized, upgrades/weapons/armor found on each run are lost with death, and only upgrades bought at the hub are permanent. Some flexibility is given to make the game easier to approach: there are difficulty settings including an easy mode with lives, spikes and bottomless pits aren't instadeath unless you select it as a handicap, etc. A frustrating pisser like Spelunky this ain't, but it's still going to expect some serious reaction time and multiple playthroughs before you even reach the final boss the first time. But all of that plus tight controls, an excellent chiptune soundtrack by Cityfires, and a lot of replay value add up to what was essentially the only great Mega Man game for years until 11 came out. The story is such: You are blue, shooty girl Nina and red, slashy boy Ace (and maybe the DLC characters if you bought them), Action Contractors! Basically bot-killer mercenaries, hired by Dr.'s Flat and Sharp to save the city from a killer robot outbreak. A simple story given some complexity once you realize the Roguelike elements of the game are plot-relevant, and the doctors are not your friends. The LP: This is a thorough look at the game; not a 100% LP, but I will be completing the game on every difficulty at least once, and completing at least one run with each character including DLC characters Hawk and Draco. Rush Job and Multiplayer will get videos of their own, while the daily/weekly challenges will just be shown off briefly, since they're basically just specific seeds that you might run normally anyway. Since there are so many augments you can unlock, I'm not worrying about buying all of them, and you'll get to see many of them in the challenge modes anyway. I'm also not worrying about the datalogs since everything's already been archived on the obligatory wiki. Spoilers for absolutely everything ahoy. I'm joined on this excursion by JigglyJacob, a fan of Mega Man whereas I've played jack poo poo. He will also be my multiplayer partner when we can get around to it. ----------------------------          
ThornBrain fucked around with this message at 20:10 on Apr 17, 2019 |
#
?
Jan 23, 2019 20:36
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 11, 2024 18:35 |
|
|
Oh, this looks very interesting. A combination of a roguelike RPG and a classic MegaMan platformer. This looks a lot like the SNES MegaMan X games, which were the best MegaMan games, so I approve!
|
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2019 21:09
|
|
|
When I read about this not too long ago I thought it looked too much like a shameless ripoff for my taste, but looking at it in action it's actually a very good unofficial successor to it. There's clearly a lot of love to the MMX mechanics but poured into a different genre, and it actually looks fun. Points to whoever was behind the randomization algorithm too, the levels actually look very sensible in spite of a few platforms that go nowhere.
|
|
#
?
Jan 23, 2019 22:59
|
|
|
Blaze Dragon posted:When I read about this not too long ago I thought it looked too much like a shameless ripoff for my taste, but looking at it in action it's actually a very good unofficial successor to it. There's clearly a lot of love to the MMX mechanics but poured into a different genre, and it actually looks fun. Points to whoever was behind the randomization algorithm too, the levels actually look very sensible in spite of a few platforms that go nowhere. The levels are generated in chunks, and the devs go out of their way to make sure the chunks fit reasonably well together. This is one of my favorite games, but I've never managed to get past the ninth stage after dozens of hours of playtime. poo poo gets hard later on.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2019 02:39
|
|
|
I admit I managed to beat it several times. Granted the way I did that was by being VERY selective with what I unlocked and NEVER grabbing anything that increased the damage of powers. Max attack damage go!
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2019 03:02
|
|
|
This game is Good.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2019 11:20
|
|
|
That Quint Laser's bullet is enormous. There is no escaping. Jumping is useless.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2019 11:36
|
|
|
Hey, at least it couldn't be as bad as the mighty no. 9.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2019 11:39
|
|
|
Samovar posted:Hey, at least it couldn't be as bad as the mighty no. 9. "Staggeringly mediocre" is a term I would use to describe Mighty No. 9, which is the worst thing that could possibly have happened to it. I think its worst aspect was poor level design, which perhaps ironically is a problem 20XX doesn't remotely brush up against. I am sometimes disappointed that 20XX only has four stages for eight bosses (plus the two endgame stages), but I understand why they did it that way. It's already gotta be challenging, to hand-make enough chunks of six stages for the procedurally generated layouts to be unique every time, much less eight. *shakes fist in general at Agnisort*
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2019 12:57
|
|
|
KieranWalker posted:I think its worst aspect was poor level design, which perhaps ironically is a problem 20XX doesn't remotely brush up against. For the game itself I think I'd agree. For everything surrounding it? "...cry like an anime nerd on prom night." Never in the history of video game advertising has someone so wildly misjudged their audience. As far as 20XX building around multiple jumps once you get them, I don't think it does. I think it's much cleverer than that, that the chunks of level are built with shortcuts if you have multi-jump, and position them such that if you're thinking along those lines you encounter those routes first. Laser you can double-jump over --> wait until the platform moves to single jump under, rather than the other way around.
|
|
#
?
Jan 24, 2019 20:01
|
|
|
I liked the concept of M#9's capital building stage where it was bidirectional, but yeah execution was not the greatest.
|
|
#
?
Jan 25, 2019 01:17
|
|
|
Clearly the reason my first run failed was because it wasn't hard enough.
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2019 20:40
|
|
|
Watching this inspired me to start playing again, and I'd like to counterpoint the Shadespur not being useful as a weapon... though i will say it's probably the most difficult to use consistently. It may be somewhat low-damage, but it multihits rather quickly against normal enemies, up to 6 hits if overlapping for the entire duration. This makes it one of the highest-damage-efficiency stage weapons in the game at close range, on top of the fact that if your control and timing for weaponizing your dashjump momentum is good enough you can sling around what are functionally omni-directional, long-distance, enemy-piercing, and most importantly terrain-piercing projectiles. Sometimes you'll be dropping into a pit of bees n' hamster wheels in very cramped quarters or find a very brutally-placed cannon raining death from the lip of the wall yer climbing and just wanna Nope your problems away from a safe distance for a couple energy. Honestly the only things it doesn't do very well are bossfights (where it hits twice at most, very meh damage for how difficult it is to line up around boss patterns without ramming a bullet) and enemies that block stopping the shots cold. It's a personal favorite that I get ASAP regardless of character when the option arises for sheer versatility. (On a half-related note, a reason to not charge the Quint: 3x cost for 2x damage. When you have low energy, sometimes every point matters to damage-race a boss!)
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2019 23:16
|
|
|
Are Nina and Ace music references?
|
|
#
?
Jan 30, 2019 23:20
|
|
|
The end?!-ish.
|
|
#
?
Jan 31, 2019 03:30
|
|
|
I'm not sure the potato battery is a Portal reference so much as a reference to that one experiment literally everyone had to do in their childhood at some point.
|
|
#
?
Jan 31, 2019 16:30
|
|
|
Man, this is a game I've spent alot of time on. Nice to see an LP of it! Gotta say that personally I prefer the other power usage setting, where you only use them with one button, and the other buttons cycle between them. No need to go to the menu with that. I guess that's personal preference though.
|
|
#
?
Jan 31, 2019 22:51
|
|
|
This was the game that finally broke my addiction to Binding of Isaac. Love it. I played it right around the time it made it out of early access. Looks like there's been some graphical overhaul since I last played. Re: Starting the next game with unlocks, I think it will if you start a new game right after buying the unlock, but if you buy the unlock and then leave the game it might not carry over. That's why I try to unlock things at the start of a session instead of the end. IMJack fucked around with this message at 06:11 on Feb 1, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2019 06:05
|
|
|
This is a fantastic sort of "unofficial" Mega Man X, and I prefer it to any of that series' titles post-SNES. The structure of it gives a lot of incentive to continue replaying, whether after failure or you've mastered the platforming stages and the bosses through the skull-mutators in Defiant mode as well as the Daily and Weekly Challenges. The control is so tight that it feels immensely satisfying to tear through the stages and bosses after you've put aa share of hours in to learn the game...then you start challenging yourself, and then unlock the other contractors by sheer accident after clearing a Defiant run with three skulls on. It also contains an absurd amount of lore detailing why the game is happening. For immersion, of course.
|
|
#
?
Feb 1, 2019 11:37
|
|
|
If at first, second and third you don't succeed, get pokey.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 11:08
|
|
|
Vera actually does less damage to Kur than it does to other enemies, against Kur it's specifically meant to be used to reflect the Quint Lasers. Against most other enemies it does good damage. Also, this probably isn't really something you'd figure out unless you do it accidentally or someone tells you about it, but you can fully charge the Quint Laser to break vending machines, which usually gives you some of the items that the vending machine would normally give. Potentially very useful.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 11:51
|
|
|
Plasma Blender is far from a downgrade. It has absolutely absurd dps and pretty decent range if you play fast enough. It charges up as you hit things and stays charged so long as you keep hitting them, getting a bigger hitbox in the process.
dis astranagant fucked around with this message at 12:12 on Feb 6, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 12:10
|
|
|
dis astranagant posted:Plasma Blender is far from a downgrade. It has absolutely absurd dps and pretty decent range if you play fast enough. It charges up as you hit things and stays charged so long as you keep hitting them, getting a bigger hitbox in the process. Yeah. It's dangerous to use, but incredibly powerful. Though my favorite weapon for Ace is one you haven't shown off yet, I think it's one you have to unlock.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 12:27
|
|
|
dis astranagant posted:Plasma Blender is far from a downgrade. It has absolutely absurd dps and pretty decent range if you play fast enough. It charges up as you hit things and stays charged so long as you keep hitting them, getting a bigger hitbox in the process. Yeah the Plasma Bender is basically "What if we gave Zero the Crissaegrim from Symphony of the Night?" Bosses melt
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 12:53
|
|
|
'I love the blender and HATE the spear granted as stated before my playstyle involved unlocking nothing but +attack upgrades and then blending bosses down rapidly edit: You also didn't seem to notice it charging up as you hit thing it's attack area becoming vastly larger not to mention you hit yourself with a platform. Although I'll give you that it's sound effect is damned annoying. I just can't see how the spear is any good though. It's range is finnicky and if you miss you have to wait for it to come back and it's just awkward to hit things with it. Like earlier in your video. It's hitbox is just so small. I prefer the default sword to it You also failed to show that you can use Vera to fly by abusing it's knock back. Godna fucked around with this message at 15:53 on Feb 6, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 15:35
|
|
|
Before I had seen this LP I watched a few runs by the Time Warriors, mostly successful, and the big difference I saw, other than just generally having more things unlocked, was that Coolguy was aggressively using his powers to shut down traps. Like pretty much the entire section at around 36:00 in that last video could have been trivialized with a single shaterfrost. Also, different weapons have different damage multipliers, like both of Nina's different primaries you showed off will only do 80% on the main attack, but 20% for each of the other shots. Hoping to see how things go once you've got more stuff unlocked.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 20:11
|
|
|
I'm wondering if the LP will show off the DLC characters at some point. I heard Hawk and Draco are sort-of cool characters with some pretty unique playstyles from someone Supposedly the devs are still working on more stuff for the game. Once you've blown through the game a few times it does get a bit old seeing the same five tilesets repeated, and new bosses could shake it up even more
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 20:57
|
|
|
A Pleasant Hug posted:I'm wondering if the LP will show off the DLC characters at some point. I heard Hawk and Draco are sort-of cool characters with some pretty unique playstyles from someone Yep, I bought them in time for part 6, so I'm going to be playing as them for some time starting then. Hawk's a lot of fun especially.
|
|
#
?
Feb 6, 2019 22:18
|
|
|
Force Nova IS in fact the weakness of Eternal Star. It makes the smaller Flapps it summons chain reaction explode. When it's summoning a whole bunch at once, this will damage it severely. The Blender can be so ridiculously overpowered that I self-ban myself from using it at times. It's very good at making bosses melt, as others have stated. For Ace I currently prefer a weapon that needs to be unlocked and which you presumably haven't unlocked yet in the videos. That is, the extremely divisive one (pun not intended, but I guess it works). Edit: Wait, THAT's not there in Reverent? Huh. But you actually ARE in danger from the explosions during the escape. It just takes a while before that's the case. You're more likely to actually see that happen when going for a certain achievement. Malicus fucked around with this message at 03:46 on Feb 7, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 7, 2019 01:20
|
|
|
For the record: Yes, it is possible to repeatedly wall-jump with one wall in Super Metroid; just find a speedrun somewhere and the player will probably demonstrate. Vile Visage looks like one of those evil clowns from horror movies to me. Anyone else? Spammy weapons tend to be my favorites, personally (lots of hits that do 1 damage add up surprisingly fast). My most hated? Unreliable ones (for example, even if something can do a maximum of 100 damage per hit I'll still hate it if its minimum is 1). Oh, and I tend to have issues with short-range weapons in a platformer too (especially sci-fi), but that tends to be more of a pet peeve and I can at least acknowledge that they can be effective at times. If I do have to use a melee weapon, though, I'd prefer to have some AOE on it (like Ace's default sword). I would've mentioned this before if I'd had anything else to say in this thread, but I always liked Shotgun Ice (the MMX weapon Shatterbeak's weapon was based on, for those unfamiliar with the SNES games). Not enough to use it consistently, because I'm a hoarder and thus refused to use weapon energy on anything but bosses that're weak to those weapons, but it's still probably the best ice-based weapon in the entire Mega Man franchise, in my opinion. ...Does the upgraded Murderdrone shoot faster, or just do more damage with each shot? And I'm pretty sure nobody's surprised that the last bosses are a "Wily and his patsy" reference.
|
|
#
?
Feb 7, 2019 13:47
|
|
|
CptWedgie posted:...Does the upgraded Murderdrone shoot faster, or just do more damage with each shot? Just increases damage. All of the buddy bots are like that. Unless they're for some other purpose like exploding. ThornBrain fucked around with this message at 19:25 on Feb 7, 2019 |
|
#
?
Feb 7, 2019 19:22
|
|
|
ThornBrain posted:Just increases damage. All of the buddy bots are like that. Unless they're for some other purpose like exploding. Pretty sure it does shoot faster. All of the attacking repros get something other than just damage from levels, most of them attack faster afaik.
|
|
#
?
Feb 8, 2019 00:54
|
|
|
Archenteron posted:Yeah the Plasma Bender is basically "What if we gave Zero the Crissaegrim from Symphony of the Night?" ThornBrain posted:It's pretty much a straight downgrade.  Godna posted:You also failed to show that you can use Vera to fly by abusing it's knock back.
|
|
#
?
Feb 8, 2019 01:24
|
|
|
Sharp doesn't have any boss weaknesses, but his attacks can be countered the same way as the boss that originally used them. The square lasers can be reflected by Vera; that floating orb that links to the boss with an energy chain can be frozen; the shield beetle and the shield it gives the boss get cracked by the mortar, etc. Flat is probably the most rogue-lite final boss I've seen to date, the way he reconfigures his room every time he crosses it. I didn't know that disabling the traps leaves them disabled if the course comes up again later in the fight.
|
|
#
?
Feb 8, 2019 01:42
|
|
|
IMJack posted:Flat is probably the most rogue-lite final boss I've seen to date, the way he reconfigures his room every time he crosses it. I didn't know that disabling the traps leaves them disabled if the course comes up again later in the fight.
|
|
#
?
Feb 8, 2019 02:37
|
|
|
This honestly looks really fun. Just one thing I can never quite get over is the animation technique they use for the main characters, with all the individual sprites pin-jointed to each other - it always feels kinda cheap and results in a lot of weird unnatural animations and wobbliness. At least the gameplay seems really tight. [edit]is it just me or do you seem to not get a lot of weapon energy compared to megaman games?
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2019 04:59
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:This honestly looks really fun. Just one thing I can never quite get over is the animation technique they use for the main characters, with all the individual sprites pin-jointed to each other - it always feels kinda cheap and results in a lot of weird unnatural animations and wobbliness. At least the gameplay seems really tight. There seems to be a bit of a you get what you use mechanic going on for energy drops. There's also a dlc character with a way to get energy back consistently.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2019 05:57
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:This honestly looks really fun. Just one thing I can never quite get over is the animation technique they use for the main characters, with all the individual sprites pin-jointed to each other - it always feels kinda cheap and results in a lot of weird unnatural animations and wobbliness. At least the gameplay seems really tight.
|
|
#
?
Feb 10, 2019 21:26
|
|
|
Crazy Achmed posted:This honestly looks really fun. Just one thing I can never quite get over is the animation technique they use for the main characters, with all the individual sprites pin-jointed to each other - it always feels kinda cheap and results in a lot of weird unnatural animations and wobbliness. At least the gameplay seems really tight. Would it look better if the animation weren't so smooth? If they limited character movement to like 24 FPS, showing keyframes only, using one lazy animation shortcut to cover for another one? This game has no system requirements to speak of.  It doesn't look too bad, considering.
|
|
#
?
Feb 11, 2019 00:18
|
|
|
|
| # ? Jun 11, 2024 18:35 |
|
|
But what is normal for Nina, no one knows.
|
|
#
?
Feb 13, 2019 10:16
|
|