I am the person who wrote that, so you can thank me... twice I guess?? I hate the screen shaking too, but you SLOWLY get used to dodging while screenshaking is happening (I think what happens is, your brain makes a mental model of where all the bullets are, and refers to that rather than the pixels on screen). Think of it as a challenge, like Super Hexagon's Hexagonest mode that spins the screen around and tries to disorient you. On the other hand, traditional bullet hell shmups (CAVE etc) don't shake the bullets/ship for exactly this reason (they don't want an extra level of unwarranted challenge).
Thanks and thanks! Beat today's level first try aswell. What the heck is going on @.@ And yeah the shaking needs practice I guess. But big ships aren't available all the time so it will take a while to get used to it.
Selachii, Wow, just wow!! I've been diving into the new update for the past hour. The new effects are phenomenal. I love the changes to the ships. I was worried about them but they are ok. The Heechi is definitely more effective and fun to use now. Thank you. The Kappa drive effect is freaken awesome!!! I was like what the hell is that?? And then realized it was the kappa drive lol. I love the new death explosion. Really amazing work. I can't wait to see the new level when it activates in a few days. That will be fun! I'm going to buy some more credits later and start unlocking more ships. So it will be interesting. One last thing. I'm actually happy you guys put the Phoenix in the games icon. It should have always been there. The first game will always be my favorite and a game I still play regularly. I'm glad you put the Phoenix in the icon. Billy
Wow just wow. It's extremely rare to find an update which makes you feel like you're playing a new game! This update is stunning. Everything is just perfect. Even the game is much smoother. Balancing is awesome! But the mega laser feels op xd
@LordShad0wz: Thanks! And i personally put some extra love in the player explosion, at least there's something pretty to look at while we all fail Funny trivia about the 'Power Generator'. It was going to be a stand-alone Zen ability at first, but we later realised it would be a great way to make the Kappa Drive more viable, so we combined the two.. they're like Peanut butter and Jelly. Glad you like the icon as well, we want to do something more with it, but at least we now have the Phoenix on it @Mrbestapps: Thanks <3 ! And yeah, it is quite possible that the Mega Laser is a bit overpower at the moment. We'll see how it all pans out. There is a lot of new stuff and tweaks and I will provide additional info for whatever you find One thing to note though. Todays 'D League' mission is harder than intended. This is because the enemies receive all their new weapons, bullet patterns and difficulty balancing tomorrow.
Got a couple of questions if you don't mind! 1. If you don't play for a day, do you go down in league? Or do you only go down if you play a misson and don't get go 5-1? 2. How many more credits do you get for a new league? 10%? 20%? 3. Does everyone get the same level depending on their league? So if me and a friend are in league A, will we get the same level? 4. The performance is definitely smoother. Any plans on adding back replay kit support? Would love to make youtube videos but unfortunately you removed it due to performance issues. (Replay kit works perfectly fine in all the games i play) Thank you! Also the medal icons are tiny on the iphone 6, was this intentional?
Cool! I'll start playing again now. EDIT: Two complaints about the new version: 1) I like that your zen ability is now automatically in use at the start of the game. But it's bad for two zen abilities - Teleport and Personal Shield. You waste your particles for no gain. Turn it off for those and I'm happy. 2) If you activate Missile Swarm even one frame before the ships become tangible, you get 0 missiles. I know that it can be avoided by waiting a small amount, but no other ability has such a drastic cutoff for when it becomes effective (stun EMP can effect ships for the entire time it's animating, for example). Can you make it so there is a short grace period (0.1-0.5 seconds) where if you activate Missile Swarm and no ships are in range, if a ship comes into range before the grace period ends, you shoot some missiles (most to all, your call)? I do like the new weapon that shoots splitters at a range of angles, it makes cool patterns. I'll see what the Leagues are like in a few hours.
The telepotation energy cost was removed. But i absolutely agree about the missile swarm bug. It's made tremire and other ships kinda useless.
I am completely overwhelmed at everything that has changed in this update, it's completely insane. There's a TON of changes, I've stockpiled enough credits over time to unlock all the ships but not to upgrade them all fully. One shocking change is with Mega Laser, you can't activate and swipe the screen with it anymore, it will only blast in it's original spot, but now has the added effect of erasing enemy bullets in it's path. That on top of point defense not preventing the main shot of ships from shooting, Arietis being the first ship I decided to use blew my mind at these changes. Will be grinding the hell out of this game to see what all has changed...
That seems weird - that was one of the few things balancing teleport. But, ok. Still, it's annoying to teleport at the start of the round and have to adjust your finger again.
Teleport changed so that you can't spam it very much or each consecutive teleport will take longer to ready up until you stop using it for some time. Upgrade text for teleport still mentions energy cost however...
First off, I am truly amazed at your continued commitment to developing this game - the effort and end result are above and beyond any game I've played on the iOS platform. I really like the league concept as it will appeal to a larger mass of players and benefit the game as a whole. The new soundtrack is quite good...but even better in the menu screen. I really dig the somber, organ-like sound in the menu screen and would opt to use that soundtrack if I could, haha! Th increased access to earning credits and XP will also benefit the game as a whole. Now, I might be in the minority here, but the new revisions are...a little upsetting. I loved the absolute speed and fury of the previous revision. I'd wager you overstepped the difficulty increase in the last change, with some 5-4 missions leaving me studying the screen going "How in the sam hell is this possible?" The geometries of the enemy spread was INTENSE, and I'll even admit, many times I was going, "This is, uh...not going to go over well with many novice players." But I LOVED it. But missions could be completed with a bit of study, particle management, and strategic positioning. Not so much at the moment. I'm a Trieme player and there was nothing so satisfying as to wipe stages 3-1 through 4-2 by playing a center position with bullet strafe and clearing the map with one well-placed missile spread. I can't do that anymore. You see, my missiles are now slow and weak. The image spread on the effective radius for barrier after collecting power particles has a changed framerate in a manner I'm really not thrilled with. There's either a change in the response time post-collection or a change in the radius increase per particle collected. Again, assume I'm in the minority. I was honestly happiest with the original roll-out in which the ship itself was partially obscured in the barrier element...I thought that was radically challenging. I can fully sympathize with the current roll out...it will absolutely provide greater mass appeal. What originally appealed to me, however, was the unforgiving albeit achievable completion of a mission with enough skill and study invested. Soooo...I'm staying and will try this out. As a Trieme player, I suppose I need now to master the Buhloo or Proxymar. I see Cinnri ships topping the chart, and how boring a ship to play!I fully support your change but as a hardcore player...You've pressed the brake pad on us, Just my $0.02
I certainly don't mind 1) If you don't play you remain in your current league. 2) The increase varies and the distribution of the credits across a mission has also been improved. 3) Yes, all players in the A League play the same mission. 4) The game still runs at a steady 60fps, there was no change here. The performance of ReplayKit is Apple's side of things, hopefully they improve it soon. The badges are indeed smaller because we want to show more at a single glance. Tapping them still gives the larger image. 1) This will be fixed in a small update next week. 2) We will change this so you can't activate the Missile Swarm if there are 0 locks, this will also arrive next week. Other than that it is more important now to observe which locks you have established before you activate. We didn't like how Teleport feeds off energy. Teleport now has an activation delay before it is ready for use. This activation delay is reduced by upgrading the ability. We balanced it so that the current Rank 5 plays exactly like the previous Rank 5, without the energy drain, but with the increased delay on successive Teleports. The upgrade text will be corrected in next weeks' update. Thank you so much. Todays missions (#343 and onward) use the new algorithms, #342 had some big difficulty spikes that were not intended. That said, the Missile Swarm on the Trireme was very much overpowered so it's going to require a bit more skill to use. I don't understand what you mean here. The Barrier only had it's lower ranks improved in terms of strength, nothing else was changed. The graphics and performance are otherwise untouched. Please provide additional information of this issue so I can see what the problem is. I am very curious what you think of S League, if you manage to reach it The patterns there are ... something else. Please keep adding to those $0.02 over time, it is much appreciated and we process all player feedback!
I still wish the phoenix's guns would get a damage increase. They don't do enough damage and it is the only fighters offensive system. Come on Selachii if you don't do it I'll start a letter writing campaign and we will get out our internet pitchforks. Lol On another note I just purchased $10 worth of credits and bought the Hime and Hunter fighters and fully upgraded them. They both looked like the most interesting fighters I would want to use. So now I'm up to spending $75 on the game. You guys keep updating and I'll keep contributing So I'll report back in a bit with quick reviews on both fighters. Let's do this! Billy
Really curious to see how the changes affect the tier list. From what I've tried so far I would say cinnri is probably one of the strongest ships, it already was up there but now the laser has been greatly improved. Only have 5k, wondering which of the new ships to invest in, if anyone's tried them I'd love some impressions
As the person that originally took a spin on a tier list for this, I cannot say what it would look like after patch, it's gonna be a very long time before I take a spin on post-patch.
There will be an update with several small tweaks early next week (like I mentioned previously), the Mega Laser will also be addressed Actually, you can. Use your music player of choice to play whatever song you like The Phoenix 2 soundtrack is available on iTunes & Apple Music, Spotify and all kinds of similar services
I'm really liking the Hunter ship. It's main gun fires fast and hits decently. It's secondary is really awesome. Projecting that shield in front of the ship is so useful!! I really like it!! The Hime on the other hand I don't like so much. I thought I'd like this one better to be honest but its main weapon hits like a little school girl and that chrono field doesn't work that well. I've tried over and over to use it effectively and I end up dying while trying to use it. I definitely recommend the Hunter. I'm going to end up buying more credits later and unlocking and fully upgrading a few more ships. I'll report back. Billy
