Duality ZF (by Xona Games)

[Matthew Doucette]

...I am happy to see that you guys post here!

Thank you for having us. This is a great place. Too bad I don't get to post more often. I appreciate the kind words!

[Hobie-wan]

A new video:

Duality ZF - Nov. 2009 Gameplay - BOSS RUSH

Looking very nice.

Amusingly, watching this video is just dawned on me why though I like shmups, I don't care for bullet hell ones. I'm a very visual person and trying to watch all 3 ships and the bullets was giving me a headache. My brain was trying to make me concentrate on everything that's going on and I have good peripheral vision, so it was impossible for me to focus on just one ship as I would need to do and play and dodge what was near the ship. I was simply being overloaded by my brain trying to process the entire screen.

I don't mean that as a knock to your game at all, it looks great for bullet hell fans. But thanks for accidentally helping me solve a mystery.

[MrPopo]

Also, the fighter speed is slower in Bullet Hell mode to give finer control for navigating many more, but slower moving, bullets.

That's good. Looking at your trailer none of the patterns are too intricate, but I was worrying about a tendancy to overdodge and run smack dab into another bullet.

[Jason]

Amusingly, watching this video is just dawned on me why though I like shmups, I don't care for bullet hell ones. I'm a very visual person and trying to watch all 3 ships and the bullets was giving me a headache. My brain was trying to make me concentrate on everything that's going on and I have good peripheral vision, so it was impossible for me to focus on just one ship as I would need to do and play and dodge what was near the ship.

Interesting. Thanks for sharing. My thoughts: Duality ZF isn't natively a bullet hell game, even though it has more than normal numbers of bullets. The Bullet Hell mode (one of six game modes) will show what a true bullet hell game is. When I watch the video, I am watching my ship since I feel like I must analyze and do what I must to survive. Hopefully everyone will appreciate the color schemes that make it as easy as possible to distinguish your ship from the others -- even when not looking at it, which is why your bullet stream matches its color. I would think that if you were playing the game itself, especially after playing it single-player before requesting the aid of other friends, that the same will happen to you. In any case, I'd love to see what your reaction is after having played the game.

[Hobie-wan]

Amusingly, watching this video is just dawned on me why though I like shmups, I don't care for bullet hell ones. I'm a very visual person and trying to watch all 3 ships and the bullets was giving me a headache. My brain was trying to make me concentrate on everything that's going on and I have good peripheral vision, so it was impossible for me to focus on just one ship as I would need to do and play and dodge what was near the ship.

Interesting. Thanks for sharing. My thoughts: Duality ZF isn't natively a bullet hell game, even though it has more than normal numbers of bullets. The Bullet Hell mode (one of six game modes) will show what a true bullet hell game is. When I watch the video, I am watching my ship since I feel like I must analyze and do what I must to survive. Hopefully everyone will appreciate the color schemes that make it as easy as possible to distinguish your ship from the others -- even when not looking at it, which is why your bullet stream matches its color. I would think that if you were playing the game itself, especially after playing it single-player before requesting the aid of other friends, that the same will happen to you. In any case, I'd love to see what your reaction is after having played the game.

I noticed the shots were color keyed to the player, as opposed to being tied to the type of shot they were. It obvious that you guy put though into the design aspect there. And yes it wasn't up to modern bullet hell numbers, but with the increased numbers over old school shooters combined with the sprays from the 3 player ships, my brain and eyes were working in conjunction to give me sensory overload. If there's a PC demo in the works I'll give it a shot, but I think my head will revolt.

[Matthew Doucette]

Re: difficulty reading the bullets

I will add that the processing of the original 60 frames per second movie was compressed to 30 frames per second before uploaded to YouTube, as YouTube cannot handle/process the raw capture file. And during the process the intermediate frames were dropped. This happens using Windows Moive Maker and Adobe Premiere, unless there are settings to change this behavior which I am unaware of. Anyway, this makes it harder to watch, read, and understand the gameplay action. If the frames were all considered and blurred together, it would be much easier. Also easier is playing the actual game at 60 fps!

If anyone here can help me process a 60fps movie file, without dropping frames, please PLEASE let me know how. XNA Roundup managed it with some Mac software: If you pause the movie you can see double-images, no dropped frames, and it's easier to read the bullets.

[Matthew Doucette]

Another defense is that the 2009-Nov Gameplay video is three players, which means bullets being aimed at three different locations. The ability to read the bullets is much easier single player. You have to build up to multiplayer. This is the same with almost any shoot'em up.

[Matthew Doucette]

Been a while. Here's some explosive new Duality ZF footage. Introducing G-MODE, the ability to control two fighters at once, each with multidirectional firing, a shmup first



(You'll want to watch it to the end.)

[jfe2]

That got crazy at the end. That was the definition of bullet hell!

Looking good!

[Matthew Doucette]

That got crazy at the end. That was the definition of bullet hell!

Looking good!

And there's a "bullet hell" game mode too. This one was "survival". I think the proper term would be "manic" but i'm not sure, as many consider them to be one and the same, but there are large differences between the two concepts.