Crusaders Quest Review (1.0 (not the version of the game, just for this review as I'll be working on this a bit more in my aftertime))

You know, I have honestly never been a mobile gamer at all during my life, always preferring the GBA and the DS my family has. The reason is that I’ve never had a phone (an iPod was all I had), and even then, none of the games really interested me, except if said phone game was an emulator for me to play GBA games... (Later down the road, I transferred from Apple to Android, which had MyBoy as the option), but I will say this: Mobile games from its humble beginnings had their main objective: to be a game that you’re able to play while you’re using the bathroom, waiting on a vehicle, or passing some time with your friends during lunch in Intermediate school. Usually, these games would be addictive, because while they might not have the WOW factor of a console game at the time, games like Flappy Bird, Labyrinth, Doodle Jump, Angry Birds, and Jetpack Joyride are all games that had a simple challenge, yet something about them made it difficult to entice players to try getting a high score. This alone, is what made these Mobile games great: providing a simple yet inducing challenge to get players to play the game, and in terms of revenue the developer gets, it’s the form of ads (which were not as deadly back then), and even for some games, the game could’ve been purchased like if it was a Console game, but the prices are like a candy bar at a thrift shop.

But as with mostly everything, all good things come to an unfortunate end, mobile games having the sad fate of declining in quality, becoming filled with ads for maximum profit with their games either being completely unoriginal or just plain stupid (Thanks Odyssey for helping me find the latter game!). For the reason people still play these mobile games? I seriously don’t know. I guess the addictive factor of mobile games nowadays reaches over to more of the darker side where there’s actually well-developed games that play like an actual game that has mechanics to know and learn, and a rich story. Sky: Children of the Light, Fairune, Cookie Run Kingdom, Genshin Impact, Minecraft (this counts!) and one that I’ll be covering in this review: Crusaders Quest--are all games that fit this dark side. I do want to point out that within my times within the mobile game space, a good chunk of it was with Final Taptasy, but as time went by, Android support for the game had to be cut, while the iOS version is able to be played and installed to this day. The game could be still played there, but there’s crashes that happen out of nowhere, ads are still present, and app purchases don’t work. Cloud data also can’t be synced anymore which means that I must constantly restart the game when I uninstall & reinstall the game. Without having to have good support for FT, I’ve had to look up a new game to play and like another game that I’ve changed my life due to a recommendation, CQ was a similar thing. Here’s some questions that I should ask though:

Ever wished you’ve had a mobile game that had little to no ads interrupting your game? Ever wondered if the game had a rich yet simple story? Have you’ve ever considered playing something that was easy to learn at home, an office, waiting on the elevator? Want to be in a favorable space with like-minded people? how’s about you grab your phone, open the game, wait the game to download (depending on your internet speed this can take long or short), touch the screen, and strap in to my review of Crusaders Quest.
 
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Story
The Story for CQ is just as great as your average console/handheld game. Although for it being limited to mobile phones, it's kind of a bit too much. For this review, I'll be covering the first Section of the Soulstone Chronicles, which is titled, "Return of the Apostles." I'll explain later as to why I'll only be talking about this.


Forest
As you sign your contract, you and Lednas help Sera to save Prestina, the Goddes of the Forest, after she was turned into a Golem by Sylunis. This part of Return of the Apostles is pretty straightforward as you find the scout Lednas has sent when we find out that the forest has enemies that are starting to become more aggressive. Using the powers of Sera, that same scout gets revived into a normal being, and from this point, it’s just beating enemies until we find the golem, to then destroy and revive Prestina.

Desert
Just when we think the journey has concluded, we must still ascertain the condition of the Goddesses, for Sylunis is on a quest to seize the shards they guard. The Goddesses hold these shards because the Apostles, enemies of Hasla, are intent on destruction, and their immortality forced them to imprison them in crystal. Sylunis, curiously, remains uncrystallized and as far as I know, I don’t know the explanation why. As we venture into the desert, Prestina informs us that our next mission is to locate Aunt, the Desert Goddess, and verify if she retains her shard. However, I find this segment of RoTA rather dull due to its linearity. There's a Desert Warrior who's been corrupted, but he's easily defeated with a single shot from my overpowered team, which I'll elaborate on later. Similarly, a "Cult Warrior" resembling an Egyptian canine appears later in the stage. As they trace a giant worm with teeth, they sense that Aunt has been turned into that, like Prestina turning into a golem. You beat it, and Prestina struggles to transform Aunt back to her normal state. Thankfully Sera and Lednas come in, with Sera helping to turn Aunt back to normal.
 
Deep Sea
The Deep Sea has got to be one of my most favorite chapters in CQ because along with the music, this part of CQ gives you a good understanding of the game’s mechanics, using them until the very end. I mean, there is more that’s to offer as you progress, but I feel this part of the game is the benchmark on what’s to come. Anyways, this part is when you and Lednas fucking die due to being literally underwater…... Alright while that doesn’t happen, you and Lednas do float for a bit before Prestina saves you two giving you temporary powers underwater. After going home, Lednas decides to stay so that issue won’t happen again, but now the next Goddess that we now must find is one named Aubrey who, of course based on her design, works alone showing more of the introvert status. Eventually during the run, Two Shark dudes come out of nowhere showing themselves as Aubrey’s protectors, and they say to not mess with she comes up to don’t bother her during her protecting process and we just must back up. With no other choice to go up against, our goal is to just destroy the Sanctuary where she lies.

Sylunis appears in this mode encountering the same shark dudes from before, but this time, she defeats them as if they were simply in her way. The good guys come along, and she puts the same black dust on the team, but Sera counters it and we move on. Eventually, she meets Aubrey, whom we learn that the two are sisters! Although Aubrey doesn’t want to give her sister the shard, Sylunis forces It out of her by turning her into a giant octopus to command her to defeat the good guys. Being me with my team of Schild, Nurspy, and Kaede, I was able to take the octopus out in no time.

Volcano
In the final act of Return of the Apostles, the group once again faces Sylunis's dark mist. However, having witnessed Sera's revival of everyone, Sylunis takes her. Fortunately, Aunt wields the power to revert Aubrey to her true form. The immediate objective becomes to rescue Sera and defeat Sylunis for good. Following that, Bella, the Goddess of Fire, emerges to challenge Sylunis in a duel, which obviously ends in Sylunis's favor, then transforming Bella into a red dragon. Because I am so powerful, the dragon was taken in an immediate instant, and we delve deeper into Sylunis's backstory, revealing her longstanding betrayal and ambition to seize the Soulstone, presumably the Apostle Shards put together. I must confess, this segment seemed underwhelming imo. The reason is I guess how the cutscenes play out. Seeing Dark Sera just saying, "now begone" constantly made this ending not as satisfying for me to see, but then again, the Japanese dialogue sounding more emphasized than the English Translation kinda makes up for it.

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Gameplay

Simply put, Crusaders Quest is straightforward yet intricate in its gameplay mechanics. This part was the hardest to review because CQ has a bunch of stuff to talk about, that I simply cannot talk about everything here. I will talk about the core mechanics given from the tutorial:

Forming a Team
As you learn with Lednas, a good team build is one that provides direct melee damage, a far range, and a support. All of this can be given from the six. Classes that this game has: Warrior, Paladin, Archer, Ranger, Wizard, and Priest. It almost fits perfectly into how she recommend the setup because Warriors and Paladins are usually direct damage, archers and Rangers are far rangers, and Wizards + priests provide support.

In-Battle
You have a bar on the bottom that has blocks coming from the right (or to the left) that go according to each character’s skill. There are 3 types of attacks: 1 chain, 2 chain, and 3 chain. 1 being weakest, and 3 being the strongest. To get a bigger chain, you need to connect a character's block 2-3 times, and press it accordingly. As you press the blocks, the Goddess meter goes up, which grants the goddess the ability to use their abilities, which range from nullifying enemy attacks, to buffing you up. Using 3 chain block generates more goddess powers than using a 1 chain block

Training Galore
"the key to training is carbo loading.” – Lednas.

To allow your heroes to promote to a bigger ☆ level, you need to play the game for their level to be at their highest (1☆ is lvl 10, 6☆ is lvl 60, etc) and to train your character using bread for their stage to be at max (this also depends on the character, but this is confusing for me to say it, so I’m skipping that). After those are finished, you’re able to promote, if you have enough Honor. Characters can be promoted to a higher ☆ but it caps at 6☆.

Skills
The Skill Lab is owned by Hallad and eventually Celine (Hellad later joins the Apostles). Each character in the given class has a whole of set of skills that they can learn within the game. Only one can be applied, and some are locked behind 3☆ characters and for the stronger heroes, Contract-Only ones.

Contracts
There are 7 types of Contracts, but for this review, I’ll be focusing on the main ones: (hehehhe)

Normal (1☆ to 3☆)
These characters are nothing but simple characters that you use to level up to promotional heroes. They barely do damage on their own, and worst of all, they don't have their own Soulbound weapons. Some characters are also characters that come from an event of some kind. The only purpose to having them is to obtain promotional heroes, or to level them up to get diamonds for heroes that you’ve had for the first time.

Promotional (4☆ to 6☆)
After promoting a 3☆ normal hero, they will now be considered a promotional hero. This is where the characters now have their own Soulbound weapons, but most are still lacking in strength, and most characters require the use of additional tools like Sigils, Rings, and such to make them even viable for the later parts of story and other difficult game modes. (Example: Maxi, Nurspy, Vincent, Spyro)

Contract-Only (4☆ to 6☆)
These characters work similar to promotional heroes, but they're naturally stronger and the only way to obtain them is through premium contracts that aren't gotten from normal heroes. (Example: Ashley, Grim Reaper, Vivian, Morgan)

Legendary (1☆ to 6☆)
Legendary Heroes start from 1☆ to 6☆, and they are 15% higher in the average stats than normal heroes. Outside of Leon to which you'll have by default, the only way to get them is through the Dungeon. (Example: Rochefort, Cano, Maria, Melissa)

Supply (3☆ to 6☆)
Heroes only to be used when sending off to champions. Practically useless outside of that alone.

Secret (4☆ to 6☆)
Secret Heroes are like Contract-Only heroes, but they only come from a limited amount of time. (Example: Altair, Ana, Schild (fun fact, the character as my Backloggd profile picture is her!), Kaede)

Otherworldy (4☆ to 6☆)
Heroes that come from other forms of media, such as King of Fighters, RWBY, Octopath Traveler (Example: Terry, Mai, Primrose, Alfyn Greengrass)


Shop
You can get a plethora of stuff to aid you in your journey whether it be gold, diamonds, BP (usually gotten through the in-app purchases), and specific buffs to make your characters stronger.

Quests/Rank
By doing certain stages given within the side quests, you can get rewards. Within this list, there’s also daily/weekly quests which gives you pretty much the same thing.


And that is all the game had to tell for you. While this might be the end of what the game initially tells you upon starting the game fresh, there’s a lot more that the game has yet to tell you, which I’ll explain later how and why this is a problem.

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Graphics
The graphics of Crusaders Quest are simplistic yet intricate. The pixel art may not be as refined as what you'd expect from consoles such as the Genesis or SNES, yet the game excels in maintaining a consistent presentation. This excludes the official art seen in cutscenes and similar content. While I'm not certain about the game's initial state in 2014, it appears that during the later stages of development, there was a change in art style that significantly altered the portrayal of some characters, the scene with Sylunis and Sera in the Volcano is a good example. As Sylunis explains their side of the Apostles and why She trying to resurrect them, the in-game portrait would disappear as if she’s keeping her thoughts in private but in reality, this is just a glitch. What’s even worse about this change is the fact that the new art style doesn’t even fit with the game’s initial atmosphere. Some might say that the art style change was for the better as it fits more with the colorful atmosphere of the game, but I am in favor of the older one in terms of using a smaller number of colors. Something that I liked before the art change was the detailed, serious expressions that telling from the Japanese dialogue was just perfect. They were serious with every situation that’s happening, and they were good with every situation that’s happening. The Desert goddess? She looks more attractive and likeable than her redesign. The same thing could be said for Sera. I do appreciate the efforts the new artist has done to try to give the game a new fresh coat of paint, but I tally didn’t think it was needed, especially since the game is now in the state of a possible End of Service (explained more down below), the chance of getting this fixed is now a whole lot lower than normal. Another inconsistency with the art is in the form of the characters themselves. The only exception I would give is the Otherwoldy and the secret heroes as they are in lore unrelated or related to the games plot (except for the former which is impossible), but why are you going to have a whole set of 4☆and 6☆ characters that at their 6☆version the art would be different amongst the others? Sure you can say that the artists is working differently every time he works on a drawing, but it’s not impossible to continuously keep the same art style. 


Soundtrack
Unfortunately, I don’t know who the composer is so I can complement the work that they’ve done. CQ had music that either you can believe that if great or mid. While you can say that mobile game games don’t need to have rich music, that’s NOT A REASON. If Secret of Mana can have a bloody intense boss theme with a giant mantis with razor blades trying to get you, then this game can have intense battles for any form of situation in this game. For my opinion, I think I’m a little more leaned towards the okay side cause while most of the later music is forgettable, the music that I come back to is the Deep Sea, the Forest theme, and the Fortress OF of Souls theme. I've explained why the Deep Sea one is especially one of my favorites, but just in case, I'll say it again:

The first time I remember entering the Deep Sea, I immediately believed that the adventure was going to truly begin with the Forest and the Desert being mere practice stages and all. The Deep Sea does a great job making the player feel progression happening upon them as they play, and the song is a lot more vibrant and upbeat than the 2 stages before this one. The Forest one I’d ask about is good, but honestly, it’s because of Nostalgia, and the fact that it’s the theme of CQ. The theme of CQ is one of my Top 20 Themes in terms of the song that makes the game, well… the game. An example of what I mean by this is the Ground Super Mario Bros theme, The Overworld Theme in Zelda, Brinstar in Metroid, etc. The Forest them sets that same ground and I guess that because of how well composed the song is, it’s one of my favorites. The Fortress of Souls is the same vein as the Deep Sea one to which that it’s a great song to show progress: While obviously FoS is a Side Story, it’s in the same category as Deep Sea to which that it’s introducing a lot more bright and action packed music to show that you’ve gotten a good grasp of how the game is and how you’ll be able to play the game comfortably with the knowledge you were given.

Other Thoughts

As I close on this review, I do want to talk about things that need to be improved upon this game. While I have talked about my compliments above, I haven't talked about my many complaints to which I'll discuss below:

Complaints:

Mismatching Art Style

I don't remember which update had the art style switch to more of this cartoony one, but it still ruined the game nonetheless with some characters having the new art style and characters having the old one. This is made worse with the fact that even if you try turning off the new art style, some characters still have the new art atyle. This change also made some characters lose some portraits in the Story mode, which makes the situations look laughable. I've only seen this happen through Sylunis, but this does appear throughout the other characters that appear in the rest of story.

The gacha system is horrific and flawed

As we all know, mobile games tend to have some sort of rigged gacha system to entice players to get the best of their characters or to get the best in terms of visuals CQ is no exception. As much as CQ got a bunch in stock for it's characters, obtaining them can be a grueling ordeal to just get your favorite character when you're just trying to play the game. The Devs try to fix this by giving you special contracts that inch you closer to getting the hero you want, but this problem still applies. Let's say you're trying to get Ana from the special contracts, but you don't want to the 10x contracs button. You'll be going through a bunch of 3☆ contracts eventually getting a lot of repeats, and through that black moment, you'll be able to have the hero that you've finally wanted. This with the fact that it costs 7 diamonds (6 for repeated tries) is going to cost you a bunch of diamonds. Yeah this game does give you a bunch of diamonds in the case of you losing them through leveling a hero that you've never had before, doing basic and rank quests, and playing coliseum. There's also the classic option of purchasing it, but who wants to do that?

Limited Accessibility

Guardian Tales released their game in 2020 and Switch players gotten the game in 2022. Crusaders was released in 2014 but to this day, still hasn't had a release on any other console. This absolutely sucks for a game this big because while there's 10 million downloads at least on the Google Play Store, there would be even more if I want to play this huge ass game on the Switch, or PS4. And they had the money to be able to do that! Maybe the spiritual Successor might get the job done who knows.

End of Service

I don’t exactly remember the day to which they announced EoS, but it was sometime between Q3 and Q4 of 2023 (with a developer's letter from July 2023 talking about it). End of Service for CQ was declared, leading to the cancellation of the next story installment in favor of a conclusion. The developers provided several tools to help players make the most of the game before its eventual shutdown. Furthermore, no new content will be introduced except for the Epilogue, and there will be no further updates to the characters. This scenario is not uncommon in online games, where a company might announce the shutdown of a game due to issues faced by the development team. However, with CQ still available to play, this decision presents several challenges for the game, which are the following:

So much information given to new players
A little fun fact, back during my first times with CQ, I remember showing this game to my sister to play this game, but her reason for not playing it was because it lacked Love Escape, one of her favorite modes in Final Taptasy. Fast forwarding to the beginning of this May, I made her reconsider playing CQ, and offered help when she needed it. Something she told me though is, "why is there a bunch of things that this game talks to you about?" When I had to binge-play this game, I had the same problem. While this game does a good job explaining the tutorial that I have said for the above, there's a bunch of other important elements that you learn along the way, along with even more explanations given for modes that you touch in the far future. Let’s say that you don’t so happen to touch the library until you reach the Kalard Chronicles—you’ll still have to learn how to use that, and the same could be said for all of the other things you haven’t touched yet.

What's next after completing the story mode?

After completing story mode, there’s literally nothing you can do in the game outside of playing events, collo, or anything that you didn’t complete. In this case, I still have a bunch of Raid things to do on my main profile, and literally everything in my other, but that’s probably going to get removed again because I don’t want to have to work on this review for a while. Collo isn’t even that enticing, as it’s just experimenting with your strongest characters trying to make a good match, and then hoping and praying that your characters will win against the others. And at some point, you’re going to lose regardless because of how there will be characters that are the strongest of the strongest, and due to the game not being updated anymore, these people will make colo even harder to get rid of.

No good way to balance out early-story gameplay/Not all Characters are strong even at i-level

As the game gets updated, the easier the story mode gets. So, to the point that in my review playthrough, I was able to get my strongest team in my main profile in a matter of seconds AFTER completing the tutorial. All it took was a day that gave a contract that allowed me to have one character from the entire roster of CQ (I used Kaede and Schild in this case as they’re both Secret Heroes), and some other contracts that gave me Halla (a great Priest) and I was all set for the entire game. Why couldn’t there be limits to the characters that you choose and play as? Theoretically you can use the same exact setup with delegating Dungeon matches for a high stock of bread, and with Leon, Nurspy, and another Wizzard, you’ll also be all set until like…. The beginning of the Kalard Chronicles. (I haven’t tested this one personally, but 6☆ Leon and Nurspy are pretty strong on their own) Another issue is that with more strategic modes like Total War, Ordeal, and Raid, a good amount of characters that you level up aren’t going to be useful in any of these modes, requiring most of the stronger characters that you find in Contract-Only, and Secret contracts. Promotionals might aswell be removed from the game cause not a single one of them are good against any of these modes, and the fact that you can still LOSE at i-level with these characters is bogus. I know, having characters to be used for different modes is alright, but when you have a giant roster in the game and only a select few are good for this mode, I don’t find that to be enjoyable in my book.


No Final Taptasy Collab???? (Addressing similarities and differences betwen each games) ︱FT: ), CQ: )\

Seriously, why does this game not have a collab with the two games Actually, I don't think that these games should be collaborating, and I know the exact reason why. I did not realize how MUCH of a bootleg that Final Taptasy is to this game, it’s almost an insult for me to see the similarities that this game has to CQ. First of all, CQ released on December 10th, 2014, a couple days before the best year of the 2010s. FT though, released in August 28, 2016, and it take a lot of elements from CQ and tries to blend them into something that it tries to be different with. It sure has gold and diamonds, but diamonds are as rare as mince teeth in FT and Demon Coins act as a similar form of Currency to Bridget Points (BP) to how scarce they are, but upon having some, can make you very powerful. The only thing that I could find different is the weapon progression to how within the three classes of Warrior, Priest, and Archer, they all have their own weapon tree from wood stick, to fish, to an almighty blade. There’s also the change in gameplay style where FT forces you to hurt your hands to win while CQ is a more strategic, and with FT, there’s allies that help you, along with ReBirth for a NG+ setting (CQ doesn’t have any of this), but that’s about it in terms of the comparrisons. Everything else is the same.

And this concludes version 1.0 of my review of Crusaders Quest. In summary, Crusaders Quest emerges as a mobile game attempting to recapture the allure of early mobile gaming while integrating deeper mechanics and storytelling. It boasts a rich, albeit convoluted, narrative across different chapters like "Return of the Apostles," while its gameplay, though intricate, suffers from a mismatched art style, a flawed gacha system, and limited accessibility outside of mobile platforms. Despite its shortcomings, it delivers engaging gameplay mechanics, albeit burdened by an overwhelming amount of information for new players and a lack of post-story content. Its similarities with Final Taptasy highlight its roots in the mobile gaming landscape but also underscore its unique strategic approach. Ultimately, while Crusaders Quest offers an engaging experience, it falls short in balancing accessibility and complexity for both new and veteran players alike. I’ll give this game a 4/5—thanks for taking in the time for me to work on this review. This is not the end yet! Also HUGE thanks to @Yuzrnaime and @Zeusdeegoose for helping me out with proofreading this review! Great Backloggd users, I tell you.

Yesterday night everyone's time of ambitious thinking, I was reminded by Aoi and Hiroto, the boy and the girl starred in the Spinoff title of Dark Witch Story: COMBAT. And I thought of an insane overhaul to this game that plays a whole lot differently. Barring that this is a DW game, I do have a bunch of concepts lying around my conscious to which today, I think this might be another one that j shall explain to you similar to one that ive done previously. This time, this one is just going to be called..

Student Monogatari (Idk a good name, just roll with it)

You have the option to select either Hiroto or Aoi, with Hiroto being the go to option for Beginners, and Aoi being for more advanced. For Hiroto, the beginning starts off similar to the original to which Hiroto gets scolded by the teacher (in this case it's Lugli but a silhouette for some reason) and after school you meet with Aoi for that nice card battle discussion. For my "remake," its a bit more visual with Lugli scolding on Hiroto (dw, it's comedic), and we see after that Hiroto is heading towards the school's trash dump as he was told by Aoi that she's going to be there right after.

"Isn't it a good day to be scolded?" - Aoi (sitting on the big trash bin)

She comes down and explains to Aoi that she's participating in an after school club that is a team in a local card/battling tournament and forcefully invites Hiroto to it, giving the official rulebook for it (the game and how it controls will come once the game starts), and if you read it too fast, you'll be forced to read it again making Aoi believe that you're actually taking care into reading it. The trick is with this section is to wait about three seconds to move down each page cause in game, if you do two seconds, it'll register as her thinking that you haven't read it. After reading it, she and Hiroto now go to Alvertstone like the original to see that there's a bunch of people in the first floor of it (seeing the enemies being docile though to the humans, beasts and fae is kinda funny to me) and the game truly begins after either you or Hiroto gets sent.

Complete with this remake is a whole revised battle system that doesn't take as much RNG as what the original used to have. Cause of course, giving RNG to a fucked up dev isn't going to be.... Really hot. This revised battle mode is going to be similar to how the GBA Kingdom hearts plays out but I'll be more in the scope of I cooperating DW's Elements into it. You'll be fighting the enemies specifically, and for every "stage," there will be a random person that you will fight. Alongside fighting as Hiroto/Aoi, you'll have the usual three cards to being alongside you, and there will be three types of cards to which you'll use: Physical Cards (they will do mostly close range damage to your enemy), Passive Cards (they will heal you for a short period of time), and Multiplier Cards (they will make Hiroto/Aoi stronger over time, kinda like buffs and such). What's also great about this form of system is that instead of having to use one at a time for each enemy, you can be strategic: you can use all of them at once, use two, or use one, and you're able to use them freely during the battle. Your main goal is to get the other opponent down, along with their cards. Cause if you have the opponent take the damage if your cards to 0, you can't put them out in the field. Same principle goes to the opponent's. If you also die by any chance (once again, same with the enemy), you'll automatically lose/win.

I think I have done a good explanation of the gameplay elements, and if it's too vague or missing something, I'm sorry cause this concept originally came from that Saturday night. So let's continue with the story: As you and Hiroto make it to Godshill, you now question who is going to be the final opponent you face, and depending on who you playing as, your rival will be your final one. For Hiroto, it's Aoi and for Aoi, it's Hiroto. The former is due to saying that while you've been going through the league, Aoi has also been doing it alongside you and now there's the breaking point between them.. For Aoi's run, irs becsuse Hiroto accidentally, messed with someone and decided to take their OP cards with them to Godshill. No matter what, your opponent will be your rival and after it's all done:

Hiroto: Aoi will congratulate him for completing the tournament but remarks that she accidentally invited Zizou over for fun (I find this better than Zizou capturing her just to have her have the strongest form of players in Beatus), and that she'll get Zizou number one. Hitoto now stares in the direction where Aoi was as she slowly smiles and leaves. Credits play.

Aoi: The same thing rolls out but as you slowly walk away, the game shows you talking to Zizou about how things will go, and then the credits will roll.

So, now how will things go by with Zizou being ofc the final final enemy? Same thing as Brave Dungeon: Get strong as hell, go to Nightmare, and beat Zizou. Except for this fight I'm gonna pull an inner agent 3 and make Zizou have 6 cards to choose from that are all the strongest in the game, and it's all about precision, timing, and a good use of your cards. Of course you won't be able to have 6 just like her. Maybe with a secret code after all of this. After you fight Zizou....

Hitoto: Aoi comes in running to Hiroto in attempt to hug him but he quickly steps aside that he doesn't do hugs, and dm this does anger her a little considering the brother/sister relationship that they have. Hiroto remarks that he is extremely tired and wants to go to sleep so he goes home... Only for him to be scared by Aoi hard as he's early to go to school. This confuses him a lot, but Aoi tells him nonetheless inside of his house that he's getting out of his bed ready for school while she's watching. Credits play.

Aoi: The same exact ending, but we learn that Lugli has stated for her to go to Hiroto's house to scare him, and the same scene happens, but here's the best part: we fast forward to the classroom, and Aoi comes in holding a tired Hiroto. This got Lugli all confused ans the classroom just starring at the two. Even Zizou comes in to just check it out and right in front of her are the two. She also gets confused, and credits play as Lugli tells to Aoi that he's going to have a fun weekend as the screen slowly fades to black.

And that's all that I have to say for my remake of DWSC! I do apologise if this came quickly and out of the norm, but let me hear your thoughts about this. Do you think this is better than the original? :)

I'll let this be a notice to those that see my profile: I do not like sexual content at all, and while this is a Parodius game to be wacky all over the place, they really didn't need to make one that went over the top with the tits. the fact that this one never made it to the SNES/N64 during this time period says a lot especially in Nintendo of Japan. I remember checking TCRF or The Sprites' resource and saw literal 18+ content within the games files. Now it's been a while since I've played this game (or watched, I can't get my hands to grasp naughtiness) so I don't remember if you actually see 18+ stuff in this game, but if anyone finished it and it's in the game.....

I'm too lazy to even come up with a response. Im never touching this game again and you can't force me to play it. Ill be heading back to Beatus for more torture 🙃

Ultimate Gradius Review Part 2.
(Covers Gradius I, II, III, Advance, V, Rebirth, GB Gradius I, GB Gradius II)

Hello this is Mali/Mals/Pitaya/whatever you’d like to call me, and we are back with another Gradius review! Except this time, we’re going to be skipping Salamander as I have already made a comprehensive review on that game, along with International and Japanese Lifeforce which is covered in that same review. Gradius II, otherwise known as the bizarre title of Vulcan Venture internationally, is the 1988 successor to the original Gradius or in my opinion, the successor to Salamander.Most, along with Konami has said that Salamander is just a spinoff of Gradius, but I disagree. I don’t believe that for a game that has been so relevant to the series, it gets the spinoff treatment. I’m looking back at Puyo Puyo and how that game is also a spinoff of a Japanese exclusive dungeon crawler dubbed Madou Monogatari! It’s great too, and it also features Puyos as enemies in the game.

But honestly, while many consider Gradius II as the best in the series, I disagree because after replaying this game, this game feels more like a remix of the original Gradius, Salamander, the MSX Nemesis 2 (different game as the MSX games follow a more cohesive story, I might get down to them later down the road) and even Japanese Life Force, to some extent. There's some weapons that gotten carried over (Pulse/Ripple Laser, Spread Bomb (a revised Napalm from MSX Nemesis 2), 2-Way Missile,), but then new to this game, there’s the Force Field, which finally protects your entire ship rather than guarding the front, a tail gun, which is a double that shoots a bullet from behind, and the Photon Torpedo, which is a missile that drops straight out of the options and the ship. It’s unconventional but it can pass through all targets except for something that’s indestructible. With the weapons, also comes in the stages that are also inspired by the stages found within the ones from the above. How about we talk about the story first, and then we can get to the stages, alrighty?

~

Story
We take a good 2 steps back, and we revisit to the original Gradius where the Vic Viper has been sent to destroy and defeat the Bacterians, but this time, a new force from them was to be reckoned with: Gofer is the new antagonist and once again, the Vic Viper has been sent to stop them from succeeding in taking over not just Planet Gradius, but the
world as a whole. That’s actually it for the story!

Graphics
I have a bit of a mixed review with the Graphics. While they are impressive indeed, I don’t think that they have much of an upgrade compared to the Gradius and Slaamander. Especially with the latter! The latter was more colorful with the sprites and backgrounds, and LifeForce also added a fresh coat of paint to the original, even if some things had to be recolored. This one feels more like an upgrade of Gradius I which ironically is, and I think it really has to do with the limits of the time.

Gameplay
I actually addressed how this game works with the above, so I’ll just skip to my opinions on the stages themselves:

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Artificial Sun (Phonenix)
The first stage of the game. This one is like Latis in Salamander to which that the place is all on fire, but this one work akin to the vertical scrolling stages in the original Gradius. This one has a bunch of suns with dragons coming out of them shooting out rocks with some enemies here and there. This one takes a bit long but it’s not too hard, either. The boss is just a giant Pheonix that shoots in blue wind (or whatever they are, I don’t know), and fire out of its mouth.

Alien (Big Eye)
Just like the first stage, this stage is not that bad, and it feels more like a beginner stage than anything. It reminds me of an expanded version of the second stage in the first Gradius, and in terms of the boss, you shoot the big eye when it’s open. Do be careful though cause after opening and closing his eyes, he will shoot a boulder out.

Crystal (Crystal Core)
Now we have our first Crystal stage. This one is pretty short and simple with a bunch of crystals coming from the right to the left. Depending on how well played you know the right path, this one should be fairly simple especially since most of the crystals can be destroyed by your shots. I will say though that there’s some difficulty in terms of how weird the crystals move and such. But then again, it could be due to hardware limits at the time. (Even though it’s not smooth on later ports)

The Crystal Core is honestly a great core and I’m glad that they referenced it in future Gradius games. It’s one of my all time favorite cores in the series because it’s normal in terms of how easy and hard it is. It falls in between both of them.

Volcano (Death Mark II)
This and the stage after this one are just repeats of the original Gradius stages. More specifically, the first and fourth stages. And honestly, I cannot find a single difference other than the fact that the layouts are different than each other. While the boss is from Salamander, not all hope is lost in terms of reusing bosses and assets. The Death Mark II gotten a huge upgrade! (even though the design of the ship looks the same). Instead of moving pathetically slow shooting the occasional enemy, this one is more erratic and shoots multiple missiles instead of one single easily defeated enemy, and upon breaking the small barrier, he actually shoots a LASER... Playing this game and going back to Salamander, I couldn’t stand the fact that Death Mark I doesn't even shoot a laser when I break the front of the ship. They have done justice to the change with Mark II, and I rather have this more than the Mark I

Revenge of Moai (Jumping Moai ︱ Big Moai)
This stage resembles the Moai stage from Gradius I, but with a new twist: the Moai turn red and shoot more aggressively. The boss, an aggressive Moai, leaps across the screen but can be quickly defeated by staying near its mouth, similar to the others. Upon its defeat, you encounter a three-headed Moai beast with heads on the top, bottom, and right. Each head releases five mini Moais that emit tiny rings. Simply target the heads to conquer this boss. Alternatively, you might allow the boss to self-destruct if you struggle to hit the top large Moai head, whichever strategy you prefer.

High Speed Maze (Big Core Mark II)
The first high speed stage! At this stage there’s barely any enemies, but the challenge comes from the speed, and the barriers that close in on you if you’re too slow. Sticking more to the right at the cost of having an extremely reduced reaction time will be the choice to go. After this, the Big Core Mark II comes in. This is a refreshed upgrade of the stupid Big Core Mark I from the original Gradius where instead of moving up and down with a tiny pea shooter as a weapon, this one does... the same thing, but there’s more lasers. At least the lasers combined look like a ship which is kinda cute.

Boss Rush/Parade (Big Core Mark I, Golem, Tetran, Gaw, Intruder, Covered Core)
Now we finally have our first true Boss Parade. Where it includes most of Gradius I and salamander’s bosses into the game for a comeback, along with changes made to make them harder.

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Big Core Mark I
I hate taking about this ship with a burning passion. This is the most overused Gradius core ever and just seeing it makes my head hurt. And within the changes he’s received from Gradius II, all that’s different is that he is faster, the barriers break into pieces that count as projectiles, and that’s about. Just blast him and get to the next enemy.
 
Golem
The Golem from Salamander works the same just as you’d expect it to: Wait until he opens his eye while dodging his hands, and shoot until it’s dead. The change with this one is that he closes and opens his eyes, and I believe that the ends of the hands shoot projectiles.

Tetran
Tetran has all of the hands fully extended out of the ship instead of gradually coming out during the boss, and what’s new to this boss is that the barriers also break into projectiles with the arms of the ship going in and out to spray more bullets at you. Eventually, it’ll just be stuck out spinning around the ship and it’s just the matter of using the same start as last time: get the options directly into the core and shoot until it’s dead.

Gaw
I’d say that this is one of the biggest changes from the original boss to the newer boss in this game. While it works like Death Mark I in terms of shooting out enemies (or the eyes of Gaw), these shoots out multiple and eventually it will start shooting a bunch of lasers. This one is erratic and itsit'srd to keep up with the boss itself.

Intruder
Finally for the returning bosses, this one is the intruder from Salamander which hs shoots out blasts of fire towards the player. This time, if you shoot him enough, hell scream and then split into three which is pretty much does the same as if they weren’t separate from each other.

Covered Core
And to end it off, we have another new core that’s the hardest of them all. This one constantly shoots missiles from the top and the bottom, and the barriers thankfully don’t break into projectiles. This one is difficult because you’re going to have to be moving all of the time and the missiles don’t always stay from the core into where it’s going.

~

Gofer Ship Interior (Demos, Crab, Gofer)
And now we finally shoot the opening to Gofer’s ship and finally into the mechanical base of Gradius II. This one works similar to the original but closer to the end of the stage, there’s moving blocks that attempt to close in on you (similar to the high speed stage) that you mostly have to stay to the right of the screen for which like usual, it’s dangerous due to hazards that that you can easily ram yourself into due to it showing off the screen. For the second in the series (I count the 4th boss stage in Salamander), there’s a wall core that you must shoot with the barriers shooting projectiles when broken and enemies coming out of the turrets from the top and the bottom. Breaking the wall core summons our first true walker: or the Crab in this game. This is a large enemy that’s indestructible that walks left and right and serves as the ultimate test of movement due to you being forced to move every time it moves, and what’s worse is that you have enemies coming from the left and right to make this even more rigorous.

And then we finally have Gofer, which thankfully, he doesn’t look like an egg. I still don’t know why they have designed him so poorly in that game, I swear... But he’s practically the same thing but in his original incarnation: He just says dialogue, you shoot the things that are connecting to him (or wait like a chad) and he’ll be dead. Now you finished the game with credits to congratulate you for the second time! Now you can continue this loop, or just call it quits and kill yourself until you get to the ranking screen.

~~

Soundtrack
This has got to be one of the biggest upgrades in terms of everything that the original Gradius and Salamander had started off with, ngl. With the Konami’s Yamaha YM2151, the soundtrack is able to sound a lot more richer and action-packed, something that is carried over for the rest of the series. Like, can we talk about Burning Heat ? The music for Gradius has gotten an intense overhaul that adds more to the experience of the stages, making them a lot more lively with each entry. Another important one to talk about is The Old Stone Age where it starts off as normal, but two loops in, it starts to become faster to go with the aggressiveness of the Moai heads. For this one, it starts off with one loop (don’t know why), but in-game, it’s two. Even the boss music from Gradius and Salamander have gotten upgrades to sound a lot more intense than the originals. And it makes sense! They are now harder than what they’re used to (except for good ol Big Core Mk I) and the upgrades reflect this new revised versions.
~~

Other Thoughts
As I conclude my reflections on Gradius II, I must acknowledge an oversight I've been conscious of throughout: my discussions of the bosses lacked strategies for defeating them. While this aspect I plan to delve into in my next Gradius review, I shall start taking into consideration the best ways to defeat the bosses. But then again, why would I do that if the start to most of the bosses remain the same? This is something that I'll do my best to revise as time goes on.

If I had remember this game to know the story, I would be complimenting it right how. But I alrsady have something to compliment with: The controls.

The controls are magnificent. Easy to learn, hard to master due to how you'll be slippery sliding all over thr place if you're not careful. Although in terms of length, that's it's weakest factor. At the end of the day, it's another great Mobile game (made in Unity!) that's easily able to be picked up, enjoyed, and played without ads hurting your progression.

Ultimate Gradius Review Part 1.
(Covers Gradius I, II, III, Advance, V, Rebirth, GB Gradius I, GB Gradius II)


Heheheh, before I started working on this review, I wanted to look back at how I started working on my backloggd in terms of reviews, and it so happens that the Gradius series was the first series that I’ve covered, and now here I am. Talking about it once again. I just want to take a few words to say how much that I appreciate this app for it being one of the best tools to help me with not only my writing skills but my skills against understanding people on who they are and how ill treat others the way that they treat me and such.

While I haven’t had any problems with anyone in a while, this site really has a favorable community even if it sometimes feels inactive. With 3 thousand people in the discord server, there’s barely any communication going amongst the other people. However, with @zeusdeegoose’s help, I was able to find out about another discord server containing some of the more active backloggd members and despite having less than 500 members, this one is much more active than the official one with more coming along the way. With how much respect I get from him and the others, It makes me hope for the best in terms of the reviews that I make, even with the ones thay are just shit posts or ones to just joke about. But hey, this review is about Gradius, not Backloggd as an entirety. Let’s start to focus on that narrative more.

I love Gradius so much that despite the fact that the games remain the same as they are, I always come back to them, because the atmosphere, the replay value through the versatile Power Meter, and the kickass music and action. Now that I think about it, I did want to share a bit of history with Gradius, which extends all the way back to 2009 on that day where I had a little family argument which left me in constant tears, and after my bigger brother called my mother about it, she requested that me and him played on one of our Wiis. One of the games was Gradius III for the SNES. On the day, I have never gotten passed the first stage. My brother was able to get to at least the 3rd or 4th. I don’t exactly remember. At least the massive amount of lag helped with making things a bit bearable. But, as time went by, my obsession of Gradius SKYROCKETTED into it being one of the top 5 best games that I have played ever, and for this review, we will be starting to cover the first game, which started it all. While there has been many ways to play this game (through the NES, PC-Engine, and the PSX collection containing Arcade Gradius I and II), I have chosen to play this on the PSX collection because it’s the closest that I can get to the original arcade experience when it was called Gradius.


Story
“Across the galaxy, there exists a distant planet known as Gradius. A lush, beautiful world, the planet Gradius has thrived in peace for many years. Unfortunately, that peaceful existence came to a sudden end when Gradius became the target of a subspace star cluster known as Bacterian. Facing inevitable defeat before their ruthless invaders, Gradius has pinned its last hopes on the hyper-space fighter Vic Viper. - Gradius Fandom
While none of this is explained in the game, the story is taken from presumably the NES version of this game’s manual. Planet Gradius is under attack by the Bacterians, and as a last ditch effort before that world came to an end, the Vic Viper was released into space, to enter the Fortress, to destroy them all.


Gameplay
This game features the following that will be in every recurring entry following after this one:

Power Meter
You see that little bar in every Gradius game? That is the power meter, where if you were to collect an orange capsule from the enemies, you’ll have the bar highlighted by one spot. Each time you get another one, it’ll advance through set bar, and upon pressing the right button, you’ll activate said powerup, upgrading your ship. There’s always a speed (makes ship faster), missile (adds a relatively strong missile usually to the bottom of the ship), double (adding another basic projectile in either the top right or the left of the ship (Tailgun), a laser (powerful long beam that can be controlled with the ship (laser) or a powerful beam that gradually gets bigger from left to right (ripple), an option (a circle that shoots what the main ship shoots), or a ? Which is usually a force field that protects you from incoming projectiles or a force field that protects your entire ship.


Core Warships
You see that ship that comes back for more in the NES Gradius? That’s the Big Core Mark I, the first in the many core warships that appear in the series. They’re simple ships that shoot lasers and all differ with how they’re designed. Although there are always protective barriers that you must shoot to get to shooting the main core (which is the blue eye), and in most modern Gradius games, you’ll have an announcer shouting “Shoot/Destroy the Core!/Mouth!” whatever you’re fighting.

Moai
🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿🗿

Okay jokes aside, The Moai are surprisingly a staple element in a Gradius game. They are usually on floating rocks that shoot circle projectiles at the player, and their weakpoints are the mouth. Sometimes, they get aggressive, changing in color, to make the stage harder, and some games in Gradius follow the boss being a giant Moai head with differing attacks.

Pathetic Final Bosses
Despite the bacterains being an evil force in the galaxies, the main leaders are always pathetic (except for that one dude in Salamander II) because it’s just a practical joke played by the developers for the last ending bit of the game to be extremely difficult. With this game, it’s just a gigantic brain that just sits there and explodes on its own, or if you shoot the things that are holding it, the boss will die that way, too. If you’re ever wondering what the final boss(ses) could be, it would have to be the walkers that appear in this series. Although for this game, there’s no walker, there’s this giant piece of machinery that comes in from the left, shoots some electric things, and then leaves. After that, the game then loops back to the beginning making the game harder with faster enemies and more bullets to dodge, because this is an arcade game after all. Other than that, what does this game have to make it unique than the others? Nothing! What I’ve said is what this game has. Oh, you want me to talk about every stage specifically? Okay!
 


Volcano
As you start off the stage, you’re greeted with the volcano stage. Here, it’s just about dodging the enemies and the lasers that come in near on the giant rock at the end of the stage.. However I’m going to admit, there’s not much to say about the first games stages cause most of them are simple and easy. You’ll see when I discuss the 4th stage. The Boss is two volcanoes that shoot rocks out, and then the Big Core Mark I, the first Core boss in the series. It shoots up and down depending on where you are and its core opens up eventually for you to shoot it. You do as I’ve said earlier: Break the barriers protecting the core and shoot it until it dies. Except in this game, the core dies within an instant due to how insanely powerful the laser is in this game.

Stonehedge
This stage makes things a little different by allowing you to move up and down for an infinite scrolling stage with projectiles coming in from areas you don’t expect, and there’s parts where you need to shoot that if not, you’ll Clash into them and die. And what’s bad about that in this game is that when you lose your power ups upon death, the game makes little to no effort to help you retrieve your lost progress, so that if you make a mistake, it’s almost borderline game over for you. At least in Nemesis, the international port of the game, allows you to continue and I believe it does fix these issues but since we’re talking about the original Gradius, it’s here. The boss is just a bunch of enemies coming in from all corners and then it’s the Big Core Mark I. Same thing as earlier: You shoot the barriers and destroy the core. I don’t know why he’s coming in for seconds, but eh, let’s roll with it.

Moai
We are now introduced to the infamous Moai heads from earlier. You shoot their mouths when they shoot their circle projectiles. Although there can be a bit few deaths from. Here and there due to tight platofmring. The boss here are those enemies that shoot three projectiles and they seem to be scared of you for sow some reason? You get close to them and they go back shooting their projectiles which are indestructible btw. And after that… why hello, Big Core Mark I! Why are you here again? Do you want to get killed again? I don’t know why, but why sure!

Reverse Volcano
This stage is just the same thing as the first stage but the layout is different. I do call these stages the life stages cause in some of the games, you’ll see small plants and well, life that also has tricky maneuvering involved. After shooting multiple enemies that come from the top right, the boss is the Big Core Mark I.....

Tentacle
This doesn’t have a stage properly designed stage, as it’s just multiple organisms like enemies with arms that shoot a bunch of projectiles in your direction. If you’re careful, you’re able to shoot them before they do much damage to the screen and such. The boss is just the same thing but with organisms that have no arms come up from the bottom left.. But then what comes after it?
Big Core Mark I, can you STOP SHOWING UP CONSTANTLY??? you such a bitch ahh mf coming up just for you to get yourself killed constantly.** It’s almost as if it’s doing it for fun lol. But thankfully, this is the last time you’ll see him in this game cause with the other bosses, they’re simple but not BGMKI.

Cell
Think of the second stage but with the scenery being mostly cell themed, and you can’t move up and down the stage. It’s just that, with the boss being the Nucleus. It’s just a stationary organism looking thing that shoots a bunch of projectiles, and depending on the situation, the boss can get killed instantly, or it dies by itself since in Gradius, if you take too long, the game will kill the boss itself.

Base
Now we get to the final stage in this game: in this one, it’s a mechanical base where the most enemies come and the most deaths happen. With this entry I haven’t died too much in this one because I can mostly get through this, but I have a feeling that for some of the enemies that come in from the left to be able to glitch into the blocks is kind of annoying and such.. Then again, that extra layer of difficulty won’t be there. And now the final boss: Xaerous Brain is just what I described earlier: The final boss that does absolutely nothing and implodes itself. That’s all there is to it through, but if it’s the brain of the place of Xaerous Fortress, as it implodes, so does the place overall. And that marks the end of Gradius and onto that second, third, fourth whatever loop you’re in. Continue surviving until you die, so you can enter some of your personal information if you’re Male or Female, your horoscope, and your three initials.

Soundtrack
Since the technology of the time wasn’t strong within the realms of Konami, the GX400 was the sound chip that was used for this game’s music, along with other games like TwinBee. There’s only good old PSG involved depending on who you are, that can either be great to sound, or not. PSG is always great cause it gives off that 8 bit feeling to it, and while the graphics are detailed, they aren’t 8 bit, I think. That’s all there is to it though, but As for my favorite soundtracks coming from the original, I’d say Challenger 1985 and Free Flyer, for not only being huge staples of the series overall, but they’re just good sounding soundtracks given the limitations of the system’s sound chip.


Other Thoughts
I’m going to conclude this review by discussing about something that later Gradius Games have suffered with, and what I’ve wished for Gradius to explore upon later: in almost every game, they’ve mentioned a Planet Gradius where there’s life and peace, but everytime we talk about this place, we’ve never actually gotten to see it before in the main games. something that I’ve wished for Gradius to have is to explore this Planet Gradius so that while it can keep most of the staples inside of the game, there can be a much more unique entry thanks to having problems directly in Planet Gradius. Another thing that I’d like to wish is for consistency with how the game works. After praising my Gradius Gaiden Review, all of the Gradius Games wasn’t great as that one, snd despite how old the gsme is, the new games didn’t have carried over features from that one but something that the newer games had I guess is the way to rotate the shot of the options you have in Gradius V. That’s the only unique thing that I can remember off the top of my mind.

If Gradius VI were to ever come out, I really wished that it would be done with success and not for fail. It’s really hitting in the veins of Megaman in terms of the games that come out but somehow it’s even worse?? Megaman at least had a recent game coming in the 2010s and whatnot (or the 2020s idk when Megaman 11 released), meanwhile Gradius hasn’t ha a game since the release of Gradius Rebirth on the now defunct WiiWare console. Are you kidding me??? And to top things off, there’s no notable Gradius fangame that I’m a least aware of. The only Gradius fangame I know is a paid Dark Witch fangame that takes the elements of DW but puts it in a Gradius setting. Dark Witch despite never having an actual developed fanbase had three known fangames ( there’s a Metroidvania in the works featuring Riva, and another one that’s jut a simple fangame that never rally contained any story imo) meanwhile I don’t know everything for Gradius. Then again, I probably wouldn’t want one cause Iit probably won’t be really easy for new players.

That’s all I have to say for this review! While the original Arcade Gradius is fun to revisit, this entry is kind of honestly forgettable. They seriously need to tone down with reusing the Big Core Mark I in this game. The next time I see it, I'm going to go insane. At least he does show up sometimes in the later entries but not as much as the first game where he was used in almost every stage in the game.. He's also in the extra stages in the MSX and PC-Engine ports in the game!

Additionally,. Most if not all of the elements of this one have been improved inside of its sequel, which will come with an extensive review after this one. I’ll give this a 2/10 because this game for a first game is just there for setting the foundation on what’s going to be much better from this point on. If you want the better port of the game, the PC Engine version is for you. It includes the graphics of the Arcade version with a slightly riched version of the music, plus bonus stages and an additional stage featuring bones and sane. As we mark the end of this review, Join me for the Gradius review renaissance.

We need a Nikki Renaissance. My girl was literally apart of a generation of nostalgia, and they forgotten her ass after Super Mario Maker.

Last time I remember her appearing was in her own JAPANESE EXCLUSIVE entry about questions, trivia and such about Japanese culture. While that sounds great, why did Nintendo Diss on her too early?

I swear, if I can just have more Nikki in my new Switch, then my life is complete. Let her be the OOBE narrator upon booting the new Switch 2 everyone is talking about. Chat can we have this review as a Nikki appreciation post?

Okay but seriously... Why is the plot the same as The Price for Desire, you really couldn't come up with a better subplot than this NAN-A? Well, I'll show you a better sub plot:

I dub this revised title, Beatus Academy: Rudymical

In this game, Rudy sets up a magical music festival containing all sorts of humans, beasts and fae with each having different tastes to music. Being that this comes after the events of the Price of Desire.... She politely asks the Ich if they've wanted to set up a contest where whoever beats the Ich in Rudymical, they'll be crowned the queen (no kings cause this series doesn't contain boys) of Rudymical. Zizou, Sola, and Al hear this from many different ways (Sola found her parents before this btw), and they all challenge each other to containing the goal for reaching queen of Rudymical.

Idk if the half point of the game appears in that game but if it does...

Zizou: After winning against the Ich, she gets bored of the challenge already and sets to ask the same characters from Price of Desire over to see if they know about the game, and if they want to play upon Rudy's request, and they agreed to it.

Sola: A little bit of the same thing but Codino reminds her that she and the 3 others are playing within this challenge

Al: Stoj asks her randomly after she was just talking about getting 6 random magical crystals (hitning at Brave Dungeon)

After they finish the 4 Germa kids, they finally go set to Franzer, which was previously the Rudymical queen (or in this Case, Rudy just put it on her cause there wasn't a queen at this time of the festival) and you get the drill: you fight Franzer, she gets awakened, and now Rudy will personally crown you queen of Rudymical. But there's a catch: you're now only able to fight with style and not aggressiveness.

Zizou: teleports before she was able to receive the Queen after hearing downside

Sola: Politely felines the offer and goes home, with somebody else (not Al) stealing it and fighting with style before credits play

Al: Takes it, chances it with style, and the ending dialogue says that she eventually gotten bored and sold it for a huge price of Syega.

And that's my revised version of Rudymical. Now the game won't be as shitty as it is nowadays. I haven't played the game to it's full extent but people have told me that the game sucks in terms of the mapping with the music.

This game is rated e for everyone and there's a stripper in the game.

Do I need to say anything more? I mean you got the blue narsisist that yells straight, a Bootleg cheap copy Ryu from Street Fighter, Bub but make him a Discord Moderator, and a purple haired.... Sorceress that doesn't even fit within the vibe of Puzzle Bubble? All these characters are honestly goated. But a stripper in an Everyone rated game.

Nice going Taito!

Salamander/Life Force Review
Intro
After completing my review of my opinion on the worst Gradius game, I have been hungry for more things to rant about. But, I had to stop and think for a moment: what other Gradius games do I need to bash about? Is there any other Gradius game that needs to be caught out there? As we all know, most of the Gradius games have cooked with each entry. Gradius II, Gradius V, and of course, Gradius Gaiden, but I have already reviewed this masterpiece quite recently. However, due to MrWarm on one of the Backloggd servers I’m in, they reminded me of another Gradius game that I need to tackle next, but this time, it’s a spinoff of the main series. Enter 1986’s Salamander. Or in the US, it’s called LifeForce. but it’s also known as LifeForce in Japan, too---

Alright. What’s going on here? Why are there 2 Life Forces? There should be only one! Don’t worry about the confusion, because before I even start talking about the games, we want to address this common issue that everyone is wondering about for these games, but first! Let’s talk about that success of the original Gradius.
Name Confusion
After starting off with the og, people have loved the heck out of this game. As simple, yet as addicting as it was, it managed to beat other shumps at the time. The only one that I can think of at the top of my head was Xevious and Scramble, and honestly, come to think about it, Scramble was also made by Konami, and I believe that the game also had its form of success? I don’t remember. But for the original Gradius, it managed to pile up tons of quarters from the arcades of ‘85 and ‘86, and Konami knew that they had to make another game featuring the peculiar Vic Viper, but although this isn’t really a sequel to the original gradius, it’s like what I said earlier: it’s more of a spinoff. We start off with the original 1986 Japanese Salamander, the game that started the__Vic Viper_ with another ship, the Lord British (also known as the red ship in the US LifeForce). They don’t play much different outside the Lord British looking a lot pointier I guess, and you progressed through the game going from left to right, and--already new to this series overall--from down to up. This game was also unique in that if you had another person waiting in line for you, they can come up on for some glorious 2 player action without having to take turns!

After JP Salamander comes [US LifeForce], to which I would honestly call the game a prototype of what’s coming in a year later. And why is that? LifeForce is just a 1:1 port of Salamander without any major changes put into the graphics, and most importantly, the gameplay. It’s still Salamander at the end of the day outside there’s new dialogue for the altered stage names you’re apt to sound more organic, but nothing is actually organic here outside of the first stage. Also, some of the names of the weapons have changed:
Speed Up= Hyper Speed
Missile= Destruct Missile
Ripple Laser= Pulse Laser
Force Field= Shield

And finally after US Lifeforce, we get JP LifeForce released one year after in 1987. Remember how I said the US one is more of a prototype? That’s because it borderline is when you compare it to this one. The stages are the same, but the gameplay goes into the roots of Gradisu this time, and most of the graphics and music were changed for that organic feel. Now this seriously feels like a Life Force! That’s all there is too this explanation though. For this review, I’ll only be covering the JP Salamander and the JP Lifeforce because those are the two unique versions of the game.
Story
Salamander
Life Force
 
Gameplay (Salamander)
Unlike the original Gradius, this one takes a more direct approach where instead of obtaining capsules to advance through the slot, this one takes in the upgrades directly, making things a bit easier for the player to progress through the stages. And don’t worry about which items are which, cause in the attract demo, it introduces the weapons that the enemies drop. As far as the weapons go, new to this series is the Ripple Laser, where it is a laser that gradually gets bigger over time. Other than that, that’s all there is to about the mechanics of this one.

Gameplay (Life Force)
Other than some name changes to the pre-existing weapons, LifeForce simply brings back the Gradius Slot system, which works just as you expect. Although my only complaint is about how the Shield works. The shield doesn’t go in front of the ship, but one part of the shield will be in the front, on the left, and on the right. I know this game came before Gradius II, but if they were planning to make the “force field around the ship” shield, why couldn’t they just make it that instead of making it look unconventional and unsafe? Most of the time you’re going to be losing them instantly because the hitboxes for them are already huge on their own.

Something that I do want to point out before I get to the indivutial stages us that this game is similar to Gradius IV where I believe that the game goes a bit faster than any of the other Gradius Games, even with the wait level being high. It’s probably because the stages weren’t meant to last for long because it really is an Arcade game overall. They can’t jabe a stage that’s too long to beat without dying because it would take up more on the Arcade then why you’re normally supposed to have.
 


Bionic Germ/Stomach Muscle Zone
The first stage is pretty straightforward. This is the beginning stage overall introducing you to the mechanics of each entry right away. For both Salamander and Life Force, both of the stages are organic themed, outside of the background of Life Force further emphasizing that feeling. Not much there is to say other than that if you got yourself ripple and enough options, you’ll be blazing through this stage and the other ones because a problem with this game is in the form of balance. At times you’ll be introduced to a new stage, and just as you approach the boss (which in the first stages case is the golem which is a brain with two arms attached to it that follows your movements), it’ll keep its eye open all of the time for an a quick kill. Saying it right now, the bosses will be the same but graphically different from each version of the game.

Meteorite Space/Kidney Zone
We now fly forward to the Meteorite Space/Kidney Zone and we’re introduced to rocks/Kidney stones that can’t be destroyed. It makes progressing through the stage harder for that extra bit of challenge, and there’s enemies that upon killing them, fire would come out of it’ personally they aren’t much of a nuisance because if you kill them quick when they appear on the screen, the flame that come out of it won’t reach you if you camp near the bottom of the screen. There’s also another enemy that flashes the screen, but I guess that’s it’s only attack because just like every enemy in Gradius, they die almost instantly. The boss for this stage is the Cruiser Tetran/Zylom, with the former being a staple Gradius boss from this game and on. It works by having four arms that spin counter clockwise while also shooting bullets from the theme of the arms. Although with this entry the arms are mad short, and it’s also pretty cheesy to beat cause all you have to do is line up the options to the eye of the boss and then you’re done. Zylon is just the organic variant without major changes.

Burning Chaos/Stomach Inner Chamber (Warning Warning, Danger Zone)
For Salamander, you are now in a fiery environment that is supposed to be the Planet Latis that the dragon destroyed. For some reason though, in Life Force, everything is tainted blue instead of another color? When I think of organisms and such, I believe pink, red, and skinny colored stuff would be used, but I don’t know where the blue would come in. There are quick bursts of fire that come in from the right, and honestly if you came somewhere between the bottom left side, you can go through the majority of this stage unharmed. It’s when the bursts of flame get quicker though is when you need to start to move so you don’t die. The boss which is the Dragon itself is also fairly easy. It makes an attempt to circle in on you but if you’re careful enough, all you need to do is to once again, position the options in the head of the Dragon for a quick defeat. It seems to me that they didn’t even make an attempt at making this game hard. All of the bosses seem to go down by very quickly, and the sense of challenge is just negated and it all boils down to just making the right movements without getting yourself killed. At least in Salamander, it’s a bit easier to collect all your items and such, but with the system of Gradius being present in Life Force, you’ll be up having a harder time grabbing all of the items that you’ve had back, especially on the stages following this one.

Volcano Area/Liver Zone
Alright folks... It’s time to put up the pitch works and torches because we’re entering the stage that begins my true rants. As we enter the Volcano Area/Liver Zone, we are met with some familiarity of the rock /life like stages within the first Gradius. For both games, this stage is the same exact thing, I don’t know why Life Force called this stage the liver zone if there’s clearly volcanoes, rocks, galore. Lazyy…… This one isn’t that bad as you have to be careful, but for some reason there’s no major changes to this stage in Life Force. However, the real challenge as to why I’ve brought up the pitch forks is with the Fortress Vails. This boss is RIGGED.

In Salamander, the cores that it spawns spawn infinitely making you constantly die and eventually game over in this part of the game, and the only technique that I can think of to prevent that from happening is to slowly position yourself just above in between the middle and the right core. This way, the cores will glitch into the wall making this stage easy to beat but for me? No matter how hard I try to make the cores stay, they eventually come out and they don’t disappear either. They stay with you until you beat the boss or you let the boss kill itself. The Boss is the same in Life Force, except there’s a fair cap to how many cores that the boss spawns making the boss much easier just like all of the other bosses in the game. I don’t understand why they had to make a sudden difficulty spike if majority of the game and its bosses were easy as hell that you couldn’t have possibly died at those stages of the game but this time in Salamander they will try forcing the death upon you.

Asteroid Hell/Lung Zone
The stages do not improve from that one, either. This one incorporates the rocks and stones from Stage 2, but with a horizontal perspective. Admittedly, this stage is somewhat forgettable, yet it's not easy. Movement is minimal, except to dodge the incoming projectiles. Noteworthy is the finale, where circles of enemies encircle the ship, and a lapse in attention can lead to demise. Following this, a barrage of projectiles from the last wave of enemies poses a significant threat, and without due care, a game over is imminent due to the game's challenging design. My disdain for this type of game design stems from its deceptive nature, luring players with the promise of a great game only to overwhelm them with random bullshit that the game expects for you to remember. Gradius I was like this too but it’s very minimal (or that I’m too used to playing the game that it’s easy). If they want to keep this game easy, you keep it easy, not make the game harder just because it's an Arcade game. The good thing about the last wave of enemies is that you can just camp to the top right making so that you won’t die. Same goes for Life Force.

For the boss, In Salamander, it’s a Death Core, while in Life Force, it’s simply Gaw. But this boss goes also make a return in later Gradius entities along with the latter, but more of the former. And every time it came back, they have done justice to making it just a batter boss than it just using a reskinned Death Core. This boss is pathetic that it makes an enemy come out very showly, and it shoots slowly. Boss. Gone.

Fortress Zone/Brain Area
And now the final stage in both the game. You’re finally in the area where the final enemy should be. But before you start attacking, you start fighting out 3 tiny Big Core Mark Is (featured from the original Gradius with the music intact) and the escape sequence with the sirens come in with Moai heads and the breaking floor stopping you from succeeding. There’s also enemies that sore fast bullets randomly but I gotten rid of them fast do I don’t much of a problem. While we wait for the boss to come from the bottom to its place (you’ll die if you get in it’s FoV), you just break the little wire that Zelos is on send then you finally shoot him down to end it all. You wait a longer and at this point you’re able to freely die if you want because this part of the game you’ll be done in no time seeing the pace you were just in get destroyed right in front of you. But I will say this though: If you don’t beg Zelos, you’ll have to restart this entire stage, making the same suffering mistake because you’ll without most of your items from the start of it. Credits roll as you leave the world to watch it explode at the end.

Conclusion
While this game wasn’t as bad as Gradius IV, the original Salamander/Life Force are definitely on the lower tier of Gradius games due to how strange the level and boss design are, and how you really need to keep this knowledge in mind when replaying this game. If you want a good port of Salamander, play the PC Engine version. Not only it’s a near perfect version, it also has a good deal of a challenge. It’s the best way to play the game imo. That's it from me. This review might be a little rough and such, but that is because this game is rough.

Gradius IV Review

Intro

I cannot believe that Konami went from making a direct absolute masterpiece to an absolute dumpster fire of a Gradius Game. And it hurts for me to say this considering that most Gradius entries are absolutely goated. Just like the one before this game: Gradius Gaiden. I don’t need to explain any further why Gaiden was a masterpiece: The presentation alone upon looking at it for the first time is extortionary. The gameplay is a step up, the soundtrack is kicking. Fans wouldn’t imagine how well the next game could’ve been with all of the perfections that Gaiden have. This leads us to 1999’s Gradius IV: And boy, for a game that’s Gradius, there are a lot of bad things to cover. Strap in as you’re going to see me have things to say about this one.

Story
We revisit to the ending of Gradius II where Gofer was defeated by the almighty Vic viper. But, a fragment of Gofer’s merged into a planet, causing it to turn into a whole ship! Reminds me of the one from Gradius I somewhat. That's all there is though, other than you having to use the Vic Viper again to stop Gofer’s resurrection from happening, to save the world of Gradius all over again. Why can’t we have a Gradius game where the actual planet of Gradius is one that we can enter, and have a direct cause to it? Why are we going back into space again? I know that it would be out of place for Gradius, but at least you can cook something with that design of that, make it serious and such! The only game that I know that gets close to this concept is Parodius, which is a spinoff of Gradius, so that doesn’t realty count. Why are we revisiting Gofer again? How and why did an element of his get merged with a giant planet for it to be turned into a whole spaceship? none of this makes any sense to me, and I wished that I can ask the developers why they slacked off two year after the masterpiece of Gaiden. But at least the gameplay should be alright, right?

Gameplay
Where can I customize the slot bars? I want to have my shield first and options second... Where’s also the other shields that I can have like guard and limit? Why can’t I edit my weapons like Gradius III? Why are we going back to Gradius II in terms of the options you’re able to use? And don’t say that this is an arcade game, Gradius III WAS an arcade game and had the option to edit your ship parts! And they could’ve spared 30 seconds to switch the slot parts. Other arcade games at the time took longer of the game to acutally start! At least the graphics are okay, right...?

Liquid Metal
WHAT. AM. I. LOOKING AT. Seriously, the first time I looked at this game, I thought it was piss. It also kind of hurts my eyes for some reason. I guess it’s because of the rapidly switching colors within the “Liquid Metal.” And I still don’t know what it could possibly be. While this is technically unique to Gradius for the first time, the layout of the stage with dragons coming out was already featured in well.. Gradius II. (you’re going to see a bunch of similarities with this game and Gradius III.) And what’s worse about this one, is that it ends quicker than you think it does. I don’t know if it’s me, the fact that it ends very quickly beofre the boss says something imo. But the boss?

It’s a giant three headed dragon monster looking thing. Once again, this is a [boss] idea that was featured in another Gradius game (Arcade Gradius III). Apparently, its name was Yorogaton Chimera. I don’t know what that means, but it does change into 3 other forms: A weird crab infused turtle.. Looking,... monster? I don’t know what they were cooking. The other one is.. I can’t explain it. It has a shell, it has a giant looking teeth thing that are it’s eyes? And the final one, a fidget spinner spinning shooting projectiles. None of this makes sense to me.


Plant
Next stage might look like a unique stage, but all and all it’s just another traditional plant stage. It kinda looks like underwater plant life to me? I don’t know if that’s true and whatnot. The stage is also pretty easy just llik4e the others. Just get rid of the weird lines and head to a plant boss that also looks weird. The name for this one is Dendrodium, and while this is a pretty standard boss, it’s just the graphics that makes this boss look disgusting or just something else. It also dies faster than Yorogaton.

Bubble/Crytsal
They really thought that they can be unique with this stage making bubbles and crystal together, but the bubbles come from Gradius III, and the crystal comes form Gradius II. The reason I’m complaining about the reuse of the stages is because when they are presented within this game, it makes no effort to make things different and whatnot. Gaiden also reuses a bunch of things, but here’s the difference: It puts a twist in almost everything, making them feel familiar but unique. This stage just has floating bubbles, and floating crystals. The boss is the Bubble Core. The first core in this game. I’ll say that this is a pretty solid boss, shooting bubbles and lasers. Not too hard not too easy.

Life/Magma
This stage is a mixed bag for me. I was going to complain about the layout of the first part being like the life stage featured in Gradius II, but then the completely original lava part comes in just right after this! While completely volcanic stages aren’t oroiginal (the infamous stage in Gradius III), this is the only stage that actually makes things unique. I guess not everything in this game is not worth complaining about. However, this stage is also similar to III in how difficult it is! In this stage, you’ll be tasked with maneuvering through the fast-moving lava terrarian, with big rocks coming form both left and right. While this seems easy, this stage marks the intro to where I say that a large point of this game is rigged. The rocks are big and so as the moving lava, and i had a hard time passing this stage cause I kept on dying a lot especially when the volcano moves hard up and down. I forgot the type of animal Gillador, the boss is, but I do know that it’s related to sea animals and whatnot with having a giant strong shell, and a tail. That's this boss, which is also a first for Gradius.

Moai
As of writing this, I forgot that there was a whole Moai stage that came before the cell stage. This one isn’t unique, but it is a series staple of having multiple moai heads and whatnot. And just like all of them, there’s a harder part where they shoot more projectiles at you. Due to how typical this stage is, there's not much to say about it. The boss, Alpha/Omega (very original) is similar to the SNES Gradius III with how you have to fight two giant Moai heads attached to rocks, but what makes this one differ is that there’s small Moai heads that come out and shoot the circles, lasers and whatnot, making it harder to hit the giant moai heads. I like the extra challenge with this one, but I died a whole bunch because of the tiny Moai heads. The movements with the bosses are incoherent, and I end up dying because they don’t have a recognizable attack pattern for me to remember.

Cell
I don’t like what this stage looks like. The graphics make this stage look like it’s real. While also typical for Gradius, they make this this one disturbing be within with the stage moving as if the stage is real and whatnot. This stage also managed to be difficult with the organism vines (Dunno what to call them) and the multiple projectiles that come out after breaking them. Then there’s the little weird sticks that look at you which is also a staple enemy in organism like stages but there’s a bunch of them in a section of the stage. The boss is another core-looknig boss named Berial that also looks weird due to the 3D graphics of the game. It reminds me of a reborn version of Golem, the Slaamnader boss with the brain and the two hands that come out of it.

High Speed
And now it’s time for one of the worst stages in the entire game. After going through the hellhole that is the entire game, the High-Speed section of this game is the worst out of all of them. Not only that the stage is fast, but the background blends also well with the stage making it hard for me to see where to go, and there’s a bunch of big obstacles that get in the way of your path. The stage also starts off fast unlike the others in that it gradually gets fast. The paths are also more confusing than the other entries that I believe had a more coherent path to it. The core for this boss is another annoying one, but what am I supposed to say about how unique it is, it’s just like the other bosses in this game where they shoot a bunch of things at the player. If you die at all in this stage, just say goodbye to your progress which happened to me. Thank goodness for save states though, because I wouldn’t know how I would be able to finish not only this game, but Arcade Gradius III, too. This boss is also hard because it does like to turn it’s head a lot making the core hard to reach.

This boss also reminds me of another thing that I have to say about the game’s bosses: They. Drag ON. I took a while to beat this boss to the point that I believe that with my successful attempt, the boss self-destructed cause being an Arcade game, You can’t take too long with the boss. Almost all of the bossses take too long to beat not counting if you die mid-fight.

Boss Parade


Vanishing Core
The Gradius I ship comes in the background to send the boss cores to you. This first one gives me massive Gradius Gaiden vibes, what’s awesome about this one is the rainbow lights that it has. Although the circles along with the missiles and the listers are also projectiles to kill you.

Big Core MK III Kai
Gradius III’s Big Core Mk.III but with a vengeance. This one work like the original with the only addition being the fact that the parts that shoot the big lasers go up and down with the lasers in the missile shooing straighter beams. I don’t know how else to say it. Pretty solid remaster of the original Big Core Mk.III.

Covered Tetran
They made the Tetran from Salamander 2 a bit more annoying to fight with it’s arms going moving left and right faster than normal, with the ends also shooting lasers to keep you always moving.

Berserk Core
Two smaller ships that shoot big beams the bigger one shooting tiny ones only shooting big ones when the tiny ships are destroyed. I dunno what else to say.
Planet Core
Now the final one! This one is like a remaked version of the final core in the boss rush of Gradius II, but this one is harder with shooting i guess bombs? When the core turns, they turn along with it. The good thing about this boss is that it’s more coherent with it’s boss pattern but still difficult as it really is the final core from the boss ruhs.


Final Fortress
Now the mechanical base! We enter similar to Gradius II by shooting the opening, and this one is like Gradius III with the color choices of the base overall. Other than that, this one does take an interesting turn with how the base turns clockwise, but don’t get your hopes high it does go back to normal before. At least it doesn’t flash like the Arcade Gradius III one, and it’s not too long like that one either. The gate featured in this one is a bit harder to avoid than the others with moving parts coming down and up but other than that if you’re careful and destroy the turrets you’ll be done with this fight.

Now the walker. It’s the walker from Gradius II. I mean, you could say that because this game is related to Gofer and such, it can have a bunch of references to II and such, but why mark this game as a 4th entry if it’s more like a reimagining of the 2nd gradius game? This stuff is just confusing man. The onyl unique thing it does is move around harder but that’s about it.

And now we finally reached Gofer. WHAT. AM. I. LOOKING. AT?????? They have massacred Gofer’s design so badly that he now looks like a low budget golf ball literally sitting on the edge of a ship that looks like it has eyes. I am the center of the Universe, my ass. Thank goodness that they made you so pathetically weaker in this reincarnation. After defeating him, the ship turns back to normal, and credits play thereafter. Where is the awesome scene where you’re going back to normal? And while we talk about this, why has there been a bunch of people signing up for the cutscene that happens in the beginning of the game? It literally lasts less tha 30 seconds.

Soundtrack
Another thing that I have yet to discuss is the soundtrack for this game where most of them are name after Greek and Roman Gods. For example, the Life/Magma stage is called Cronos/Hades, and the Final Fortress has Prometheus/Athena respectively. I don’t know why they have done this considering that there are no roman/greek references within the stages themselves, but I already questioned too much of this game’s existence. As much as I like listening to the soundtrack within this game, this game’s music is off the trail with how it’s supposed to be serious and such. There’s no capturing of seriousness and such featuring lighter instruments, and the soundtrack is jazzier and more upbeat than the other Gradius games. The High Speed stage is an example of what I mean. It’s exciting, happy! And upbeat! You ready for a fast-paced stage? Here you go. Or how about the Bubble/Crystal one? It’s calm, and once again, has that Jazz riz. I don’t understand why most of the songs in this game are light considering that earlier entries had musicthat was too light in the scope of the developers.

Conclusion

So that was Gradius IV. A game that referenced stuff from past Gradius games and didn’t really seek to improve what has already been established. Honestly, for Gaiden which learning now literally translates to side story in English, I’d rather call that game the true Gradius IV as they put in a ton of more effort to it that makes it more of a love letter than a continued series down the line. Not to mention that, like the first 2004 SpongeBob Movie, the developers wanted to have Arcade Gradius III to be the final entry to the Gradius series overall, but none of the games after it made a great continuation as much as from 1 to salamander, to 2, and to 3. The graphics also don’t hold up much especially when comparing it to other games released in 1999. They should’ve stayed with the 2D designs even if games at the time were supposed to be all that 3D. But that’s it for another review off my list. I would’ve gotten more ruthless with this entry, but I’ve done the best that I could to explain things in greater detail than before.