Everyday Shooter
Everyday Shooter just came out on Steam, and since I don’t own a PS3, this was my first chance to play it. It’s a beautiful game– head on over to the site to get an impression, but the movie doesn’t show off how beautiful the game looks as you play it, or how the music responds to your actions. (There are games that are more responsive musically (Rez), but it’s a nice touch.)
The video also doesn’t demonstrate the awesome “chaining” system that gets you most of your points. Each level has a totally different chaining system, i.e., a way to cause a chain reaction of a lot of your enemies turning into points. Since chaining is at the core of the gameplay, each level plays totally differently.
Actually, it’s not just the different chaining system that makes each level play differently. Each level has a new collection of enemies, which combine to form a custom system unique to that level. There’s a level about a central eye-thing that sends out robots, which return to make the eye-thing more powerful, which then shoots out small eyes to chase you. There’s another level about these growing linked nodes that feed off each other, each releasing enemies or bullets in a different way– you get to choose to prioritize larger or smaller ones based on how you want to take down the network. Everday Shooter’s site describes the game as an “album of games”, which is accurate: each level is its own self-contained system.
For people like me who suck at shooters, there’s also an unlock system. The unlock system is based off of how many points you’ve scored total. Sick of starting at level 1, and having all your progress not count if you die before your previous high score? In Everyday Shooter, every point counts. Spend them to start each game with more lives, or to unlock levels in the level-select mode, or even to unlock crazy graphical effects.
In theory, Everyday Shooter is only ten bucks. In practice, I either need to pick up a good gamepad for my PC, or a PS3. I don’t know that ES is worth buying a PS3 for (though I might buy a Wii for Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People), but it’s clearly more than worth its price tag on either platform. If you’re looking for more information, IGN has a pretty fair review.