"What are your favorite platformers be it old and new?" Well it usually depends on what I am playing currently so I am going with Mega Man (Classic, X, hell even Zero despite it's flaws) and Sonic the Hedgehog (idc what anyone else says about Classic Sonic the only one I hate is Sonic 1). Also, I already voiced how I feel about difficulty in Kiev's Disjunction review so I'll say what I already said: I think you can make games with a higher skill ceiling in mind and it can still be fair, and that's what I prefer. On a slightly offtopic note (long-winded comment incoming), this game's structure kinda reminds me of The Mega Drive's Alien Soldier, even down to the point where I had to switch to the only other difficulty, kinda like Keiv did with Steel Assault (Alien Soldier has "Easy" and "Hard," that's it) because I couldn't even get past the first mini boss. When I switched, it felt much more fair, and it even has unlimited continues and passwords, and let's you change weapons between deaths. (I gave up save states as a compromise because yes, I'm on an emulator). Yes, Alien Soldier on Hard doesn't have any of this, (when you pick your weapons at the beginning, you have to commit to it 'till the end or 'till you run out of lives). And to somewhat bring it back to Steel Assault, Alien Soldier, has at least twenty levels, albeit very short, from what I can remember, compared to this game's Five(?), and although I'd prefer something like Mega Man Zero over a Contra-like ( I don't mean that as a bad thing) for my fast-paced action game, if I had paid whatever full-price this game was going for in the 90's, I feel like I would have gotten my money's worth over Steel Assault's $15 (going off of what Kiev is showing and telling me here again, sorry I can't buy everything.) Hell, that's even acknowledging that Alien Soldier could've been $60 usd if not more. (Idk, I wasn't alive then). To close out this needlessly long-winded comment on a lighter note (I have a lot of thoughts, okay? sheesh), at least Zenovia Interactive has been brought to my attention, so even if I buy their first game on sale instead of now, I will keep them on radar (which basically for myself means I'll keep googling their name until something shows up) in hopes that they can make something really good, as pointed out in this review (I shoiuld really put indies back on my radar again like I used to). Oh, and Happy New Years!
You're right on target with this review. The presentation is aces, but the fatal mistake of Steel Assault is that it's a dumb arcade-style action game that relies too much on cheap hits and obtuse play mechanics. It's a pick up and play game... everything should be intuitive right from the start, but when the whole damn floor is covered with electricity as it is when you're fighting Schmidt, you're not going to understand how to avoid the damage until you know to fire a zipline between the gaps of the train's open roof. Did I know that? Hell no, until you SHOWED me that in your video. As a means of conveyance, the zipline is a turd. Sometimes it catches surfaces, and sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes you can climb it, but sometimes the line falls apart in your hands. Sometimes it's obvious how to make progress with it, but sometimes you just have to guess. There's no room for guesswork in an arcade-style game like this... either they make it clear what to do, or you fumble around until you either come across the solution by lucky chance, or you die trying. That sucks. Not understanding or caring about this is what makes Steel Assault also suck. Good review. Not a good game, but a good review.
Just completed the game on normal today. The hardest parts for me personally were the level two boss and the second phase of the last boss which both requires you to use the zipline to dodge attacks. Overall normal was more forgiving than I expected since you get a full bar of health and a checkpoint when you enter a new area of a level. They probably should have balanced the difficulty a little bit better on the easy setting in a way that you were forced to use a bit more skill in order to complete it. But not so much that it gets frustrating as it can be on normal and above . As it is now the very easy and easy difficulty is pretty much the same thing.
Hey man, are you ok?
Do you still make content?
Any upcoming videos? Will you review Death Stranding?
awesome channel man :)
"What are your favorite platformers be it old and new?"
Well it usually depends on what I am playing currently so I am going with Mega Man (Classic, X, hell even Zero despite it's flaws) and Sonic the Hedgehog (idc what anyone else says about Classic Sonic the only one I hate is Sonic 1).
Also, I already voiced how I feel about difficulty in Kiev's Disjunction review so I'll say what I already said: I think you can make games with a higher skill ceiling in mind and it can still be fair, and that's what I prefer.
On a slightly offtopic note (long-winded comment incoming), this game's structure kinda reminds me of The Mega Drive's Alien Soldier, even down to the point where I had to switch to the only other difficulty, kinda like Keiv did with Steel Assault (Alien Soldier has "Easy" and "Hard," that's it) because I couldn't even get past the first mini boss. When I switched, it felt much more fair, and it even has unlimited continues and passwords, and let's you change weapons between deaths. (I gave up save states as a compromise because yes, I'm on an emulator). Yes, Alien Soldier on Hard doesn't have any of this, (when you pick your weapons at the beginning, you have to commit to it 'till the end or 'till you run out of lives).
And to somewhat bring it back to Steel Assault, Alien Soldier, has at least twenty levels, albeit very short, from what I can remember, compared to this game's Five(?), and although I'd prefer something like Mega Man Zero over a Contra-like ( I don't mean that as a bad thing) for my fast-paced action game, if I had paid whatever full-price this game was going for in the 90's, I feel like I would have gotten my money's worth over Steel Assault's $15 (going off of what Kiev is showing and telling me here again, sorry I can't buy everything.) Hell, that's even acknowledging that Alien Soldier could've been $60 usd if not more. (Idk, I wasn't alive then).
To close out this needlessly long-winded comment on a lighter note (I have a lot of thoughts, okay? sheesh), at least Zenovia Interactive has been brought to my attention, so even if I buy their first game on sale instead of now, I will keep them on radar (which basically for myself means I'll keep googling their name until something shows up) in hopes that they can make something really good, as pointed out in this review (I shoiuld really put indies back on my radar again like I used to). Oh, and Happy New Years!
You're right on target with this review. The presentation is aces, but the fatal mistake of Steel Assault is that it's a dumb arcade-style action game that relies too much on cheap hits and obtuse play mechanics. It's a pick up and play game... everything should be intuitive right from the start, but when the whole damn floor is covered with electricity as it is when you're fighting Schmidt, you're not going to understand how to avoid the damage until you know to fire a zipline between the gaps of the train's open roof. Did I know that? Hell no, until you SHOWED me that in your video.
As a means of conveyance, the zipline is a turd. Sometimes it catches surfaces, and sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes you can climb it, but sometimes the line falls apart in your hands. Sometimes it's obvious how to make progress with it, but sometimes you just have to guess. There's no room for guesswork in an arcade-style game like this... either they make it clear what to do, or you fumble around until you either come across the solution by lucky chance, or you die trying. That sucks. Not understanding or caring about this is what makes Steel Assault also suck.
Good review. Not a good game, but a good review.
Just completed the game on normal today. The hardest parts for me personally were the level two boss and the second phase of the last boss which both requires you to use the zipline to dodge attacks. Overall normal was more forgiving than I expected since you get a full bar of health and a checkpoint when you enter a new area of a level.
They probably should have balanced the difficulty a little bit better on the easy setting in a way that you were forced to use a bit more skill in order to complete it. But not so much that it gets frustrating as it can be on normal and above . As it is now the very easy and easy difficulty is pretty much the same thing.
Can you review Riley Reid videos?