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dkirschner's Really Big Sky (PC)

[July 5, 2016 03:46:48 PM]

This twin-stick shooter / bullet hell / schmup has some beautiful neon colors going on! Unfortunately, when things get hectic, I get big framerate drops, even if I turn the graphics to low (which shouldn't happen on an indie game from 2012). Really Big Sky manages to be different than any other twin stick shooter I've played, and it was fun for a couple hours before it got grindy.

Things that set Really Big Sky apart from others in the genre that I've played:

- annoying narrator, who occasionally provides warnings when a boss approaches, but more often says inexplicable things such as "Gordon Freeman!" and "Gordon Levitt!" and "Tits!" (when you die...why?)

- TONS of different enemy types, though only a few different boss types (so far)

- planets! you can switch your ship from fire mode to "drill" mode to drill through giant planets. Sometimes, you just drill through and get powerups. Sometimes, you drill through and have to destroy a planetary core. Sometimes, it's a gas giant, and you can get a lot of points. You can also switch to drill mode and save yourself from getting nailed by meteors when those come at you.

- persistent upgrades! A rogue-like, this ain't. Your ship upgrades carry over, and you collect star bits to spend on upgrading like 12 different things like laser strength, shield strength, laser weapon spread, wide range of absorbing star bits, etc.

- flying dinosaur skull fossils that breathe fire (this is clearly the best thing)

SO, the game does begin to feel grindy because at some point, you are just trying to buy upgrades. It doesn't much matter how far you get or how long you last, you will collect plenty of star bits to upgrade stuff. I upgraded one thing to max, have about 5 more things close to max, then have all the rest near halfway. You don't feel the impact of these upgrades until you've done a LOT of upgrading. Each thing probably has 30-40 upgrade levels, so you see tiiiiny increases in your shields and weapons. And the game is hard, so the grind feels Sisyphean.

The other thing that sucks is that framerate drop. Things will get hectic, and when that happens, the neon colors just get too busy to distinguish the who/what/where of it all. There are like 50 enemies flying around, hundreds of bullets, and your tiny, tiny ship somewhere among it all. And then a meteor will slam into you. Sometimes, the screen turns a sort of photo negative black and white, and it's really hard to make out who/what/where when that happens. And the rest is pretty standard for the genre. Apparently there is/was online play, but the leaderboards don't load and I see no option to play online. My guess is the game isn't really supported anymore. It is pretty cool and was worth the couple bucks I paid for it.