Recent arcade like/score chaser games thread

[silentstorm]

I assume most people here like or have played arcade games, whether in ports, compilations, Mame or Arcade Cabinets themselves, or games for PC and consoles that aspired to imitate them.

Well, for a while, genres like Brick Breaker games, maze games, beat'em ups and more seemed to have been mostly gone in the end of the 90's and the 00's, but if there is one thing that indie games and retro inspired games have done, is making sure that genres and styles of games don't die, and as such, there are still arcade inspired games being made and i feel like those games warrant their own thread.

So basically just discuss, recommend or mention arcade inspired games, whether it's shumps or a simple brick breaker game.

For some examples of recent games, there are:

Heiankyo Alien 3671

Pretty much an awesome arcade maze game revolving around burying aliens alive and obtaining a big score.

Slipstream

Racing game inspired by 90's arcade racing games and Outrun with a bigger emphasis on drifting, looks nice, has a great soundtrack and it's just fun to play.

Strikey Sisters

Brick breaker game revolving around going through levels and killing enemies with your ball and power-ups, a pretty fun game overall.

BLUE REVOLVER

Awesome shmup that just does everything right, fun to play, looks good, great soundtrack, just an awesome game really.

Super Weekend Mode

A really fun shump/rythm mix game, basically, you control two paddles(each having it's own button to move left and right) which can shoot at a boss, but you must also catch shapes(catching also hurts the boss) to avoid making the screen smaller and harder until you get crushed, meanwhile there also bad shapes like skulls which you must avoid.

So it becomes a frantic game of catching and avoiding shapes while occasionally shooting at bosses, all with a charming retro look and a good soundtrack, it's addictive and genuinely pretty fun.

So, does anyone know about more recent arcade like games they want to talk about or recommend?

[silentstorm]

May as well mention some more games in hope of people coming to this thread:

Gunlock

Single screen game that revolves around one thing and one thing only, killing as many enemies as you can in an area of your choosing while using a variety of weapons to survive, fast and pretty fun.

Highscore Processing Unit

Brick breaker game with one twist, it's set in a circle and the ball doesn't hit your paddle to go to the blocks, no, instead the ball is magnetically attracted to your ship and you must rotate around the edges of the circle to control the ball as it follows you so it can hit and destroy the moving blocks.

A simple but fun twist that makes for a good game.

Iron Crypticle

Twin stick shooter, pretty simple, you are a knight, a princess has been kidnapped and is in a dungeon, go through it while killing everything in sight.

While i wish the knight's starting speed was higher, it's still a pretty fun game that is worth picking up.

SPACE MOUSE

Pretty simple game with a heavy retro look, just climb a tower in some levels to get to your rocket while avoiding enemies, poison and controlling your air supply, or play the endless mode and forget about the rocket part as you try to obtain a high score.

Superflight

While the screenshot doesn't show it, there are points in this game, it's simply a fast endless runner kind of game where you play as a guy with a wingsuit going through mountains and doing stunts for points.

Simple but fun, it does have one flaw though, no soundtrack, so better put up some music before playing this game.

Graze Counter

Fun bullet hell shmup that revolves around one thing, getting close to the bullets without being hit to increase some meters to unleash the ship's most powerful attacks, with a player being able to do it seveal times per level.

Good soundtrack, fast, fun and just an awesome shump.

[X-pert74]

There's this game called Gon' E-Choo! (I can't stand the name, personally), which is basically like a Popeye clone that can be played with a VR headset, as if you were looking at an actual cabinet. It's pretty authentic to classic arcade game design.

Steam link

[silentstorm]

May 25, 2018 16:23:11 GMT -5 X-pert74 said:

There's this game called Gon' E-Choo! (I can't stand the name, personally), which is basically like a Popeye clone that can be played with a VR headset, as if you were looking at an actual cabinet. It's pretty authentic to classic arcade game design.

Steam link

I guess i will check that out, though i sadly don't have a VR headset because that sounds like it could be fun.

[ZenithianHero]

Skypeace - 3DS and Switch. It's an autoscroller where you fly around collecting coins and avoid enemies. It is fast too, reminds me of Sonic special stages in that regard. Doesn't last that long, but it is only a dollar. It takes a while to get all the in-game achievements and I found it difficult to get top rankings.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4sT79rbdS0

Pirate Pop Plus - 3DS, Wii U, PC and now coming out on Switch. It's a Pang clone with Game Boy styled graphics and a gravity gimmick. It's designed to play as a survival endless mode. Coins can be used to customize your handheld hud complete with screen palette and button colors.

Woah Dave! - From the makers of Bit Trip. Single screen action game where you throw monster eggs or skulls at enemies.  Gets frantic fast. Has a sequel titled Space Dave that just came out but is a single screen shooter instead.

[silentstorm]

Cool suggestions, will look for those!

Anyways:

Cosmic Cavern 3671

Honestly not the biggest fan of this game, but people seem to like it, think of it as a more tactical version of Dig Dug where you stop monsters from getting into the base on the bottom of the screen by making them fall from some heights or leaving tranquilizers behind and getting them while they are dizzy or sleeping, a bit too slow paced for my tastes, but again, people seem to like it.

Cosmic Snake 8473/3671

The return of Snake...with a twist, you can touch your own body all you want, earth keeps falling and there are monsters around either digging of flying around, the objective is to lead the monsters into the earth, dig some holes or paths with the snake, and while the monsters are inside of the earth, cut part of the terrain and crush them so they give items that give those sweet sweet points.

One Finger Death Punch

It has to be here, it's an amazingly simple game, yet fun, addictive, frantic and just awesome to look at, just one guy, two buttons and tons of enemies to kill.

I Hate Running Backwards

Pretty much what you can see, you play as a character running backwards as it shoots the enemies in front of it with a variety of weapons and power-ups, and it's a pretty fun game.

Also, it's from Devolver Digital and it's their crossover game, so Serious Sam, Lo Wang, Rambro from Broforce and Richard from Hotline Miami are available as playable characters as they go in a never ending game focused on worlds and enemies from Devolver games...so if you ever wanted a game with a co-op option where Serious Sam and Rambro unite forces, good news, that game actually exists.

[zerker]

May 25, 2018 18:09:29 GMT -5 silentstorm said:

May 25, 2018 16:23:11 GMT -5 X-pert74 said:

There's this game called Gon' E-Choo! (I can't stand the name, personally), which is basically like a Popeye clone that can be played with a VR headset, as if you were looking at an actual cabinet. It's pretty authentic to classic arcade game design.

Steam link

I guess i will check that out, though i sadly don't have a VR headset because that sounds like it could be fun.

From the Steam page, it looks like the VR support is optional.

[silentstorm]

May 26, 2018 5:58:23 GMT -5 zerker said:

May 25, 2018 18:09:29 GMT -5 silentstorm said:

I guess i will check that out, though i sadly don't have a VR headset because that sounds like it could be fun.

From the Steam page, it looks like the VR support is optional.

Cool, will have to try it out then.

Anyways, just found that Jeff Minter is working on a little game called Tempest 4000 that will be coming to PC, there is even a video of some gamer playing the first(tutorial) levels of the game:

I guess this makes up for TxK being a Vita exclusive?

[hades]

Devil Daggers is a good one from 2016, has an aesthetic like the first Quake, basically you are in a circular arena floating in an abyss and endless waves of monsters come at you and you survive as long as possible. The monsters leave behind shards when killed and collecting enough upgrades your attack. It's very easy to play, hard to master.

[silentstorm]

Played a bit of Gon' E-Choo!, it's really just furry Popeye with vore in it and...it's not that fun or addictive to me for some reason, like, Popeye is a game that's more fun, i don't know if it's because of the license that i like, but everything about that game just feels better than Gon' E-Choo, particularly the levels, i dunno, maybe i was expecting something more.

But compared to other games that i and others have mentioned?

It's really nothing special after a couple of minutes, though i do like that it's attempting to emulate an actual arcade cabinet, that being said, one of the games mentioned is on Steam and popular enough to actually get an arcade cabinet in Japan, that, of course, being Heiankyo Alien 3671

Which is popular enough in Japan that it's getting a new arcade cabinet with a new mode...that won't come to the Steam version according to the developer...though the Steam version will get it's own exclusive mode as well and two exclusive items.

Still, it's pretty cool seeing that in Japan, games like Heiankyo Alien still get arcade cabinets, and it's even cooler that said game is available on Steam, even it doesn't try to imitate an arcade cabinet.

[boomer]

DESYNC is a first-person shooter about killing enemies in special ways for more points, and then figuring out in how many special ways as possible you can kill a single enemy for the most points. These ways are called Attack Sequences, and they depend on many things, such as the weapon you used to kill an enemy, your positioning, whether you sent an enemy flying into a trap or the abyss, whether you stunned an enemy, whether you juggled an enemy mid-air with rockets, whether you even looked at an enemy when you killed it, that kind of thing. The poly-neon artstyle is rough, but surprisingly readable. There's a lot of supporting mechanics underneath to learn about which can help you score even higher, though a lot of them are rather cryptic in nature. It's very unlike most first-person shooters which are just focused on survival.

I currently own all the world record spots for all the nine main levels, so I guess I'm the one person in the entire world who understands the game the most. Which lends me some degree of sway since there exist next to no guides or information explaining the deeper mechanics of the game.

SPOILER: Click to show

[silentstorm]

Ohh that sounds cool!

Anyways:

Death's Hangover

Another Arkanoid/Breakout game with enemies to kill...or you can just blow up a door open and advance, or find a secret room or whatever, it's a fun game, though i am not the biggest fan of the story's humor.

Shatter

This game is what happens when you make a brick breaker game, add a great soundrack, and make your ship have a variety of abilities and powers without needing to pick power-ups even if they are still around, it's pretty awesome really and well worth checking out.

The Bug Butcher

Pretty much Pang, only instead of destroying balls, you go around destroying big dangerous bugs, also pretty fun.

Bot Vice

Yeah, this one will depend on whether people don't mind games that start pretty hard from the start and never let up, this game starts fast and hard and ends in the same way, prepare to die a lot, but if you can stomach that, it's a pretty solid and fun action game, you control one character at the bottom row and the objective is to dodge attacks and kill your enemies with a variety of weapons and attacks, looks nice, has a good soundtrack...but again, prepare to die or get frustrated.

Either way, i think it's worth buying...if for no other reason than it's cheap and the developer is clearly interested in doing arcade games(the same guys that did Strikey Sisters) but their games haven't been selling well.

[Bumpyroad]

Savant - Ascent




Pang Adventures



Downwell





Pac-Man Championship Edition 1 & 2 + Pac-Man 256

  

Chime and Chime Sharp



Wizorb

[silentstorm]

Chime looks interesting, how is Pang Adventures anyways?

I haven't actually bought the game yet so i would be interesting in knowing your opinion about that.

Anyways, found this game that came out very recently.

HOT PINK

Yeah, another brick breaker game, only an endless one where the board is always different every time you play, there are challenges to gain extra points, there are no power-ups aside from getting multiple balls and some explosive bricks, it's very fast paced and has a good soundtrack...oh, and the bricks descend every once in a while and if one hits the bottom of the screen it's game over, so there is a constantly shifting board that you have to pay attention to.

Oh, and it's pretty damn fun and addictive, seriously, i just bought the game, thought i would try it for a couple of minutes and when i finally checked the time, i found out that i had been playing this game for 63 minutes, and still wasn't bored with it and felt like i could play some more, also feels like the kind of game you can come back to a few months after if you get bored and get addicted all over again.

Seriously, it's pretty damn cool and better than i was expecting, easily worth the 6,55 euros i spent on it on Steam, and again, only have played it for a hour, so if you like Breakout/Arkanoid clones, seriously consider picking this game up.

[Bumpyroad]

May 29, 2018 15:13:29 GMT -5 silentstorm said:

Chime looks interesting, how is Pang Adventures anyways?

Chime is quite short and Chime Sharp is a bit on a hard side, but both quite fun. Pang Adventures? Tbh, i actually only briefly tried the original arcade Pang, it seemed ok. Guess, Adventures is just expanded version of that with some extras and all that. Just check some vids, if in doubt as always.