[Kinto]

Several years ago, in what must've been my second year of university, I remember discovering some prototype of an indie game made with XNA. That game was Aces Wild. Despite how basic the mechanics and enemies were it was ridiculously satisfying. At the time it was the coolest indie game I had ever seen.

Years passed. It didn't come out, I forgot about it.

Now it has returned to me.

I need to make people play this. It's like 2D God Hand made by Treasure. There are lots of things happening on screen. Sometimes you can't see where you are, but you always know where you are.

The controls are extremely simple. You have light attacks, these build meter. You have a heavy attack. Holding the button down charges the heavy attack. As you charge it the meter drains. The more meter you build up, the longer you can charge the heavy attack, the harder it hits when you let go. The harder you hit the more enemies bounce around the screen like angry billiard balls.

Your character's physics change when you're charging, it makes it slightly easier to miss. Landing a hit feels like nailing an albatross with a boomerang. The result of the hit feels like breaking in a game of Pool with a rail gun.

The dude who made this game made a thread here a couple years ago, but hasn't posted since. Well, I think this game is right up SBs alley, so I thought I'd bring it up again.

You can buy it here.

It's also on Greenlight, help the guy out on there if you want!



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[swampfriend]

the Aztez guy wrote about this game on his design blog and has nothing but the highest praise for it:

[Kinto]

OH MAN. I had no idea the wild meter corresponded to the God Hand-style Level Die thing. This explains a lot!

Also jeez I miss like 90% of my crash attack attempts.
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[Wall of Beef]

Wow, this does look boss!
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[ArOne]

I'd sooner compare it to Bangai O from the looks of it.
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[Kinto]

It has a very Bangai-O feel to it! Especially when you line up a huge crash attack and hit multiple enemies at once. You get that same earth-shattering feeling, a big number appears on screen and chaos unfolds.
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[Ronnoc]

Huh, maybe I don't hate video games after all.

[Bacon&Onions]

I just played the demo, this game is a hot mess.
Hot- Yes the gameplay is really fun and satisfying, this game is very much worthy to be compared to god hand. A+ Had more fun playing the demo than I have playing a action game in a long time.
Mess-took me 30 minutes to figure out how to get my non-360 controller set up to work with the game, title screen menu is a confusing mess, no reset to default so if you mess up the controls you have to reinstall the game. The game is buggy, there are areas in the backround I could slip into that I shouldn't have, whats worse rather than taking me to the boss the last area before left me trapped inside itself, looping me around the same empty area every time I tried to leave. The other 2 playable charcter's feel unfinished. Finally the grading system doesn't even seem to work. I can't get any logs to show up.

This is a great game worth your attention but be wary that it will be demanding and really needs to be fixed up.

[Bacon&Onions]

I think I sounded overly negative. I had to deal with a lot of frustrations just to play this game but even with the problems this game is diamonds. The game may have some programming issues but the guy who designed it must be a genius. I'm going to buy this game. I really really like this game. I have to play it more and give it some time but I think this the greatest 2D beat'em up I have ever played. Go play the demo. Then play the demo again because wow this game is really satisfying on such a base mechanical level you don't need level design or new enemies, it just feels good to play.

[tiburon]

God Hand meets Bangai-O

and it's a windows game

( ._.)

i would buy this tomorrow if it was released on xbla
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stream - steam - tweets

[swampfriend]

it was originally planned as an xbox live indie game and i think it's still on its way there eventually (which probably accounts for how hard it is to reconfigure controls) so you may get your wish!
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[tiburon]

neat! hopefully before the xbone kills current-gen xbla
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stream - steam - tweets

[Schwere Viper]

This looks really badass.
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HeavyViper@Twitter ~~~ HeavyViper@Soundcloud
Blog: Machines That Sing

[BenoitRen]

[ArOne]

The game itself looks ace but I'm not sure I'm digging the normal guy against the crazier looking enemies aesthetic I see going on.
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[Bacon&Onions]

But that's the thing! Ace's Wild's real story is about all of us. Its about the average Joe overcoming unfair advantages given more privileged lives. Its about defeating multiple swordmaster's at the same time, bare handed.

Seriously if the normal guy bothers you, there is a alternate player character who's basically a six packed shirtless skater who wields and rides in air a giant blade.

I think the asthetics are going to be the biggest problem most people have with this game. Enemies flash red to broadcast that they are about to attack, in the mist of the demo during parts where more than 3 enemies clouded the screen(this happened a lot) I found too much of the action very hard to see, and the game came down(for me a newb) more to understanding the AI flash's than anything else. The actual level's themselves are hilariously the same generic crate in different colors and boring stamped light bulbs and beams.

There are plenty of times where you are focusing on the movements and behaviors of a few very powerful enemies and that's really nice. Fighting a tunneling dog while two ninja's attack you from above, or fighting a boxing guy while again ninja's supported it from above were both times where I felt everything was actually avoiding punches and delivering back your own.

I've always struggled a lot when prototyping action games with finding a way to clearly convey to the player the complex movements of many enemies on a 2D plane and I've concluded 4 is the limit for me.

[Kinto]

Yo Bacon maybe just the demo is buggy? I've had the odd bug but nothing really that bad. As for my controller, it's a Wii Classic Controller Pro plugged into a cheapo Chinese USB adapter with shitty drivers that actually manage to BSOD Windows 7, and the game handles it just fine!
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[Bacon&Onions]

Maybe... I will find out when I buy it, but hey! We are using the exact same set up! High five Kinto!

I have found the Classic Controller Pro to be perfect for every 2D game I have thrown at it! I actually have several 360Xbox Controllers but I refuse to use them for 2D games unless I have to.

[Schwere Viper]

I use my Sega Saturn USB pads for 2D games almost exclusively, but they make AW crash at start-up for some reason. So I'm stuck with analog sticks. :<

I'm exchanging mails with the author about it, and apparently controller issues are quite common. Hopefully it gets sorted out smoothly.
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HeavyViper@Twitter ~~~ HeavyViper@Soundcloud
Blog: Machines That Sing

[nothingxs]

I actually used to play this before every salt-e-sports recently until we all sort of had our schedules explode in our faces. This game is incredibly hype.

I wish I'd known about it before, too, because the main character urgently needs more hot blood in his voice and I can provide it.
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select button
i've gotta let go. i've gotta get straight. why'd you have to make it so hard? let me get away.
3DSFC 1736-1476-0518

[108]

yeah, this game is amazing. i have been on board the train for many years now. the creator, tyler doak, is coincidentally a good friend of action button entertainment~~~
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[Kinto]

Nothingxs: yeah the title screen clip is lacking too. Ask him! Couldn't hurt.

108: heck yeah, I was gonna suggest you hire his ass when AB makes it big.

I'm falling deeper in love with this game as I get better at it. I love the way my struggles at the frontier turn me into a god in the earlier levels, which then rapidly ramp up in difficulty to meet my new powers. It goes from punishing me because I'm stupid to punishing me because I'm cocky.

God Hand-style difficulty should be the default in all games.
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[boojiboy7]

[Kinto]

No not Battle Garegga, they did it badly.
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[boojiboy7]

I think they did it just fine, honestly. I just don't like the "all games should do X" idea.

[Kinto]

Don't you try to temper my boundless enthusiasm goddamnit.
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[boojiboy7]

I WILL TEMPER WHATEVER I WANT YOU AREN'T THE BOSS OF ME.

Yes, I am kidding.

Probably going to pick this up soon as it does look damn solid. Hope the Greenlight thing does whatever it does for it.

[Endless]

I was supposed to voice one of the bosses in this game. I am sad that didn't happen!
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[gsilverfish]

You can get Aces Wild at a discount right now on that Not on Steam sale. I picked it up but I haven't actually played it yet.

http://notonsteam.com/

[Bacon&Onions]

I just played the full version of the game and conform that the problems I was having with the demo are gone. This game is so great. Son of godhand indeed.

[Kinto]

Jeez, is SB the nexus of all indie game dev or something?
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[Deets]

Game crashes on startup for me, guess I gotta try it on my other machine :|

[Pat the Great]

it did that to me too. try unplugging your controllers on first launch, and plugging them in when it successfully opens. worked for me.
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-pat m.
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[Touran]

Got the demo, beating up dudes, then fell below the map somehow and got stuck

Aside from that, very solid and fun - reminds me a lot of Treasure's Astro Boy for the GBA, with just less friction
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Man, I'm sorry.

[ArOne]

The control setup in the options isn't that good. It highlights the action you set before instead of asking you to assign a button to the currently highlighted action. It also needs a reset to default option.
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[Ymer]

This is now on Steam. Just so everybody knows.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/269230/
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[Kinto]

I was following the guy that made this and then left that account alone for weeks. Just went back now to congratulate him and found out he's blocked me. Wtf :c
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[MattCD42]