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Terrible controller support as the reticle constantly wants to reset. Only two 4:3 resolutions to choose from even though the game is from 2015.
This game is an absolutely fun side scroller. To those that have played any of Astroport's mech side scrollers then this will be a much welcomed upgrade on their previous titles. Word of advice for all those coming in fresh, if you truly want to experience the storyline/evolution of the game go in this order: Supercharged Robot Vulkaiser, Armed Seven, Wolflame, Gigantic Army, Satazius then this. I know some people say games like this have weak stories but if you play all the games together you get to see the rich timeline and growth of the universe these games take place in. This game essentially bridges them all together in a nice little package. Some features new to this game include: -Multi-part levels and checkpoint systems -Unlimited continues -Saving functions -Better mouse targeting system -Multiple weapons and upgradable strength Altogether Steel Strider is an amazing game. Upgrading the various sprites from previous games and making the gameplay more exciting. The battles are more interesting and fast paced as well as featuring enemies from the previous games.
if you liked cybernoid on snes...
Fun little mech SHMUP. Be aware the resolution is limited. Get it on sale - it's worth it.
Fun little mecha 2d shoot em up. Sequel to gigantic army. Very forgiving compared to gigantic army, and that is not a bad thing. Has even a save system. Mouse and keyboard feels best for this but 360 pad works fine too.
I have to admit, at first i was a bit worried about this game. I wanted to play it because it looked really awesome and... well, it did not dissapoint me. It was actually really tough, even on normal mode. I just... Well, i just generally like this game. I think the only negatives i have are the animations sometimes look a bit wonky, but in general it's a solid game. even doing a letsplay of it. https://vid.me/dS6a
Note that the listed time that I played isn't correct, probably because I played it also offline. Anyway I will keep this review short and compare it a bit with Gigantic Army (their previous game which I more than Steel Strider). Steel Strider is somewhat like contra with gameplay but with a jet pack and a melee attack. The range of weapons is solid (pistol, rifle, shottie, glauncher, laser beam etc) but somewhat generic, same goes for movement. The blade melee attack is fun to use. However when compared to Gigantic Army, Strider feels less unique (no shield, no dash and less robot feel of the playable character and instead more humanoid feel). I personally also like the art style of Gigantic Army more. But mostly, I liked Gigantic Army's levels more, Strider's levels seem to be more (annoying) platforming. What I did think is an improvement in Steel Strider is de checkpoint system and no short timer that when it goes to zero you die.
If you enjoyed gigantic army it's highly likely you will love this. Absolutly love it!
Ohhhh... The game promises to be spiritual succesor to 16-bit games such as Front Mission: Gun Hazard, Metall Warriors, Cybernator, Ex-Ranza etc. Actually, it has nothing to do with this games. Poor mech customization, poor graphics and sound, slow paced and repeptitive gameplay, lack of ideas and easter eggs make this game worth playing once, when you have nothing to do (or play). Game has no replay value.
What we have here is a proud, noticeable improvement to Gigantic Army. Let me offer some bulletpoints so far, and I may change my post depending on how far I get into the game. ----Pros +I'm pleased to say that the controls are fantastic. A bug or two persisted at launch, but the developers have swiflty patched it out and I can report that everything works smoothly. I'm more of a gamepad kind of guy, but I must say their use of keyboard controls is refreshing, and anyone who likes either scheme will not be disappointed. +the graphics are nice, once again utilizing fine spritework instead of lazy pixel art like it's become a habit of in indie games +there's about 7-10 tracks of music in the game, but they're really catchy. I've often left the game open just to listen to some of the boss music (incase you're wondering why I have so much playtime). Soundtrack when? +the pacing is smooth, in that you'll never suffer a massive whiplash in difficulty. Also, the game advertises 4 planets to explore, and each has 8-10 levels each. The length of each level is about 1/3rd of the length of your average GA level, so I'd reckon this game is almost twice as long. +overall it's an enjoyable experience with a good difficulty curve. Expect to die a bit +The game, unlike its predecessor, utilizes a save system, where you can start off where you left at certain checkpoints, so you don't have to do the whole game in one run. In exchange, your mech can't tank hits anymore. A few shots and you're dead, and hazards are actually a threat to you now. +you trade in the shield of the GMR-SALADIN in favor of multiple weapons, each of which function as your basic damage dealers, but there's enough variety for each playstyle. +the game makes good on its promise of large, imposing bosses. Each has a distinct feeling to them, a strategy to take them down, and even unique arenas to fight them in. Whether you're soaring through the sky, or running on a collapsing bridge, they change up the formula to keep you on your toes. +the store page says they make several references to their older works, like Satazius and Vulkaiser and I think even Armed Seven reared his robotic mug. I won't spoil anything for you, but the way they reference each is pretty cool, and they're not just background murals or small missable things. +Nyu Media and Astro Port have been quick to keep watch over and work out any issues with gameplay or other bugs (as with all their games) so you can expect a quality product. I definitely love this game enough to fully recommend it, so it's hard to contain my enthusiasm in a single review. ----Cons -achievements are a little bugged(doesn't affect the game, so if you're not a dedicated achievement hunter, this shouldn't be a problem) -not too many configuration options, as you can't personally drag the screen to your desired size, but it does offer some choices. On that note, I think that, along with Xenoblade Chronicles X, Earth Defense Force for the PS4, and Final Fantasy 15 (and the promised magitek missions), robots are coming back in style. Steel Strider is a fine staging point for that. Now if only Astro Port could make a 3D robot game where you drive it around like in XCX. That would be cool, but that's for another day. For the meantime, I'll be busy trying to beat this game on hard, which will take me alot of hours, because I'm a total casual. I admit it.
Another awesome 2d run and gun from Astro Port. I will say I am overall a bigger fan of their more traditional 2d side scrollers but the twin stick/ mouse control scheme is a nice change of pace. Truthfully the controls seemed more tuned for mouse control but I am playing with a controller and getting by, it just may feel a tad unruly on occasion.
Controls are broken to the point that the game is unplayable. Screen modes are 640x480 and 1024x768. (That's it.) Fullscreen disables aero and resizes the desktop, which scrambles my desktop organization. It's 2015. This shit is not fucking acceptable, and this title is the last straw. I've filed for a refund and will never again purchase a game from ASTRO PORT. It's just overwhelmingly clear that they simply don't give a shit about their work.
No
This is really disappointing, gonna try and refund. Don't make a shooting game where the aiming reticle moves on it's own and constantly resets or floats around without player input. That's not fun, challenging or even realistic gun sway, it's just maddeningly irritating. Graphics are really nice, but that's about it. Controls are abysmal and slow. Music is extremely bad techno with no identity or variety. Doesn't seem to be any variety in combat either.
Gigantic Army is a really fun twist on the Contra formula because you have a jetpack, a dash move, a melee attack, and a shield to block bullets. But for Steel Strider they took away the dash move and the shield, the very mechanics that made Gigantic Army so fun. The jetpack is all that's left to distinguish this from the Contra series (that and the doujin aesthetics). Major downgrade.
ASTRO PORT goes high definition! Finally, in the year 2013 (the original Japanese release), right when the first 4K TV was released, we've got the chance to play ASTRO PORT game in glorious... 1024x768... Yeah... The guys were still at it. Even though they've finally updated their engine, it still felt laughably outdated. And the price for it was a bit too high, since it heavily impacted FPS. Nothing critical, but don't expect this game to provide the smooth and stable 60 FPS like the previous ones. But enough about the bad stuff. I'm a pretty big ASTRO PORT fan, after all, and, well, there's a lot of good stuff in STEEL STRIDER. Unlike the other ASTRO PORT games, this one is a twin stick shooter, similar to the popular DOS game Abuse. ASTRO PORT claims it to be like Super Contra and Turrican, but don't really expect that, since you'll end up being disappointed. STEEL STRIDER is way, way slower than those games. Heck, it's even slower than Abuse! Remember ASTRO PORT's GIGANTIC ARMY? That's the pace. Only this time we control a small robot (reminds me a lot of Ex-Ranza AKA Ranger X from Sega Genesis / Mega Drive) in Abuse-like style. That's pretty much it. Doesn't sound like a good thing, but it... kind of is, since ASTRO PORT are pretty good with their thing. It's just when they claimed their GIANT ARMY to be like CYBERNATOR, it was true, while this time... it's very different experience from what they say on the store page. Or maybe it's a publisher's fault, I don't know, whatever. Anyway, ORDAN's design is still here and this time there's a big reason for that. The thing is – STEEL STRIDER acts as both prequel and sequel to another ASTRO PORT game - SATAZIUS. And it won't be only about text briefings (yep, like GIGANTIC ARMY, this game has story-related texts between missions). We'll experience some of the SATAZIUS parts again, this time from the different point of view. For example, not only we'll see Trafalgar vessel, we'll actually help it to take off and escape pirates. Pretty cool stuff for ASTRO PORT fans, just make sure to play this game after SATAZIUS to fully enjoy it. Not like this game won't be fun without playing SATAZIUS, it's just... you know. It's always make things more fun when you see all the references. The game will also switch to the SHMUP style from time to time (again, a little bit of Ex-Ranza here) and will try to be creative about the level design here and there. Unfortunately, it'll also mean a pretty bad thing for us – STEEL STRIDER comes with a lot of cheap deaths. Sure, ASTRO PORT games used to have some of those, but this time? Those are everywhere. Pretty much every level has at least one of them. And even though you can re-play levels as many times as you want this time, it still feels pretty annoying. In this case, STEEL STRIDER brings back the part of the past that you don't really want to return. Even though it isn't the hardest game from ASTRO PORT, don't expect your first playthrough to be painless. So... yeah. Here comes STEEL STRIDER. Should you buy it? As long as you like ASTRO PORT games, absolutely. Sure, it fails to be as fast as the games it claims to be similar to. Sure, FPS is less stable this time, while resolution still isn't high enough. Sure, it has way, way more cheap deaths than usual. But it's still very solid and fun old school experience. An experience that even PC-only players will probably like, since, let's just admit it, everybody who wasn't born yesterday, loves Abuse. And with the price of $ 5.99? I'd say you don't even need to wait for a sale. It's totally worth it. Especially since it's longer than ARMED SEVEN. Not that longer, since it's always a bad idea for such a game to be too long, but longer enough to make it feel better (ARMED SEVEN felt a bit too short). So, yeah. Like with pretty much all other ASTRO PORT games, I do recommend this one. Just don't expect it to be an advanced “modern” game. The only “modern” thing this game has is Steam achievements. But well, if you've played ASTRO PORT games before, you know the drill. The guys just live in the past and let's just admit it, it totally suits them.
STEEL STRIDER is the best one of all ASTRO PORT shooting games. You will fight along with other units from previous games. Pros: +Auto save. If you stuck at final boss, you can load the game from that point and try again. +Unlimited retry times. Now you can restart from current section. +Don't worry about recover HP. The game provides enough medi-kits to help you. +A lot of powerful weapons. You have enough ammo to destroy most of bosses. +Very long main story. +Interesting and unique level designs.
I would call Steel Strider a relaxed paced, twin-stick run 'n gun. While the game has a number of faults, I still kinda like it. Let's start with controls. For me, I found I had best results with an Xbox controller using the left stick for movement, jumping/jump jet and crouching. While the right stick was used for aiming. I haven't played with the options, but it'd be nice if I could just point my weapon at the angle I want to shoot and let off the stick. Instead, I have continually push in the direction I want to aim. Which feels a little awkward. The shooting and melee tied to the tiggers works well and the shoulders for weapon selection works too. I found myself off the other buttons since the right stick needed constant attention. While I can this game a run 'n gun, I found slowing up a bit to aim worked better than rushing forth. Most enemies really telegraph their ranged attack, and your character, while kinda slow, has enough mobility options to generally stay pretty safe. The game does want some platforming, but the player character has jump jets to really control their landing. So long as they have fuel left on their meter, which recharges automatically when no in use. The game features a number of boss fights which are pretty fun. Steel Strider has a number of weapons that the player slowly collects then collects upgraded versions. Your handgun has a slow fire rate but unlimited ammo. The Assault Rifle has a faster firing rate but uses ammo. Though, like the Shotgun, I rarely ran low on ammo. The previously mentioned Shotgun spreads shot for better cover further away. The Grenade Launcher fires a power attack but at an arc. The rocket launcher fires a little slower and has pretty limited ammo but packs a punch. The Missile Launcher fires a volley of homing attacks. The Lightning Gun fires a powerful continuous beam. And the Rail Gun shot passes through most enemies to damage anything in its path. The player character also has a powerful energy sword melee attack which is good for dispatching nearby enemies. The graphics, sound and music aren't great and look a little cheap to me. But they are functional and aren't off putting. I certainly can't say that Steel Strider is a great game. Not even a good game. Yet, I kinda like it. It doesn't look like anything special and the controls are a little janky (but that's easy to overcome). However, I do still find myself enjoying playing through the levels. So, I suppose I do recommend it, but only if the price is really cheap.
Following up on the likes of the allcaps ARMED SEVEN and GIGANTIC ARMY, the similarly named developer ASTRO PORT brings a much more mouse-and-keyboard oriented title. Given that it's in the same vein of sidescroller shooters featuring low-boost jump ground mechs with swappable weapons as GIGANTIC ARMY or Armored Hunter GUNHOUND EX, it makes the most sense to compare to those games. The main difference is movement and aiming. There's room for all kinds of moving and aiming schemes in games and it works well, but the movement in STEEL STRIDER loses the sort of weight of inertia that makes GA or Gunhound feel so good, and aiming with a mouse makes most of the enemies a total cakewalk to obliterate. It feels a lot more like Super C or Duke Nukem 2, where your character is neither particularly slow or fast, there's no horizontal boost or maneuvers to mix things up, and instead the focus is laid on ammo conservation and weapon swapping, like a sidescrolling Doom. They mix things up a little with one flight stage and one "stealth" stage, both of which are implemented well and add rather than detract. That said, ammo management emphasizes some interesting choices compared to cooldowns- balancing between the level and the boss does come into play, and there's no telling when the next reload for your killing implement of choice is coming. Unfortunately, most of the difficulty is frontloaded- the later bosses for the most part are utter pushovers, even with the lesser weapons. Mouse aiming and a very solid duo of assault rifle and shotgun (with occasional grenades) for the levels means that even the quick deaths won't occur too often, most deaths I experienced were from falling (the boost is extremely short, even when using it in puffs or bursts). I will say, however, the last boss makes good use of most of the game's elements. On the subject, the Final Boss's theme sticks out amongst a fairly forgettable albeit punchy score (which is good, because you'll be hearing it a lot). I never considered GA's music to be its strong point, either, but in either case it does the trick. The Bosses are mostly memorable in terms of design if not capability, and ASTRO PORT does not disappoint on the scale end of things with their usual artstyle. The story is as inane as ever and outside of obstensibly being part of a "delivery" company there's no special hook to this one. It's also very short, and despite spending about a third of the time on the last boss I defeated normal difficulty in about two hours. So, why recommend it? It's got good variety for this type of game, has a good pace and fluid movement, leaves on an exciting last battle, makes use of its ammo mechanics well, has memorable boss designs and is dirt cheap on sale. It's less than four bucks right now, which is a very attractive price point for a game that can easily be played twice. In summation, its minor flaws and being underambitious is outweighed by the fact that it's solid, digestable, part of a genre with few quality entries and the price is right.
Steel Strider is the much sequel to the cult mech game Gigantic Army while improving on the original's formula. PROS - It now contains a save feature which auto saves after certain checkpoints plus you can save and load from anywhere during a level. So don't have to playthrough in one sitting although you still can and there's an achievement for that if it matters to you. - The controls have been greatly improved over the first. It now controls like a proper side scrolling twin stick however I found that the mouse and keyboard are way better than gamepad. - The controls can now be rebound. This is a godsend if you don't like the default scheme. - Unlike the first the mech can use all 6 weapons during a level rather than picking your loadout at the start of the level. - Your mech feels more responsive\agile than the first. In Gigantic Army your mech felt like an ancient piece of scrap metal with an engine strapped to its back. Your mech in this feels like it got a much needed improvement in the movement factor. - Has way more variety in terms of locations, enemies, weapons and powerups. - The graphics look really cool much like the first. CONS - Mech feels too squishy, at this point I rather the shield back from the first game. - Story is still a wall of text that scrolls a bit to quickly (though you can control the speed somewhat). - The dash feature from the first game was removed unless it's still there but hidden. - Gamepad controls suck or maybe I do, I've never been good with twin sticks and gamepads. - Graphics resolution options are very poor, there are only 2 resolution types 640x480 and 1024x768 which resizes your desktop when selected. ANNOYANCES +/- Feels a bit too long for some reason. My playthrough time is at 3hrs when compared to the original I had already beaten it multiple times over but I'm already tired of this game. VERDICT Did I enjoy my time with Steel Strider, well yes and no. While it does have some major improvements over the first game and also includes some new features, I stopped playing either out of boredom or tedium. Up until the time I got tired of it I was enjoying but I feel too much was added on to the original's formula or maybe it's the fact that I died way more in this than in the original. Much like the original it's extremely cheap $5.99 or cheaper during a sale so you could give it a try and return it if you don't like it.