Nanobots

Oooh, not bad!

Level 4 is baffling though.

Argh. I still hate the use of an on-screen keyboard for entering the user's name into the high-score list. I have a real keyboard!

:sigh: I would have preferred a more straightforward control scheme. Thrust/rotation is more 'real', yes, but I find it somewhat frustrating to use than the basic up/down/left/right/use mouse to turn scheme.

Ok, on my second try I did mouse primary instead of keyboard primary which feels much better, though I stand by my assertion that I prefer the 'dumb' way to handle it.

I agree with Ben. Their mouse controls are awkward. I use a trackball, and would have preferred moving with the trackball and shooting/whatever with the left button.

Wow, this is Nitrome's first fare in a long time that I've really enjoyed! It's pretty fast-paced and attractive. The keyboard controls are a bit clunky compared to the mouse--which is disappointing because I normally like primarily keyboard-controlled games. I think the best thing for this game would be to incorporate rotation/aiming for the mouse and keyboard for the thrust/aiming. Otherwise a lot of fun!

Ugh. Clunky controls and it froze my computer.

does anyone know how to get pass level 4? as in, after you destroyed the greens you cant do anything.

I did not like this game at all. I would prefer mixed mouse-keys control. In mouse-control mode, why not be able to strafe with the arrow keys? It just seems silly to me that in a non-scrolling shmup that I have to face the way I'm shooting. If I can turn, rather than just moving side to side, I should be able to move and shoot independently. Maybe you can argue that that's part of what makes the game difficulty, but poor design choices are not a substitute for challenging gameplay.

"The result is one of the best Flash-based shmups on the internet."

Nitrome seems to get more than its fair share of dues from you guys.

I don't see why this is one of the best.

Maybe I'm just being paranoid.

Patrick is free to write anything he wishes. Neither I nor anyone from Nitrome coached or coaxed him to write what he did. If you take issue to something he wrote, then please do comment here freely explaining why you disagree. :)

jiawai, I agree with you 100%. I've got up to Level 4 THREE times now, without any success. Maybe it is just something Nitrome will fix very shortly- in which case I'll forget the whole thing.

Nitrome seems to create a lot of pretty games with interesting ideas, invariably crippled by slow and obtuse play control. Upon seeing "shmup" and "Nitrome", I'd hoped they would manage to avoid crippling this game similarly - come on, shmup controls aren't hard to design! Even for a free roaming, shoot-in-any-direction game, just copy Robotron or Abuse or even Warning Forever! - but no, they managed it again... *sighs*.

I enjoyed the concept here, but agree that the controls are difficult. I thought the graphics were nice and the gameplay (if the controls were easier) would be very engaging. As far as the missing "save game" feature is concerned, personally I do not have a problem with games that require you to start from the beginning every time. But that's the arcade-gamer in me talking ;)

I enjoy this game a lot, but what's with that bug on level 4? Has anyone gotten any further than killing the green guys on level 4?

Yea, I don't think Level 4 works.

This game is made to be played on touchscreen. I think that the mouse controls will suddenly start making sense.

I think this game is one of Nitrome's better games as of late, with them producing a game almost every week and a half (unless I miscount).

This game has reasonably good controls (I mean, they're not the most intuitive, but they're clean and they work) and I find the bomb mutation to be soooo slow, btu beyond that it's a fair bit more solid than a lot of it's other games that run like molasses.

I couldn't pass 4 either, but hey, they'll fix the bugs eventually, right?

EVERYONE! Good News! Nitrome have FIXED the Level 4 menace! The pink and green foes have swapped, we are FREE!

yech, thats awful, maybe itd be better if the steering wasnt so difficult. i tried it with both the mouse and the keyboard but neither work well.

This may sound like a dense question, but-

Can Nitrome change the game AT ALL after it is released? Because if a game received complaints that it needed, say, more lives, couldn't Nitrome actually then put the lives in? This game needs some things.

The virtual keyboard is new for their older games, though. That must have been added afterwards.

Hooray! Finished the game.
I'm talking to myself I think.

Dum de dum.

Every time Nitrome makes a new game, I insantly go to play it. Nitrome has never let me down with a bad game. Until now... A odd game, that instantly loses my interst after two seconds of shooting.

level 4 has invsisble mine things that hurt you when you hit them. Took me a long time to figure that one out. watch where you step!

LOL someone posted as 'Davsuks'!

This is a great game! Plain GREATGREAT!!!!!!!!!!