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What's good in UFO 50?

Bongo

excused from moderation duty
(he/him)
Staff member
Lords of Diskonia is a very original concept, but I’m losing terribly on the first level. Can’t seem to get a handle on effective tactics. Fun to watch, perhaps, but I’m not feelin’ it.

⭐ Night Manor ⭐ has scenes of horror and dread, eh? Certainly has a lot of scenes of mold. The anthology format is working to this game’s advantage; with adventure games like this I often get a feeling like they’re going to pad it out and make it too long. I finished it and got the cherry in a single sitting.

Elfazar’s Hat seems easier than the other shooters. I can live long enough to see how the powerup mechanic works: three unmatched cards restore life, a pair gives you a weak powerup, and three of a kind gives you a strong powerup.

⭐ Pilot Quest ⭐ is an idle game. And, judging from the description, it remains idle even when playing other games. Well, it’s no big deal that I had already put 20 hours in before I booted it. I’ve been looking for a good idle game lately.

⭐ Mini & Max ⭐ is such a cute and clever concept, and I bet it's just packed with secrets. The description says it’s their biggest game yet, and I’m running out of time before I get majorly interrupted with some real-life obligations, so I’m going to set this aside and dig into it later.
 

Bongo

excused from moderation duty
(he/him)
Staff member
Combatants is frustrating me with the poor pathfinding. I make workers and they don’t do any work because they can’t find the food. I tell them to follow me and they get stuck on walls. A strategy game where you spend more time fighting against the user interface than against the enemy is not really what I’m in the mood for right now.

Quibble Race is a race fixing simulator, something I have never heard of before. Gameplay is easy to understand, but since it seems to be a hidden information game, playing against the CPU seems somewhat hollow.

⭐ Seaside Drive ⭐, I heard, is the only game in this collection from Downwell creator Ojiro Fumoto. Using movement to control both aiming and charging gives it such a unique feel, and it’s super smooth.

Campanella 3 ain’t no Space Harrier, but then, what is? The way the sidearm starts firing in the opposite direction of your movement is a challenging wrinkle that I appreciate, even though it trips me up every time. I feel like I could learn to get good at this.

⭐ Cyber Owls ⭐ has a lot going on. A Battletoads-like multi-genre adventure: one beat-'em-up, one sneak-'em-up, and two different kinds of shoot-'em-up, plus a little puzzle game that you play to recover from failed missions. Fast-paced and challenging, it seems like a fairly comprehensive test of action game skills. The voice samples were a suitably dramatic new addition for the final game, and I can only imagine that the ending will turn out to be something that would have been no less mindblowing in 1989.
 

Lakupo

Comes and goes with the wind
(he/him)
this is where some of the anachronisms in UFO 50’s design creep through: while a deck-builder would have been technically possible using 80’s hardware, as a matter of game design that concept didn’t emerge until much later
Lokii's answer is better, but I'll chime in here anyway: While there are some games here that specifically are trying to fit within the design space of the past (I'm looking at you Barbuta), I think the heart of the collection is interesting indie games within the constraints of a fantasy console. To that end, the anachronistic design sense is even kind of the point.
 

Lakupo

Comes and goes with the wind
(he/him)
⭐ Pilot Quest ⭐ is an idle game. And, judging from the description, it remains idle even when playing other games. Well, it’s no big deal that I had already put 20 hours in before I booted it. I’ve been looking for a good idle game lately.
Just wait until you get to the "meat" of the game!
 

Bongo

excused from moderation duty
(he/him)
Staff member
Yeah, no, yeah, I've gone on a number of unsuccessful expeditions.
 

RT-55J

space hero for hire
(He/Him + RT/artee)
Lokii's answer is better, but I'll chime in here anyway: While there are some games here that specifically are trying to fit within the design space of the past (I'm looking at you Barbuta), I think the heart of the collection is interesting indie games within the constraints of a fantasy console. To that end, the anachronistic design sense is even kind of the point.
imo what's interesting to me is how the games here are anachronistic in both ways, as it were. Games that seem authentically retro at first glance, such as Magic Garden with it's simple arcade stylings, reveal themselves to have surprisingly modern design sensibilities, while other games that appear to be fully modern in concept (such as Pilot Quest) have some very authentically retro sharp edges and depths. (Though some games feel fully modern in their sensibilities, and a small number of them seem fully retro).

Speaking of Pilot Quest, I just finished my first run of it this morning. The ending was exactly what I expected. It's a very good game overall once you get into the groove.

Anyhow, I've seen some people already clamoring for a sequel to this (16-bit or whatever), but imho it already has a sequel: those itch.io charity bundles with thousands of games you haven't played.
 

RT-55J

space hero for hire
(He/Him + RT/artee)
Anyhow, speaking of Star Waspir, here's a no-death playthrough by some shmup expert:

video link (thumbnail spoils the final boss lol)

They manage to keep their score chain running through the entire game, which is nearly unbelievable.
 
The Big Bell Race is my first gold. It feels like how I always want a racing game to feel, in my mind. I'm the sort of person who skids along the edge of the track in arcade racers.
 

Isrieri

My father told me this would happen
I wanted to wait until this went on sale to pick it up, but this thread convinced me to try it out now.
Kinda happy I did because these games are pretty great. I've only tried half of them so far.



<01 Barbuta> I appreciate that each of these games for this fictional console all have fictional release dates and you can see the progress of the UFO team as they get more familiar with the hardware and become better developers over time. Barbuta is the first game in chronological order and it looks and plays like something right off the C64: Old, janky, and inscrutable. Its a very slow adventure game that at first glance appears to be all about secrets and, frankly, little else. I only played one game searching around the nearby rooms under the starting area. Presumably you can find items in the world but I only found dead ends. The egg respawning thing is exactly quirky enough to really sell that this is a game made around the turn of the 80s.

<02 Bug Hunter> I didn't think I'd like this but I was surprised at how long I kept at it. Baffling without instructions, but as you play around with the features you can figure out pretty quick how to use the energy cells on the ground, aquire new moves on the fly, and form a 'by-the-seat-of-your-pants' strategy. Its not something I see myself returning to again and again but I appreciate how well-crafted the experience and the puzzle-tactics gameplay.

<03 Ninpek> There is a truly ancient NES game called Ninja Kid that this reminds me of very strongly and, this game too, is deceptively tough as nails despite appearances and the simplicity of play. This seems like one of those games where the stages just repeat the further and further you go, and I wouldn't be surprised if it looks back around to the start at some point, but I did notice the scenery change as I went further along. There doesn't appear to be any unique pickups apart from more shuriken and happy faces. I hope I'm wrong, but if that's all then its a bit of shame, but I won't complain because the double jump alone pulls a lot of weight.

<05 Paint Chase> Pretty good Atari style game that is bare-bones simple, but very satisfying to succeed in. Didn't stick with it very long but it was charming.

<06 Magic Garden> This one I really like. I was totally confused for a hot minute as to how it controls because you can only turn left and right and the jump feels extremely pixel perfect. I think I'm just not good at it. Trying to fit a very long snake of slimes into the goal tiles is exactly the kind of addictive fun of those early NES titles. I think the trick is you want to not grab potions immediately, but try to have at least one on-screen at all times so you can clear the field of bad slimes when things get too hectic.

<09 Attactics> That's a stellar name. I also really like this one conceptually. I didn't play the main mode and leapt into a quick game skirmish. I agree with Bongo that this would be stellar with another human player, but even if you don't quite understand the nuances its just fun to move your guys around. I adore the big derpy sprites.

<10 Devilition> This reminds me of something but I couldn't tell you what. Don't have much to say other than I wish you could influence what pieces you can place on the board instead of it being random.

<11 Kick Club> I didn't get very far because of how large the enemy sprites are and how esoteric the ball-kicking is. Watching it being played you'd think its very simple to just kick the ball at 'em but the ball's trajectory seems to have a mind of its own sometimes. I didn't check to see if this was a 2 player game but it had better be. You can't make a Bubble Bobble-esque and not have co-op.

<12 Avianos> This scatches an itch that Bug Hunter does not. A game like this, you may be tempted to turn away from it because all you have to work with are tiny little symbols and menus that won't let you in on how they operate. However it only takes a turn or three to suss out the gameplay loop. Seeing your little army go to bat against the enemy is a nice but essential touch that brings this game up in my estimation. Plus you can move mountains around! I still don't know exactly how that helps you, but its fun!

<14 Bushido Ball> THIS is just the sort of NES game I would have adored as a babby. It is supremely satisfying how well made the game's rules and movesets are. I love the art style and the little referee.

<17 Campanella> This was the second game I tried after Barbuta. This one also surprised me because I didn't think I would like it. Were this actually made in the past I feel like you would have been made to bounce on things instead of being given a slash attack, and the game would have been all about precision navigation. The game is about that, but it also is about wrecking the obstacles in your way and pulling off cool trick moves.

<18 Golfaria> I opened this up for about twominutes and put it away pretty quick when I realized it was golf. Nothing against golf, but there are other games I want to try.

<19 The Big Bell Race> Since I had beaten the first area of Campanella I wasn't too shabby at this one. They took the floaty physics of that game and made it into a racing game. I did a couple of laps around a couple of courses but if there is anything here beyond that simple premise I didn't stay long enough to discover it.

<21 Waldorf's Journey> I have no idea how to control this. I know how to make jumps and how to hover in the air, but I don't know how to use those two tools to direct myself onto stable footing. What a weird game. A walrus?!? Sure!

<23 Onion Delivery> Games like these have a certain appeal. The controls are so un-suited for a gamepad and the gameplay frustrating enough, that the real fun is plonking someone else down in front of it to watch them struggle while you take the piss out of them the whole while. I don't think this one is for me, but it has a real level of care and attention to detail put into it. It was the first one I played that had an opening cutscene, and in the upper left you can see the cabby's face react to what's happening on the ground.

<24 Caramel Caramel> Played this long enough to discern it was a Gradius-em-up before moving on. I like space shooters with the best of 'em but its a genre I struggle with, and this one was challening but didn't look like it would knock my block off. I'll come back to it later on to give it the ol' college try when I'm ready to spend an hour or two with just it.

<26 Hot Foot> I like the premise and the gameplay looks pretty fun, but the controls are pretty tricky to execute on a keyboard. I think if I had a controller, things would go more smoothly. I like the athletes' expressions and color palette.

<28 Rail Heist> Pretty unique idea. Its a weird turn-based action-platoformer hybrid that reminds me of Elevator Action of all things. Presumably I need to pick up and use the crates on the train to navigate while avoiding the lawmen who can shoot you as soon as you enter their line of sight, whether its their 'turn' or not. You can run out of bullets yourself, which made me sad.

<30 Rock On! Island> This is my favorite of the whole collection thus far. A tower defense game fits like a glove in a retro catalogue, and I find the whole presentation endlessly charming. Its deceptively tough: I played the game for several hours and have only gotten to the desert oasis and deep jungle on the first island, but its proving to be quite the challenge to get past those hurdles.

<36 Hyper Contender> If you've ever played Spelunky's battle arena mode, you'll feel right at home. Played it enough to get the idea, but it didn't grip me. I wonder if you can play with more than one CPU per fight.

<37 Valbrace> I know I shouldn't be surprised that they made a dungeon crawler for their UFO 50 game, but I was taken completely by surprise. I just got back from playing it before writing this post and its pretty punishing if you don't have decent reflexes. I love how violently the screen shakes when you bump into the wall. Whomever made this sure know what they like.

<38 Rakshasa> Extremely Chonky. This is probably my favorite premise so far. I've never played a game that risks giving you a game over before you can even move your character. Its like if Karnov and Ghosts n' Goblins had a child, complete with stiff movement and distressing enemies but also teeming with the uniquely spooky-uncanny charm those games possess.

<39 Star Waspir> Here there be a space shooter that WILL tear me a new one, and quickly. I kept dying within the first few seconds. When you have a huge spread of bullets like that and need to build up your powerups, it makes it really really hard to concentrate on enemy bullets and I run right into 'em. Great presentation though, and Iike how holding the fire button will give you a smaller concentrated fire-rate instead of the spread shot you get by tapping. Seems like it would come in handy but I suck at the game so I suppose I'll never know!

<41 Lords of Diskonia> Didn't like this one at all. Interesting premise, but I was all fired up to see what the game was going to be from the title screen and cartridge art, only to find some kind of billiards thing. There had to be at least one of these - not every NES game you tried was going to be a winner, and everyone probably has at least one like this that pulled the wool over their eyes.

<45 Mini & Max> Didn't get very far because I could tell there was a lot of meat to this one but its super cute. I wonder if the whole game takes place in that one room. It appears that you can shrink and grow at will, and depending on where you shrink down in the storeroom, you'll warp someplace completely different.



P.S: I don't think I've ever used so many hyphens in one post in my life.
 
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Sarge

hardcore retro gamin'
Night Manor was cool - I thought they did a great job with a spooky atmosphere. That PC Engine-esque soundfont helps, too. My only gripe is that the killer would show up a little too often, but otherwise I had a lot of fun with it.

Other standouts for me so far are Warptank and Vainger. The latter feels pretty safe overall, though - I wouldn't sell it as an amazing Metroidvania, but it is fun. But Warptank hits all the puzzle-y bits and seems to have a shocking amount of length - I've got an hour or so in and still only at 12-ish percent?!

I need to get better at Pingolf. I love the look and feel of it.

EDIT: Man, Warptank is cool. I think it's my favorite of all the games so far.
 
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RT-55J

space hero for hire
(He/Him + RT/artee)
look mom i'm famous!

i wish they quoted my bits about .ufo disk images and LXticle tho lol
 

ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
⭐ Night Manor ⭐ has scenes of horror and dread, eh? Certainly has a lot of scenes of mold. The anthology format is working to this game’s advantage; with adventure games like this I often get a feeling like they’re going to pad it out and make it too long. I finished it and got the cherry in a single sitting.

Yes. I also got the cherry in one sitting, and this game was pretty fun! A less-punishing MacVenture! That is also Resident Evil 7!
 

MCBanjoMike

Sudden chomper
(He/him)
Wow, I am just getting absolutely destroyed by the last level of Rock On! Island. This has probably been my favorite game of the collection so far, despite the fact that I've failed this level like 10 times. The built-in timer says that I've played 7 hours of it to date? That seems a little high, but I could easily believe 5-6.

Man, I'm gonna be playing UFO 50 for like the next 18 months, aren't I
 

Lokii

(He/Him)
Staff member
Moderator
The year's barely begun and I've played some exceptional stuff (Crystal Project, Crab, Animal Well) but I think UFO is an easy shoe in for my Goat of the Year.
 
Got my second win and first cherry in one go on Kick Club today, clearing it in 18 minutes. Took 11 attempts, a bit over 2 hours total, to get there, mostly just playing one round a day and doing a bit better each time.
 

That Old Chestnut

A E S T H E T I C
(he/him)
I couldn't resist grabbing this either. Tried the first ten tonight, and had fun overall.

Impressions!

Barabuta: I get it. I didn't want to play it for more than a few minutes, but I get it. Good job I guess? Evidently, the dot on the minimap is
some kind of fuck you instant kill ghost , going by videos I watched. Trying to explore without running into that adds a nice bit of tension, at least. Main character makes me think of the little buzzard knights from Joust. Maybe that's what made them turn to evil? It was either harass the ostrich knight or get their shit kicked in by this weird castle.

Bug Hunter: First impression was like "wow, 2 games in and we're already doing a deck-builder, huh?" I normally bounce right off these when they're in vidja format (just let me do the shit without having to draw it from a deck!), but in this case it works pretty well! I enjoyed having to work within my limitations to keep from getting overrun.

Ninpek Okay! Fun little SonSon inspired game. I like how when you lose a life, your little ghost form gets its own powered-up shot. I found the sandwich from the opening scene, but got killed before I could grab it, so I got pissed and quit.

Paint Chase Alright, kind of a Rally X meets Q-Bert sort of deal, with some nice puzzley level layouts. I like how even the design of the car communicates that it's pointy as fuck and will pop most of the stuff you run into. It got harder than I could manage in later levels, but was still fun. The driver even cusses like Q-bert!

Magic Garden I'm way worse at this game than I feel like I should be, but I really liked it once everything clicked. Kinda feels like if you took Libble Rabble, and made it a very competent Snake clone. I'm a sucker for anything with a "magical woodland" aesthetic.

Mortol Can't help but to root for this weird death cult. Between the stone temple lost civilization aesthetic and the nice chunky monsters, it kinda feels like Rygar's more cerebral but nihilistic cousin.

Velgress Probably one of my favorites so far! Pirate Alpha moves and shoots like a dream, and the platforming has a great sense of tension. Wasn't really expecting a reverse Downwell through the filter of a Metroid x Kid Icarus mashup, but I'll take it!

Planet Zoldath I love the goofy rubber suit critters, and some of the items have unexpectedly fun uses, but I don't really like that you can only carry two of them. Might take a couple go rounds for this to really click.

Attactics Got much farther in this one than I expected to! Lining your melee guys into columns of three (they don't take damage when you do this) feels pretty satisfying when you can pull it off. Hit a wall in one of the later rounds, but will most likely come back to this one.

Devilition Ah shit! I remember this one! It's Diabolika! I used to love playing this way back when, and I'm glad to see an updated version made it into this collection. I like how the addition of the townspeople both gives you a more clearly defined goal, and something else to plan your chain reactions around.
 

JBear

Internet's foremost Bertolli cosplayer
(He/Him)
Man, no else seems to love Barbuta on as many levels as I do. That game slaps! Easily my favourite game that I've played thus far. Just so incredibly satisfying to slowly suss out all the rules and secrets, and once you do figure everything out, you feel like a wizard.

I realize that it looks inscrutable at first, but there's NPCs peppered throughout the game that give you tips that, unlike many games of the era its aping, are really good and useful!
 
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ShakeWell

Slam Master
(he, etc.)
With really only two exceptions, one of which was "playing a spooky thing on stream," I've not been digging into the games, I'm trying to get a survey of all 50, then coming back to the ones I really dig.
 

RT-55J

space hero for hire
(He/Him + RT/artee)
Rail Heist is a really good stealth game --- a great fusion of old and modern sensibilities. The game is divided into ~2-screen size stages reminiscent of some old puzzlish platformers (complete with an opening panning shot like Gyromite/Lode Runner), but the mechanics are very intricate and emergent like an immersive sim. Turn-based action-stealth feels like a bizarrely obvious combination in retrospect (one of the Steamworld games did this before, right?).

Every level has three cheevos you can get for speedrunning, killing all guards, and killing no guards. For some of these levels it seems like pacifist would be the hardest challenge by a long shot.

I really wouldn't mind a level editor for this one.
 

Sarge

hardcore retro gamin'
Warptank is definitely my favorite of the bunch so far. Four stages I need to find, though, before I move on. But I'd dropped the whole kit-and-kaboodle 'cause Zelda. Once I do that I'm going to dive back into Vainger (did a bit last night) and finish it up. I don't think I'm terribly far from the end of it - just have a few map spots to uncover in the original area.
 

RT-55J

space hero for hire
(He/Him + RT/artee)
I played theough Pingolf twice last night, first getting a +35 and then getting a +18. I was doing pretty well the second time around, until I started bungling holes in the mid and late good. It's still really pleasant. Lots of nice visual touches, and the dunk maneuver is quite satisfying.

Less satisfying is game #50, Cyber Owls. The TMNT-esque mascot team brings to mind several late-NES corpo-art setpiece-rushes (Battletoads & Double Dragon, Bucky O'Hare, Zen: Intergalactic Ninja, etc.), and frankly this doesn't compare well in terms of spectacle or polish (even if the graphics and sound are no slouch).

Each of the four mascot characters has one stage in a different gameplay style. There's a buff macho owl with an action platformer where the sprites are too big. There's a hotshot owl with a horizontal shmup where the sprites are too big. There's a army-looking owl with a Cabal-like gallery shooter with awkward aiming/shooting controls. And there's a ladybird with a Metal Gear-lite thing, where you have to deal with the awkwardness of cycling through your inventory with no pause button (it's still my favorite of the bunch).

The issue here (besides me being bad at half the games) is that with only one stage apiece, the levels feel like shallow minigames compared to the depths on display nearly every other game in the collection. Without room to elaborate or twist their concepts, the stages here feel derivative despite the ostensible variety.

Ironically, the most interesting minigame only happens if you lose a stage: the character ends up captured, and you need to do bring in another character to do a little DROD-like turn-based action to rescue them, in lieu of having lives (note that if you lose a rescue mission, that means you have another character than you need to rescue!). I never figured out how to play these missions well, but I found them neat regardless.

(In my opinion, if they really wanted to bring these 5 game styles together, they should have flipped the script: have the DROD-like levels be the meat of the game (and maybe squad based?), and then have the different types of action be Archon-esque dressing.)

This is mostly based on vibes, but I wouldn't be surprised if the metafictional reason for the game being like this is that UFOSoft's bosses stapled 5 different projects together in a last-ditch effort to make a system seller, much to the chagrin of the development staff involved. Some aspects of the presentation seem to indicate to me that this was what Mossmouth was going for here and, you know what, I respect that.

If nothing else, it makes for a neat prequel to Avianos.
 

Sarcasmorator

Same as I ever was
(He/him)
I've been enjoying this (someone kindly gifted me a copy all impromptu). Haven't played any game very long, but I have tried them all a little bit. I liked Hypercontender and the Metroidy antigrav one, offhand. Adore the concept of it and the lost console metafiction running through it all. Most things hit that retro sweet spot of playing like you remember 80s games playing while actually playing a little better.
 

spines

cyber true color
(she/her, or something)
i've tried out right about half of these so far and here's my top 5 so far:

magic garden - hits just right. feels retro in the right way but the game ending and the scoring encouraging you to fill the screen with garbage in a way that makes the game get super intense is really fun. it's pretty fun to get in the zone and play safe too, even

waldorf's journey - this is a game i would find pretty annoying if the aesthetic wasn't so good...it's weird and surreal and the story side of it hits nicely for an offbeat game

golfaria - this game convinced me to buy the collection. it's pretty golvellius, so i liked it. i know it's tough to start but it gets really good once you get rolling

velgress - another thing i wouldn't think of buying alone, but since it's just one super-intense six minutes (haha. like i live that long) it really hits. people need to do this more, lol, i know you can't just release standalone games of this length and get people to play them very easily, but still...

cyber owls - it's art. it kinda sucks on average and that's part of the art. it has a softlock bug and i seriously wonder if they won't fix it because it fits the vibe so well
 

jpfriction

(He, Him)
I broke down and consulted a guide for Barbuta last night as I had been stuck for a couple of days. Apparently I had made it to one screen outside the boss room. Stupid blind leaps onto hidden blocks. Ah well, there were a couple other hidden items I missed that I probably wouldn’t have found on my own.
 
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