1993 Space Machine

I had this notion to go through my entire steam library and place each game for at least 20 minutes. Needless to say, that didn't get very far. But the first game on my alphabetical list was this little gem. What is 1993 Space Machine? I'm still not sure. There's some kind of weird story about a bad guy who makes weird robot thingys? I don't think it was 1993 or I encountered the space machine. But it's a fun little shooter regardless. Not sure it's worth 10 bucks. I finished the main game in under 2 hours. I must have gotten this tossed into a bundle or something. It's like a 3/5.

Can't really complain when you pay about $1 for the game, but I'm going to anyway. I'm just curious to know if the devs even tried with this game? The levels are boring if not tedious, and the designs (especially of the ships) are horrendous. Play any other game of thos genre, even the mobile versions, and you'll probably be more hooked

懷舊畫風的清版射擊遊戲，手感還行，甚至有升級系統，但敗筆也在升級系統。首先武器五花八門，卻缺乏真正的武器展示動畫，只有一張靜態圖，玩家根本無從參考。機體升級也是意義不明，原本的初階機移動速度快又有護盾，其中一個升級選項不僅拔掉護盾 (無傷抵達 Boss 戰簡直不可能)，還讓機體本身變大 (更容易被打到)、速度變得更慢 (躲不過彈幕)，WTF。偏偏好死不死我所在的關卡需要越過好幾處陷阱地形，那麼大一台機體根本無法無傷通過！ 重複遊玩關卡時，擊敗敵機無法再次獲得金幣也是很失敗的設計！ 另外根據我搜尋到的結果，這遊戲的成就系統已經壞了 3 年了！我全破 Rookie 難度後完全沒有解鎖任何成就。 [h2][b]總結[/b][/h2] 這遊戲的升級機制有嚴重的設計缺陷，不是入包或骨折千萬不要入手。如果你是成就黨就更要把這遊戲列入黑名單。 個人入手方式：Steamtrade

Eh. It's an ok shmup.

un excellent petit shoot’em up pour les amateurs du genre, ou pour ceux qui veulent une dose rapide d’arcade bien fun !

All that it's missing is a synthesized voice saying "bloodmoney"

The title already narrates the story of the game: an Amiga production that ended up abandoned due to personal vicissitudes of the developers - I even vaguely recall having heard of the original title [b]Shenandoah[/b], which has been recovered for the 2020 update - until one of them found the old code and assets a couple of decades later and decided to resurrect the project with today's development tools. While some elements are clearly modern, like the 16:9 format, with others it's difficult to tell where the original production ends and new parts begin. The rotating shield, for example, feels new because with the joysticks mostly used at the time, I can't see it as a convenient mechanic. According to the devs, allowing up to four players was always in the plans, and they had even developed an adapter for that in the 1990s. The presentation would've been excellent at the time and it's still pretty good for today, an era where indie gaming has brought a big re-evaluation an resurrection of pixel art. A few ship designs aren't great but the variety of sprites and environments is really notable, showing it was indeed an ambitious production for those years. An especially original enemy appears in the lab stage: creatures releasing bullets from their vats, they can't be destroyed but can be sealed by shooting the lids enough to close them. There are also two passages where, suddenly, excellently animated animals made up of moving bullets appear, "nonsensical" but beautiful. The developers have resisted any temptation to modernize the core gameplay and, for better or worse, [b]1993[/b] is an "euroshooter" of the day: janky, fairly slow, big player hitbox, higher probability of having to tank some damage than dodge attacks, ship that can easily become overpowered, haphazardly designed enemy waves. Yet, they managed to adjust it just enough that, while far from the best titles of the genre, I found it still fairly fun to play. The devs also kept working on it over the years following the original release, leading to the current version that also offers a more accessible difficulty. Doesn't change that, well, it's still a janky euroshooter, with some obstacles that are wholly unfair (looking at the small suns), and great confusion at times due to small particle effects, which can make seeing small enemy bullets difficult. It's also severely lacking in options, not even a key configuration. [b]1993[/b] is really a passion project directed at a specific niche. It's enjoyable and at this point it goes on sale for ridiculous prices (93% discount, heh!) that make it worth getting, but its development history may be more interesting than the game itself.

Tickles the exact same brain lobe as those old arcade cabinets of my youth, tucked in corners of hotels or pizza places or ferries, when there were never enough quarters to go around and the flashing lights and 8-bit sounds plied my young mind with the promise of cool sci-fi military hardware and explosions. So many explosions. Love. My only gripe is that you can't resize the window and it defaults to fullscreen without any in-app option to change that, which is kind of awkward with a superwide monitor.

It's not terrible, but I can't recommend it. Gameplay is mediocre and the achievements are broken. There's some weapon variety which is nice, but it's really hard to gain currency to buy them since money drops are near non-existent if you replay levels so if you want to try other things you're kinda forced to just restart.