10S FOREVER
by owch
Finished: XI've been meaning to talk about this game, and now it's on sale for 50% off on Steam until November 13th, so it's a good time to talk about it.
It's a quite challenging tennis combat bullet hell game where you hit the ball into enemies to damage them while dodging the attacks that are sent your way (four hits and you're out). The game has 8 levels where you fight waves of enemies and each level ends with a unique boss fight.
I played the original 10S and I was delighted by it, so I knew that I would have to check out 10S FOREVER. Compared to 10S's 3D visuals, the top down 2D perspective of 10S FOREVER does lose a bit of the weird charm that I liked from the original, but it does make up for that in basically every other part of the game.
Much like the original 10S, this game just has an immaculate vibe. There is definitely a story, but finer details are lost on me as the writing is often cryptic and strange. I don't know why an orchestra hit sound effect plays when you take damage, but I like it. The pixel art is simple and pretty, and the character animations are so expressive. Meanwhile, the music sets a weird mood while you're fighting for your life on the courts. All of these things turn the act of playing tennis into something that feels like a surreal ritual.
I love the ways that the bullet hell mechanics intermingle with tennis.
Hit the ball to gradually build up power (called heat in the game) and spend your heat to hit a charge shot to do an Area of Effect attack for massive damage. The bigger your heat, the bigger the attack. You don't lose heath for letting the ball reach the back edge of your side of the court (a new ball spawns for you to serve if you do), but you do lose heat. If you build your heat to its max level, then a heart spawns which will heal you if you collect it before it disappears, and you have the option to spend all of your heat to unleash a super attack that does massive damage.
You want to constantly be paying attention to both the enemy's side and your side of the court in order to make sure that you are in position to hit the ball back, but also dodge bullets. It's not always possible or safe to be in the position to hit the ball back, so you have to make the momentary judgement calls: do you fully commit or drop your combo to play it safe? Your attacks and the ball dispel enemy bullets, so you might want to put yourself in danger to keep the rally going while hoping that your attack and the ball will block the projectiles. You also have a dive that can get you out of bad situations, or allow you to leap towards the ball to hit it back just in the nick of time.
Some enemy attacks spawn additional balls when you hit them, adding to the chaos of the field with more things to keep track of and rally back. More balls means more damage and building up heat way faster.
These simple mechanics have quite a bit of nuance to them that you pick up on while learning the game.
Your swinging attack is a rectangle surrounding you, but the angle that you hit the ball is dependent on where within that rectangle the ball is when you hit it. This allows you to control whether or not you hit the ball at a more forward angle or at a more sideways angle. It's very satisfying when you get a feel for this.
You don't actually lose your heat when you lose a ball: you lose your heat when a new ball is spawned after there were no balls in play. Therefore, as long as there is at least one ball in play, losing balls doesn't cost you any heat. Your charge shots destroy the ball that you hit, and if that's the only ball in play, a new one has to be spawned. However, if there are multiple balls in play, no ball is spawned after a charge shot, meaning that your charge shot is free, assuming you can keep rallying the remaining balls. Knowing this, you can set up for situations where you fire off multiple charge shots, taking out groups of enemies.
These bits of knowledge add even more layers to the game, which gives you more options for when you have to make split-second decisions.
When trying to keep your heat combo: do you chase after the ball that is already in play, or is there an enemy projectile that you can hit to spawn a new one that you should go after instead?
The charge shot attack counts as a ball in play while it's active, so you might want to use that to buy yourself some time to find another ball to keep your heat up.
When the heart spawns, it starts at the top of the screen and slowly moves downwards until it disappears behind you. Once it spawns, you only have a certain amount of time to get it. Is it worth it dropping the ball to run and get it, or do you think that you can set things up so that you can collect it and keep the rally going? Is it worth trying to put yourself in more danger so you can heal yourself?
I love the ways that your two main objectives of hitting the ball back and not getting hit yourself clash with one another. You're always trying to get away with as much as you can, and it's so satisfying.
10S FOREVER is great and I highly recommend checking it out.