I find that when you go straight you leave a longer trail.
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I find that when in doubt (or nearing panic) just hold a direction and spin in circles until you get your bearings again.
(Have not made it back to that first boss yet)
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I like how just when you feel like you’ve got this game figured out you can’t break a score of like 42!
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A few times I’ve managed to steer myself through the gap between two enemies and it’s like whoa there that’s a pro level move I’m not ready for yet and then go back to steering right into the only enemy left on the screen.
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I imagine leaving a C where they’re going to be and it’s helped me get to the first boss more consistently.
bumping off the boundary can be pretty useful, if a little risky
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trying to control this really messes with my head
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I was not necessarily planning to play this game again today but I don’t know that I can abide my score being beaten by a single point.
Edit: And of course the second boss has a second form that I could have easily avoided but drifted into in my ignorance the one time I managed to beat it.
Edit 2: I really like the drippy meter.
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So close. I panicked at the very end of the third boss’s second form and ran right into a projectile.
This might be obvious but I will share the strategy I’ve been using:
After the first three gems, leave the next batch sitting for a few seconds until they become 2x gems. At that point, grabbing three or four in rapid succession will make your meter drip and then you have the opportunity to create and collect many more. I try to keep collecting them to remain in fever mode but also keep a crop in one corner or another to harvest when they reach 2x.
That said, even today I had a couple rounds in which my total score was 3.
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Managed to the beat the first boss. I can get to him somewhat reliably now but haven’t scored higher than 57 gems.
It’s fun! I find I survive a lot longer when I focus on going after gems rather than trying to kill or avoid enemies. Enemies will get killed as a side effect of collecting the gems anyway. Plus I’m getting a little better at steering my fish. I’ve unlocked three additional fish and checked them all out but so far have just been sticking with the default.
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Seeing everybody’s new scores, especially @wourme’s progress, I had to keep playing. We’re coming for you, @miffy!
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i’m so proud of everyone!! i may have to unleash my true power…
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264 is my best run so far. That second boss is a bastard! Also, I’ve learend bumping walls is a viable strategy. Is there any reason to not always pick gems as your bonus when you beat a level?
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Funny, I had the same thought about the shield. It’s the only option I have ever picked.
I now know exactly what game I would choose for this.
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Ditto. Also the “yeah” when the red door appears sounds like dynamite headdy’s “yes” imo
At 1 minute
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This is killer box art btw.
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i think gems are the best choice almost inarguably, i’ve never picked either of the other two power ups more than a few times. i think for some of the weirder flies it’s a harder choice since they might benefit from the other power ups more, but if you want to optimize your score you need to just pick gems and play as best you can
each boss appears at a set number of gems; the first boss appears at 50, the second at whatever your score was when you cleared the first boss plus 100, and the third at whatever your score was when you cleared the second boss plus 150 if i’m remembering right. because of that, you’re kind of locked into this score curve as you progress through the game, and your score is more or less a function of how long you can keep going without dying. so the way to really push for a high score is try to find ways to get ahead of that curve you’re locked into and use your limited time efficiently to get as much score as you can out of it before you inevitably die, and there are only two ways to do that
the first is to leave as many gems on screen as you can manage before collecting the final gem that triggers the boss, and then safely collecting them as the boss fight begins; bonus points if you manage to cook them into +2 gems. this also helps you maintain fever for a brief period at the beginning of the fight which can really help you get through it
the second way is choosing the gem powerup. always always try to cook them before collecting them; if you enter the door on the very corner you can avoid collecting them all as they appear and leave the majority of them to cook. you can collect some of the outer gems to get your fever going and dodge enemies while the rest cook, but even if you collect only a portion of the gems as +2s it’s usually worth it. whenever you collect a gem from the gem powerup, it doesn’t count towards your progress towards the next boss; you’ll notice that like the number at the bottom of the screen that tracks that will go up with your score every time you collect one, so it’s just a flat bump ahead of the score curve i described
ive played enough to where i can consistently beat all the bosses though, and i think shield is really useful for practicing the bosses and just like, letting you see more of the game. once you get to that point of consistency though gems are the only option, if someone manages to get as far as you did while always picking gems then they’ll just always have a higher score
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also wall bumps are really useful, especially during the boss fights. the quick kill on the first boss i mentioned before is just getting a really good bump on the right side of the screen on the boss’s second pass when it’s not shooting, and then turning away from it as it nears the edge of the screen so your bubbles cluster up and do a ton of damage in a really short time. if you do it perfectly and managed to get some damage in on the first pass when it is shooting, it’ll just die right there and it makes it a total breeze. i think someone already picked up on this earlier in the thread but i can like upload a gif of that if anyone wants me to so you can like see what i mean, i’m sure it’s hard to visualize written out like this
on the second boss a wall bump at the top of the screen is sometimes the only way to survive a really tricky pattern of missiles, and that sort of thing comes up outside of boss fights too where a bump can be the best way to get through weird situations that sometimes occur when you journey to the edge of the screen to collect gems, but that’s much less common
it’s also just
☆ﾟ * ･｡ * ｓｔｙｌｉｓｈ * ｡･ * ☆ﾟ
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