DC Super Hero Girls: Teen Power

Platform: Nintendo Switch
Release Date: Jun 4, 2021
Developer: TOYBOX
Publisher: Nintendo
ESRB Rating: E10+
Players: 1 Player

Been playing this from launch. This is a really solid game and I can see why Nintendo published it. The whole situation with this game is strangely handled; it's practically a stealth release. Anyhow, here are some quick notes.

The fights in this game are predominantly speed-oriented / mobility-encouraged. Time attacks. (I do a glass cannon build, which actually works great for speediness achievements.) There's more powerUP points and money awarded for beating encounters under a certain low time and other special conditions. All the characters have good vertical ability. Combat arenas or action events are directly taken from places in the city, so everything looks well-designed and gives off a sense of cohesiveness / enhanced familiarity.

Punches, projectiles, super special attacks, fun beat em'up grabbing and throwing, dodge offset and 'just dodges' -- it's all here. Goes beyond the typical floor-grounded super hero crew battling that co-op would definitely not work on one screen or a split screen for the reason of the aforementioned drastic vertical changes (i.e. flight state). Lots of aesthetic mayhem, solid framerate. Game enemies have no qualms hitting you with a projectile when they're off-screen; given that they do this it greatly pays off to be cognizant of what could be at a distance behind your character.

Upbeat World Design + vibe. Puts me in a good mood. No "ugh, modern game design" moments as everything has a very snappy type of speed to it. Running around in the overworld (open area, not open world) and finding things, triggering events, or just amusement-based randomness is fast-paced with the character's infinite sprinting speed, certain city' springpad-imbued' architecture, and overall condensed world size. Think New Donk City in Super Mario Odyssey. World is always 'evolving'.

Great game - I'd recommend it. Challenge-wise, even if you don't go for the harder time attack clears, I've been hit with rather abrupt 'Game Over's. Requires quick-thinking. Game's difficulty has rising progression.

Don't sleep on this game, people.

Is there difficulty? Sounds interesting, also it was made by the deadly premonition 2 dev, weird.

Doesn't look like something I'd play but sounds like the combat mechanics are solid.

Running around taking selfies and dressing up didn't look good. How bad is that type of stuff? How much of it vs combat?

>builds
How do they work? Equipment? Distributing stat points.

>DP2 dev
What...

>DP2 dev
What...

Yeah, and it took me about 15 minutes of googling to figure out who developed this, very hidden.

hedfone wrote:Is there difficulty?

Yes, if you go for shards (what you'd normally call 'S-Rank').

Birdman wrote:Doesn't look like something I'd play but sounds like the combat mechanics are solid.

I'd recommend watching the Japanese trailer. But I will upload some footage later on.

Running around taking selfies and dressing up didn't look good. How bad is that type of stuff? How much of it vs combat?

You can take all the selfies you want or none at all. The camera-use in this game is very creative, and like you I don't have any big interest in taking photos in videogames, but here its implementation is very inspired and really adds to the experience. I'd mention Dead Rising for comparison-sake but it's definitely inspired by another game (I won't spoil).

Deciding things by combat is the norm in this game. There is a mission select with all the main and sub missions you've completed in the game, so you can spend hours going for all shards clears.

How do [builds] work? Equipment? Distributing stat points.

There aren't any real builds as you have 3 different characters to switch from that have different abilities. HP, Attack, Skill Attack, Super, Unique Action -- all the things to supe up. It's kept very simple and straightforward. No skill trees. No equipment.

hedfone wrote:Yeah, and it took me about 15 minutes of googling to figure out who developed this, very hidden.

Credits haven't been uploaded yet, but I'm very interested in who the director is and how much Nintendo staff helped out.

Say, do you find it well priced? Just digital, right? Seems to me the license rights were steep.
I'm not cheap, you see. I'm just laying open my noble formation in the video arts.

Zenyn wrote:Say, do you find it well priced?

Sure. I have no bad feelings after paying full price.

Just digital, right?

No, there are plenty of physical copies to snag at retail stores.

Any more questions before the big post? Points of comparisons to be made? Stuff that would make you buy the game? Under normal circumstances this game's purchasability doesn't happen by the more-than-enough appearances of red flags from the trailer and boxart:

multiple characters
This is a red flag to me for just about every 1-player action videogame. The characters here (there are actually more than 3 playable characters) are all fun to play as without any off-putting / out-of-place gimmick character that crate pushes or fishes or something else at odds with the fast-pace. I found Wonder Woman to be disappointing in her moveset but much later on her designated missions are quite impressive when the stage becomes tailor-made around her maneuverability & attacks. I'm having a rather hard time getting all shards for her final sub-mission.

Most missions allow you to choose your character (and assign up to 2 support characters). If they don't then it's a scenario that plays into a particular characters strength. Your teammate's AI attack pattern is a mystery: they act on their own and don't seem to have any player triggerable-states for when they use special moves. At first I thought the teammates were practically unbeatable since their health bars barely budge when hit, but it appears there isn't any limiter as they can take significant damage from explosive attacks, although I am not sure it's enough to 'down' them.

theme
Super hero games are usually not that great outside arcade titles. Although, I did remember thinking Superman 64 was cool in that it let you fly and use ice powers, but that it just was too hard. Here it's nice to see what a good Superman combat system looks like.

this is for 'children'___ and 'girlyness'
No. Also, I've read that children and journalists have struggled with aforementioned flight controls.

trailer
It's impressive how the trailer obscures so much. Social occasion emphasized, naturally. But then that super bubbly-voice narration somehow obscures everything making it imagined that the character interaction is without textboxes (showed once later briefly in the trailer) and that you'll be subjected to full unskippable dialogue scenes. Fighting shown in snippets (20s total) while character art takes up ~1/3 of screen. Top Youtube comments all sarcastic {post Paper Mario didn't play image}.

I haven't uploaded any action footage of my own or imagery just to see how much written text can recover perception.

Review-time! A must play videogame for its great sense of speed, aesthetic mayhem in the chaining system, and to discuss realistically-assembled spaces versus abstract levels in action games. While I have no doubts that people who enjoy Nintendo games will appreciate this title, I don’t think writing that is enough: this is the most compelling 3D superhero action game on the market. Everything else looks generic compared to when you see the results of pulling off a 50 chain combo or the triumph of getting to the vaunted 100 chain (a level 10). Can you keep up with the aesthetic bombardment? While in Ninja Gaiden 2 [360], Ryu practically bathed in explosions, here the big hits by your character explode out a giant colored word of “SMASH!!” (and the color changes based on your chain number count) and hitting multiple foes in a juicily-landed hit saturates the screen with numerous of the aforementioned visual effect.

A quick summary on the story or the story mechanics of this game: Nintendo story-lite*. Down-time is better thought of as "what's around the corner?" when it comes to getting to point B. Personally, I enjoyed everything so I wasn't tapping my foot wishing for non-stop fighting. There's an upbeat sense of relief interrupting / interwoven into the crisis points in the game that sets itself apart from other action titles. Each character controls in a favorable manner to snappy, fast / responsive attacks and maneuvers. Very surprising feat, IMO, cause usually one of the cast of characters sucks. The animations / mannerisms really sell the personalities well and these subtle traits also do impact character handling, albeit subtly.  



Action in the game is speed-oriented, smash-powered, and score multiplier-incentivized (i.e. chain number). Speed-oriented means that there is no block button, drastic changes can be made to player's position from a standstill, and finding items ala Golden Hamsters are cleverly hidden but within close grasp (i.e. Shinobi on PS2). In terms of combat moves available, everything is unlockable for a character near immediately (or more descriptively, after 1 battle). There are a small variety of moves that remind me of something akin to a 2D beat-em-up game. You have your standard melee combo, a burst attack, a character-specific unique action, and a super special move. There is a flight state enterable with Supergirl / Starfire that has its own moveset, which gives those two characters more complexity. Another character has the only double jump in the game. Stuff like that.

Only at one point did I feel a lull, and that was my fault for just mashing the x-button to do one type of attack. It was effective and unchallenged. However, I quickly learned how to bait attacks to refresh your burst attack, pop enemies up into the air for juggles or to bounce them off a wall, zip across the stage to quickly grab powerUP drops to refill the burst gauge or charge the super special attack gauge faster. Additionally, not getting hit gives you a satisfaction like collecting Sonic rings because the game's visual effects explode out around you as you essentially 'charge' your state of play into an untouchable death run like a STG. As such there is a hyper awareness of tuning into the different timing mixed crowds of enemies will employ against you.

Stages are beatable within a short time like an arcade game level short time. And this might be for good reason as getting too good or ensured success or prolonged battle is aesthetically chaotic. Sensory overload. No checkpoints. Quick restarts. One point of interest is how screwed up you can get when switching a scenario or award requirement. There are also real devious punishments that go into play like getting hit by a move with a status effect, normally a minor irritation, that will cause you to fail a mission.

IMO, the combat system works best for group encounters. So boss fights with minions are better than solo boss fights. Bosses are hit-or-miss but always employ new strats to take them down to give them a special aura compared to the regular baddie fodder. 1 surprise boss fight was an expressible disappointment to me given their known power level. When you think of boss fights you might immediately think of a large, heavy-weight creature -- well, I won't spoil it but it is clever how the enemy weight attributes are used in this game, although not for the boss fights oddly.

This game has been compared -- only in the most superficial way possible of a one-off sentence that I interpret as a name drop than knowledgeable opinion -- by game reviewers to Bayonetta and Devil May Cry. Both those games are crammed full of mixing attack inputs and directional inputs where this game is not. An apt comparison would be to Shinobi because both combat systems work on having no interruption, but here you get goodies to absorb rather than souls. Getting a chain to 50 is a challenge, 100 a triumph. So bop /= bludgeon. Bop /= cut. This game's combat is of its own unique system.



And you can not only see the results but your score will be put to good use dumping money and points into buying new decors for a dilapidated city and also for outfits. I think the city building is neat, but I am wondering how much more venturable through it should be for a battle ground ala Devil's Third multiplayer.

Frustration of saving the best for last. Of the Action treats. There is this 1 insane Test of Valor-esque mission where 99 enemies must be defeated while you dodge lasers from floating laser beam-firing pods that fully surround the area. Got a chain of 350 on this mission! 'Go, Wonder Woman, Go!' is crowd-control 5-out-of-5 stars game design other companies wish they could incorporate with a level design so seemingly simple it almost boggles the mind how the greatest superhero event lies herein. What's great here is how even with minor moments and disappointing moments and "this is why I play videogames" moments, all that stuff, every highlight in the game is easily accessible in a mission select to play at a moment's notice.

*The 6-12 year old target audience for the show, and thus majority of the videogame's supposed audience, do not have time for pretentious exposition dumps. I get that people are apprehensive about picking up a game with 'cartoon girls' on the cover, but just like with similarly-looking Splatoon, dismissiveness is unwise.

I'm not saying this is bad, but based on what you've written I'm not seeing anything unique about it or a reason to buy it unless it's on sale. Like for $5.

>girly design
I'll still try it if the combat is good. But I need more info.

Can you make some videos of some fights?

There's some GameFly sale now where someone got the game for $30 used.

I have videos on my twitter: https://twitter.com/supergamer303

In the top video you can see that Harley Quinn can launch herself an enormous distance to reach enemies on the opposite side of a large stage. Not only is the spring fully aimable (also cancellable) in any direction (minus downwards, of course) but it also, as you can see, moves the player at a thrillingly fast speed. It's quite a challenge to time this as a long-range option to aerial spin-slash through people, but that just makes it all-the-more satisfying when it connects. If you or anyone else can name other action games that let you close such a massive distance in such a small time from a standstill position please share.

Although I am more interested in your thoughts on the videos in general.

Its uniqueness comes from its comic book-styled nature for both its physics engine, particularly the mobility but also the 'POW!!' enemy goes flying knockback, and color use whereas the other 'high-def' super hero games to me feel and look rather drab like playing a Mortal Kombat game that removes the red blood for the censored grey 'sweat' dulled color, almost to the point of no hit impact visual effect at all. On the September 4th posted videos I was able to recreate an RE4-style camera look, which isn't possible by normal means; gives the game quite a serious look I think. And finally the aforementioned chain system that greatly visually rewards you for being an untouchable force (notice in the videos that I only reached a 60 chain/level 6 drop-rate and how much the screen is getting flooded with stuff).  

I'll be editing the review to add more detail, although I purposely will continue to not spoil the major unique action events because it's more interesting to see what happens to new players if I don't.

> If you or anyone else can name other action games that let you close such a massive distance in such a small time from a standstill position please share.

Is this really that special though?

>Although I am more interested in your thoughts on the videos in general.

I don't know what happened in those videos. I wouldn't mind seeing proper mechanical breakdowns though.

>unique for superhero games

Never liked them.

Special? Yeah. Being able to do that spring maneuver makes a big difference for time attacks.

I don't particularly care for superhero games either, but this game is different. It really deserves a sequel, and I'm not sure it sold in Japan at all considering I didn't see it in the Media Create Top 30 sales charts. (Hoping the overseas audience has healthy sales.) The aerial acrobatic maneuvering you do with Wonder Woman's shield, another spring-bounce move, on her final mission is absurd. I'd really like to read other high-level players opinions on here talk about favorite stages they enjoy and time trial scores to beat. One of the missions I barely got the requirement for a shards award by two seconds! I am not sure how to achieve this with the other two characters available during that point. But yeah, this game you are just blowing through enemies as fast as you can moving in an outward direction whereas I find other games get you more comfortable and situated duking it out in a set area / ring.

>Being able to do that spring maneuver makes a big difference for time attacks.

I mean in the context of other action games. A forward momentum ability is nothing new. Being able to attack from the state is good and adds depth. But it's far from making me want to buy it right now.

Can you break down the mechanics more? Make a full guide for it like what I did with Knack 2. List all combat options. I can see you're really serious just like I am about certain unrecognized action games, so I get where you're coming from. But you need to put in more effort regarding mechanical info. Go all out. Start an in-depth combat guide. If I like what I read I may buy it for whatever the price is. Is it only on Switch?

Offense-wise, the base mechanics that apply to all characters:
Melee Attack - you hit up to 4 times, with the last hit being a 'power strike' that grants you i. frames. The same applies in the air with two exceptions.

Skill Attack - a burst move with a period of recovery afterwards before reusable. Is able to be used as a 'power strike'. A powerful attack that grants you super armor. Each character's skill attack greatly differs from the other.

Unique Action - usually a huge mobility-oriented move.

Special Move - your big powerful super move that deals lots of damage and grants invulnerability. Fills automatically when receiving damage.

[Note: Supergirl / Starfire have access to an additional move via a flight-state, which has its own special controls and physics engine, that allows them to boost-ram enemies as a tech chase move.]

Defense-wise
Dodge - 1) can be used as a dodge offset to move within range of an otherwise unreachable enemy to continue your combo; 2) can be used to dodge normally; 3) can be used to 'just dodge', which acts as a slowmo-inducing move that lets you follow up with a 'powerstrike' or jump-cancel; 4) can be used to cancel a skill attack.

Jump - 1) can be used as a means of jumping over an attack; 2) can be used from a 'just dodge' in order to not expose the player to an anticipated attack; 3) can be used after a regular dodge to eliminate recovery lag
-----------

That's just describing what happens in a regular interaction space. Stage hazards and stage elements also are able to be used to up the amount of interactions possible. (i.e. you can hide behind a crate, wall, column, etc. to escape laser-detection shots). This is game demonstrably reminded me how important compelling stage design is for 3D action games. [Note: I forgot to talk about Lock-On but I don't use it anyway]

>power strike grants i-frames
Unusual.

I noticed Super Girl can freeze enemies. Is this guaranteed? Works on all types? How long does it last? What other elements are there?

Pretty sure I saw her or someone else throw an enemy or object. What can you do? Are there enemy collisions?

I believe I may have seen a wall hit (well it was an enemy hitting car but didn't see clearly). Is this a thing?

Can you cancel flying into instant drop?

>Is able to be used as a 'power strike'. A powerful attack that grants you super armor.
Used in place of the normal power strike?

>your big powerful super move that deals lots of damage and grants invulnerability
So a musou type attack.

>jump cancel
Can anything be jump canceled?

Ice breath or is it 'super breath', can either freeze or blow away enemies. It works on most types, but some require low health to work on. An important thing to note is that its normal use only has super armor, so using it on a no-hit run is very risky; time attacks, even worse since it is slow. I usually destroy everything immediately after using it, I'd estimate it lasts for slightly less than 5 seconds. There are also fire and electric elements.

You can throw enemies, vehicles, bins, etc. You can throw an enemy and also carry stuff. I'd like to write that there are enemy collisions outside of throwing them into one another because 'powerstrikes' completely clear the general direction you send your enemy flying, but maybe they are getting caught up in the actual strike itself. I am fairly certain it is the case where they're bowled over by the enemy but it's not like you're trying to line up a specific enemy to hit into another specific enemy from a distance with melee moves.

Yes, you can rebound enemies off walls and continue pummeling them mid-air. I don't think the wall hit incurs any damage.

You can instantly rise, but dropping has a slight delay before you free fall, which prevents it from feeling like your character "has no cartilage" cause an immediate fast fall to hit the ground would be jolt-inducing.

Yes, special attacks can be used in place of the normal power strike. Generally this is inadvisable, but certain character special attacks (i.e. 'super breath') have different properties when used as a power strike than as a non-combo finisher or 'just dodge' retaliatory attack.

Jump cancel shaves off lag time of a regular dodge animation; i.e. a dodge roll.

>can either freeze or blow away
Based on what?
Is the blow away a knockback?

>fire and electric elements.
DOT and paralysis?
Can they be grabbed and thrown when affected? Any effect spread? Can objects be infused?

>an immediate fast fall would be jolt-inducing.
It would be a billion times better. Landing long before enemies for relaunch, falling attacks like in certain fighters (think Magneto in MvC2 or Super DBZ flight cancels). Lots of neat stuff.

>jump cancel
Only works on dodges? Disappointing.

Yes, the blow away is a knockback 'SMASH!!'.

No DOT. Paralysis is only a player-induced status.

Only Supergirl / Starfire can throw enemies. Both are characters that can't use fire. I think only Harley Quinn can light enemies on fire, and it's random effect with an RNG gun. So she could as a teammate could inflame an enemy for you to then throw them but I don't think it spreads that status. Nor do I remember giant fireball attacks causing friendly fire. Objects can be frozen, although not water 'spring bounce' spewing from fire hydrants.

>It would be a billion times better. Landing long before enemies for relaunch, falling attacks like in certain fighters (think Magneto in MvC2 or Super DBZ flight cancels). Lots of neat stuff.
You'll see that what you've got imagined isn't that ideal here. Again, the 'feel', the heft, the elasticity of character control is dead-on here. When you enter flight-state either through jumping OR a throw (automatically puts you into a flight state) because of this regrounding quirk, you are encouraged to air-boost in place of taking that slight delay and mini 'cloudpoof' landing lag. If you attack when falling, you don't keep dropping: Supergirl levels out in the air and proceeds to air combo, which is something to note so that a player has to give a melee button a reprieve to land.

>Only works on dodges? Disappointing.
Eh. I forgot to add that dodges allow you to cancel out of a skill attack.

>Objects can be frozen
>not water
Totally makes sense.
What is the purpose of freezing objects?

>flying
Should have been a state you can click on or off. The possibilities from such a simple command are insane.

How is flying actually started?

>dodging out of skills
A good sign.

Yeah, the fire hydrant thing was very noticeable. I thought initially it was disappointing, a rare oversight in the game, but soon after I realized it's perfectly reasonable and not an oversight in the slightest. I can explain. It returned to a undistracting non-issue for a couple reasons: 1) the game has a very simple nature and charming nature where throwing 'ice spears' is a jagged and violent action than the subject material allows; 2) a fire hydrant's water supply from underground wouldn't be frozen and would burst anyway sending the ice flying off; 3) it would be irritating waiting out the freeze time to regain use of the hydrant for a trampoline-boost.

The purpose of freezing objects is for 1) a damaging 360-degree spin attack; 2) stop enemy advancement; 3) gives your teammates easy to hit enemies. 4) hit a particular enemy that would hurt you if meleed; 5) drop airborne enemies. It's a very effective move and makes you question whether to ever drop Supergirl from your team as a playable character or backup.

>Should have been a state you can click on or off. The possibilities from such a simple command are insane.
We're not gonna agree on this one. I guess I can only further explain that the slight delay provides a necessary clear visual/animation/indication that the player is entering or about to enter another avatar-state and allows far more comfortable mistake-correcting. I personally think this is quite noticeable at high speeds (or more accurately, maintaining a high speed) where character control gets more volatile and these small/minute changes are stronger felt than at a normal speed. Maybe someone can mod the results of such an adjustment on an emulator.

Flying is normally started by pressing and holding the jump button while in the air from a jump. But you can also activate it by grabbing an enemy, which immediately raises your character off the ground. You can also activate it from falling off a building.

EDIT: HEY!, you can immediately reground if you flight-steer into the ground (or skim across its surface) and release the jump button.

>Subject material
What? They smash enemies with hammers, set them on fire, use bombs, shoot eye lasers, but an ice spear is an issue? It would be just as cartoony as anything else present. And it doesn't need to be ice spears. Could be blocks, pieces.

>fire hydrant's water supply wouldn't be frozen
Wouldn't need to be. Just take ice chunks off the water than comes out and it continues as normal.

>stop enemy advancement
Do they freeze when they touch the object?

>hit a particular enemy that would hurt you if meleed
Flaming enemies?

>drop airborne enemies
How? Do you throw the frozen object? What does a non frozen object do to them?

> makes you question whether to ever drop Supergirl
Not good look for the others.

>We're not gonna agree on this one
Don't need to. I just question how you can be against it considering the amount of depth it would provide.

>the slight delay provides a necessary clear visual/animation/indication that the player is entering / about to enter another avatar-state
Was never an issue in the games that do it.

>allows far more comfortable mistake-correcting.
I'm not saying they can't have a visual confirmation on landing. I'm saying they should be able to fast drop. You could still have a slight landing animation. This drop would enable you to hit the ground ahead of enemies for all sorts of fun. And since it would be a state you could click on and off like Super DBZ, the fall is no different from coming down from a regular jump. This allows you to not do the flying melee attacks, but falling normals. Nothing but gain here.

>gets more volatile and these small minute changes are stronger felt than at a normal speed
Practice makes perfect.

>pressing and holding the jump button while in the air from a jump
Low jump flying state possible?

>activate it by grabbing an enemy, which immediately raises your character off the ground.
Always?
His far does this take them off the ground?

>EDIT: HEY!, you can immediately reground if you flight-steer into the ground (or skim across its surface) and release the jump button.
What does this mean???

>What? They smash enemies with hammers, set them on fire, use bombs, shoot eye lasers, but an ice spear is an issue? It would be just as cartoony as anything else present. And it doesn't need to be ice spears. Could be blocks, pieces.

I mean this is really breaking the game down far more than you might want to before playing it. An ice spear is jagged, and cartoons associate those shapes with evil associations that go beyond the playable villains' range here. It doesn't mesh with the game's colorful bold look. You throw large bulbous objects, the girls are cute and bubbly, etc. Them 'goring' an enemy is a no-go. But in aid of your argument is that the game's blue robot enemies shoot three ice-sculpted pyramid-shaped projectiles. So I'm certain there can be pointy objects, but not objects that are slender and pointy.

>Just take ice chunks off the water than comes out and it continues as normal.
Again, I think game design-wise there is a consistency that is better met not having any renewing ice-formation from stage elements that must be used for the primary purpose of verticality.

>Do they freeze when they touch the object?
Only enemies directly hit by 'super-breath' get frozen.

Yes, Flaming enemies, spinning attacking enemies, electrified enemies, etc are vulnerable to super breath where meleeing would be risky or ineffective.

Certain flying enemies will drop when hit by a 'super breath' attack by Supergirl meeting them in the air and hitting them with the attack. Note that if the enemy is too weak, it gets blown away instead of being frozen. Yes frozen objects are then throwable. It doesn't seem to matter if you throw a frozen object or non-frozen object at an enemy. Funny thing is Supergirl can't grab enemies she lights on fire (burns her hands. haha) -- her laser beam super move has burning properties. I guess only [EDIT: I meant Star Sapphire] Starfire can do that.

Well, I am partial to Supergirl character anyway ha, but I think the other characters hold their own well where no one feels like a handicap character.

Free falling melee attacks is an interesting concept. Not sure how well it would work for this game though. I can at least feel inspired by it because its a very cool thing to do as an inkbrush player in Splatoon.

Yeah, the low flying jump state is possible from a grabbed and released enemy. Otherwise, you are stuck in a hovering item-carrying avatar-state. The low flying edit comment means that it is faster to reground by diving at the ground while airborne than doing a free fall drop, although past a certain height it is far faster to free fall (it does sacrifice the player's forward momentum).

>breaking the game down far more than you might want to before playing it
I'm just getting started.

>An ice spear is jagged and has evil associations.
I've never heard that before.

>'goring' an enemy is a no-go
I can accept that. I just meant ice usage.

>blue robot enemies shoot three ice-sculpted pyramid-shaped projectiles.
And there you have it.

>Again, I think game design-wise there is a consistency that is better met not having any renewing ice-formation from stage elements that must be used for the primary purpose of verticality.
Acceptable.

>Yes, Flaming enemies, spinning attacking enemies, electrified enemies, etc are vulnerable to super breath where meleeing would be risky or ineffective.
Risky? Meaning you could kill them without taking damage? Do they have openings?

>Note that if the enemy is too weak, it gets blown away instead of being frozen
So that's the rule. Weak as in lowered HP or just small fry?

>Yes frozen objects are then throwable
Size difference when encased in ice?
If so, could a single object hit more than one enemy?

>Supergirl can't grab enemies on fire (burns her hands. haha).
I guess they had no choice in a game since she's supposed to be immune to most things.

>I guess only Starfire can do that.
She can actually do it?

>where no one feels like a handicap character.
Without freeze what are their options for those risky enemy types?

>Free falling melee attacks is an interesting concept
Mainly a fighting game thing but would work perfectly.

Many action games don't have fighting game jump-ins. They mostly have air moves that freeze them in place or zip down (Helm Breaker/Killer Bee). Chaos Legion has both. Both basic jumping melee attacks don't stop jump trajectory at all so you can pop them out at any point (so low jump or close to ground are options, also allows 'while rising' versions), which is also true of the DMC moves (low/late inputs but they take over the jumps path) except for rising options. CL's Airblaze is like these. As soon as you input the command Seig stops the jump and comes straight down.

>flying
I feel like there's tech to be discovered here. Some kind of whacky cancel. We can only hope.

Would probably grab it just to try. But it's $90 here.

I think only Wonder Woman has a melee option via her sword with its separate hitbox to attack these 'whole body is a hurt-box' enemies but they'll continue moving into your damage zone if you don't dodge away after the initial strike. It may be possible to bop spinning enemies on the head if angled correctly with certain attacks (for those robot enemies that damage-spin their arms horizontally -- vertical damage-spins seem like you could strafe and hit them on their exposed side but this is challenging and probably best accomplished by a lock-on attack after a jump than a slower ground strafe). The spinning attacks and elemental-charged foes have a constant hurtbox from what it looks like; at least, I can only wager there is no opening on an even level seeing how fast the spinning attack is.

KOs (all) = blown away. Low HP (all) = frozen. Strong enemies = frozen when half HP / weakened.

No difference in size are objects when frozen. Items thrown can hit numerous enemies. Star Sapphire can throw enemies that are enflamed or electrified. Each Super Hero has projectile weapon (super breath / ice breath is Supergirl's projectile), so throwing a batarang, shield, etc. would interrupt enemy 'powered up' attacks.

Update: Enflamed status does lower HP of player character and enemy. There appears to be slight damage taken by enemies that get knocked into walls.

This game just won't go on sale. Why?

Well Vert, you've succeeded. I ordered this online today. Should arrive end of the week.

Decided mainly due to being bored but also some of your Twitter clips looked interesting.

Got it. Played about 2 hours so far. Here's my notes. There will be a lot of stuff Vert has already said. This is just me working through it myself.

Movement on the ground is pretty smooth and responsive. Easy to run around and turn.

Flying is a bit slow. Jump then press jump again to hover. Hold B+direction to fly around. Turning isn't sharp. No excuse for not having ZoE controls like boosting straight up or down. To get down you press jump again to drop but it isn't fast. You can tap it again to stay in the air. Dodging in the air also stops you falling.

Jumping has two heights. Tap for short, hold for higher. Slightly useful on certain enemies. The basic robots have buzzsaw arms and do horizontal attacks that you could short jump over (so you don't end up above them) and attack safely. Not really necessary with how easy it is to dodge or just run around them but it's there.

When jumping while moving you'll get a forward flip animation. Doesn't affect anything. Jumping while stationary is just straight upward but you can move slightly after the input. Whether it has any purpose remains to be seen.

You can 'just dodge' by dodging right before an attack connects. Press attack immediately and the character will zip over to the enemy and perform a strong hit. Don't know if this has any invincibility.

Each character has 3 abilities. The cooldown attack (I think they're cooldown, haven't been paying attention to them), the unique ability with no cost ability, and the super.

While playing, I totally forgot a lot of stuff I read here. Vert, I just read the part where you said those abilities can be used as power strikes. I'll need to test these next time I play.

*Supergirl

5 hit punch string.
All hits have quite a bit of forward movement. You can attack in any direction per hit which is something I like.

4th punch launches. Haven't looked into ways to capitalize on this yet.
The big punch at the end sends the enemy flying, though these were light enemies.

This string is the same in the air.

Can cancel with the dodge and dodge offset as noted by Vert already.
You can completely cancel the animation.

One strange aspect is with the last hit where she winds up and delivers a huge punch, if you dodge at the start of the animation and press attack again immediately, she'll still try to to that final hit. So it's dodge offsetting into itself infinitely.

No jump canceling attacks. You can kind of JC the dodge though. When Supergirl dodges, she comes to a stop and slides a little. If you press jump though you can get rid of that slide, but she doesn't actually jump. She does this tiny hop. If you hold you'll transition into the flying dash, so you skip having to have to to hit jump twice. Might need to test that because now that I think about it I don't remember this detail properly. Just going by my notes.

Canceling the dodge with a jump is a way to stop offsetting from happening. The jump part resets the combo.

When flying, smashing into enemies will knock them away. Should be possible to use this dash to follow up on other attacks.

>Power Lift
Power Lift is the grab. She'll automatically be hovering a little above the ground after grabbing, holding the enemy above her head. They'll break out after a few seconds if you do nothing. You can move slowly. Based on the basic robots, when they break free, they pop up into the air then drop down. Really bad animation. But you can grab them again during this. You can throw into a group hitting multiple enemies. Need to test if they can collide with enemy projectiles like missiles or thrown objects by the evil dolls. Enemies can still be grabbed during their attacks. Doesn't cost anything to use.

When thrown, they travel in a straight line. You can throw them into walls, though I wasn't paying attention at the time so don't remember if the wall hit damages them. I think it does but need to verify.

>Freeze Breath
Freeze Breath uses your special meter then goes on cooldown.
Supergirl spins and freezes anything around her. You can be hit while doing this.
Frozen enemies can't move and can be thrown.
Doesn't seem like she aims this. So if enemies are too far below or above it could miss.

Haven't used her super yet.


*Batgirl

She can fully jump cancel her dodge, unlike Supergirl.

Dodge offset does not work with the final hit of her string, where she jumps into the air and comes down with a stomp with both feet. You can dodge cancel it leaving you in the air, allowing you to start the string in the air (which is the same) but when you get to the final hit, you will be unable to cancel it again.

If it were possible, you'd be able to cancel at the height of the part where she jumps and repeat the process to go as high as you wanted. Not that this would matter considering you get the Bathook which lets you zip to the top of buildings. I don't think it actually has anything to do with the devs limiting this particular move, but rather there's a rule where you can't dodge twice in the air.

>Bathook
Lets you zip to the top of buildings is you're close. Otherwise it seems to pull you to walls. It's acting weird for me as an attack. I can lock-on and hit small robots (only ones I've tested it on) and it will hit them causing knockdown. But sometimes it doesn't work.

Any time they're in the Bathook's  path they usually get hit. Like you can just do it near them and clip them as you zip past. If near a wall you'll hit them as you go up.
You can dodge cancel it too.

>Batarang
Pretty good move. She throws a few out and they home in.

>Super
Launches a ton missiles. Really good.

Forgot to add she can glide and wall jump but I didn't focus on these too much.


*Wonder Woman
Enjoyed playing her the most though there are some things that disappointed me.

The last hit of her string is is a 360 spin. Fantastic in groups.
She has the same infinite dodge offset thing that Supergirl has on the last hit.

She doesn't have an air combo string like the others. This is one of the reasons I like her more. Instead she has a single, vertical downward slash, like Helmbreaker but it doesn't bring her to the ground. It also fires a short range, vertical slash beam somewhat similar to Drive. She can also aim it at least downward.
Can only do it once per jump normally, and can only be dodge canceled once, but I found a way to do it many more times.

If you throw the shield, slash, then throw again, you can slash again. You'll slowly descend, but you can get in a lot of them. So far useful on every enemy I've come across especially those bears. The shield misses because it only moves on your level but it's only used to allow you to repeat the slash.

>Shield Throw
This is one of the disappointments. First, when you throw it, it slightly zig zags and often completely misses who I was aiming it. It auto aims when close enough. Didn't try lock on because I keep forgetting it exists. It's manageable though.

It doesn't do much damage (as the game notes) though it does go through enemies and hit others. Just got an upgrade that claims it stuns but haven't tried it yet.  

The real disappointment is that it doesn't hit enemies with returning. No excuse for this.

It can be stuck in walls or other objects like cars. When you jump on it it acts as a springboard letting you jump super high. If you're above or below enemies it doesn't target them, though again I haven't tried with lock-on yet.

It can't be linked into her sword string at all, though the throw animation can be dodge canceled and doesn't affect the shield itself.

>Lasso of Truth
This is her special that uses the meter. She grabs and pulls in enemies. This disappointed me first because it isn't free like Supergirl's grab, and I was hoping for something like Bayonetta's Kulshedra like throwing enemies into each other.

Her super seems to be an AoE explosion.

I was in the process of writing notes on her JC abilities but had to go out. I think she's like Supergirl with that little hop. Will need to confirm.

When you see these notes Vert, let me know if I'm getting anything wrong. Will add more later.

Played a bit more.

WW's lasso is similar to Nero's grab in that it pulls you toward larger enemies.

Using the jump attack repeat technique I can stay above most enemies and keep throwing beams down on them.

Fought Livewire as WW. Ok fight. She could be grabbed by the lasso sometimes. Need to replay to see how consistent it is. Jump attack>shield trick worked well unless she did the lightning bolts that come from above. Perfect dodge makes short work of her. She managed to heal before I realized you can destroy the power poles.

If you press dodge>jump>attack fast enough, you'll cancel the dodge with the jump, then attack before the jump happens. Been trying to perfect this. Found a good way is to roll your thumb over those buttons. This lets you instantly reset and keep attacking after a dodge. WW can do it but haven't tested the others. Batgirl should be able to.

No difference in shield throw height when locked on.

Tried the uniques in combo strings. Does what I thought it would. Not sure I'd use everyone's move like this.

Supergirl's grab is really good. She homes in and grabs them without even touching them like they're magnetized. Can even dash in on different heights.

Fought the giant woman with Batgirl and she was really useful. Her wall jump works on this boss so I was able to do almost the whole fight without touching the ground. You can do stuff like the air string, dodge cancel the last hit, do the whole string again then wait before the last hit to let it reset, then kick jump off and glide around and do it again. Throw Batarang special when it's ready.

I want a new character. Tired of these three now.

The enemies are pretty aggressive. Did a mission in a room full of large robots and UFOs. The were various colors and each had its own move. Blue shot 3 large ice spikes horizontally (which can cause Freeze), red shot a huge homing fireball (inflicts Burn), green did windmill arms physical attacks, purple stayed back and would charge up and fire a laser beam. The UFOs kept firing beams.

I can see how you get the Shinobi comparison. It's not mechanically the same, it's more like the way you move and the small moveset. Zipping around a lot to avoid damage then strike back while maintaining a chain. A little like Killer Is Dead.

The only aspects from the DP dev is the Facebook-like thing. The Good Life also has this. In TGL you can take photos. Then you need to upload them to your PC in your house (where DC SHG just uploads them instantly) and there's also trending topics. In both games a message will pop up like 'Photos of birds are trending'. These can get you way more likes. In TGL you can get money. Not sure what you get in this. Been largely ignoring it.

Uploaded some clips to Twitter.
https://twitter.com/Birdman96813752/status/1482184858944573442?t=infRxXDUTa2tDAfAnEDF0Q&s=19

This is the first one. You'll find the rest on my page.

Found something interesting regarding the jump cancel.

The thing is you can cancel a jump by attacking, but you can't cancel an attack by jumping.
The window to cancel the jump early enough that your attack comes out fast enough to be the ground string is when they bend their legs before they rise off the ground.

You can cancel an attack with dodge, cancel dodge with jump, and jump with attack. Then repeat.
To do this consistently to be fast enough to delete any delay is extremely difficult. And this I think, is due to not being able to see the jump animation because it's canceled completely.

Do it fast and smoothly enough and it looks like you've just done another hit in the string.
So you don't get any visual indication. Sometimes I can do it like 3-5 times in a row but screw up due to the fact I'm only guessing the timing. It's harder to do with Batgirl because she attacks quite fast. Doesn't work properly with Supergirl I think due to her flying mechanics..

Got Harley Quinn. Don't like her that much but her mechanics are interesting.
Her air attack is unique. She spins vertically like a wheel with her hammer. Hits multiple times. Can use twice in the air.
The most important thing is it gets momentum from other actions. Like if your jump forward it'll go forward, from a dodge it barely moves. Once you buy her Spring Step ability, where she can jump either super high or super far forward, you can fly across the screen with this attack.

Her cool down ability is a gun that randomly causes Burn, Freeze, or healing. She can double jump too.
Definitely has the most mobility so far. Her Spring Step is actually more effective than flying.

Her ground string uses a huge mallet and is a little slower than others but has good crowd control especially on the first two horizontal swings.

Been trying the dodge offset cancel with the first two hits. Easier than Batgirl.

Do not like Catwoman at all.
Her whip special is nice for crowds, but her unique move is basically the Bathook.

Just got Star Sapphire. She's insanely good. I'd say she's the strongest character so far.

First, her basic attack is energy projectiles AND she can fly. This means many enemies can't touch her. Just fly up and rain down shots. If something can shoot, her just dodge is a beam. Her range isn't unlimited but it's still really far.

Her cool down move is a big energy dome. Does tons of damage and gets an upgrade that sets enemies on fire.

If that weren't enough she has a grab. It functions a little differently from Supergirl's one. She grabs them with a beam and holds them in front of herself. When you throw, she Spins them around once and this can hit others, before slamming them into the ground.

She's just plain OP. Many enemies become irrelevant and shooting ones aren't a threat due to being able to either dodge and return fire or just dodge into an invincible beam. What the hell?

Downside is there doesn't appear to be any cool tech like WW's air slash trick. And stopping dodge offset has no purpose when you're nowhere near the enemy. Though I'm finding the offset trick isn't really worth using in general but we'll see by the end. Star Sapphire is almost braindead WIN mode.

There's a way to replay missions. I should see if I can fight previous bosses with her and see if they can deal with her bullshit. Giant girl won't stand a chance. Livewire will be interesting.

I beat the game. Then back at the school. I guess this is free roam.

Star Sapphire's basic attack string is so good I don't need to use anything else.

Going to stop here. All that's left are repetitive side quests.
It was fun finding tech but I don't see any lasting mechanical value.

I can repeat missions but largely found them boring.
Enemies are fought pretty much the same way. Hit and dodge.
Characters don't have enough to them.

There's some cool elements.
There are two types of fire hydrant; the one that shoots water straight up (used for high jumps), and the horizontal one.
The horizontal one shoots water across the enemy's path and pushes them to the side. If it's a fire bot (Demobot type), it will kill them instantly, or at least heavily damage them. I say that because I don't know if ones that appear in later missions are stronger.

Some interesting notes for Livewire. Why is she and Catwoman the only villains you fight?
There's a vertical fire hydrant. If her electrical orb shot touches it, it will electrify the water. Being electrocuted temporarily stops you from using your special or super.

There are also 3 small oil containers around the arena. If hit, they create an oil pool. If Livewire's shots touch them, they set on fire. She can also do this if she shoots the containers herself and skip the pool part.
Star Sapphire's energy dome special can set the pools on fire too.

I was able to do a cool setup. Stood in front of the pool and waited for her to shoot. While she fired I ran behind her and did the combo string, the finishing hit sending her directly into the fire she had just created.

I'll upload the video of this later, then done with this.

Glad you got the game. I don't have much time to talk games this year.

I mentioned this earlier ('Go, Wonderwoman, Go') -- best parts of game are in the post-game. You're there. Talk with Karen to get Supergirl's final mission. Talk with Doris to get Wonderwoman's final mission.

I found Wonderwoman to be uninteresting until the post-game where she became awesome. Her skill ceiling is deceptively high. When you play her final mission you'll find out why. Also, much faster repetitive aerial slashing is achievable. hint 1

Spoiler:

And if you don't want to figure it out

Spoiler:

Nice video of you air stalling. Would be cool to see that done against a grounded opponent and a UFO / flying enemy to hit with the shield throw. Love the complementary attacks the AI characters seem to do shadowing the player's movement; i.e., Supergirl hitting downward when you're doing the air stalling overhead attacks in the Metropolis High School fight stage vid.

Didn't think to followup a dodge cancel for attack purposes; very useful for quickly nabbing golden hamsters with Catwoman (who is technically the 2nd fastest character but her agility is way better than Supergirl's higher speed in flight, which makes her the ideal character for 100% finding goal). The cancel animation - attacking in that manner looks violently fast.

You beat the game way faster than I did. (The game does let you take a no nonsense approach just doing action missions.) What were your favorite missions? I'd definitely like to get your thoughts on 'Berserk Truck', if you're able to get the shards for the time attack. It didn't seem you bothered with it, but I did enjoy the city building aspect. Do you have any thoughts on how the defend building missions could be improved upon or how you'd add a layer of strategic placement of guards/buildings that would 'activate' in missions?

Birdman wrote:One strange aspect is with the last hit where she winds up and delivers a huge punch, if you dodge at the start of the animation and press attack again immediately, she'll still try to to that final hit. So it's dodge offsetting into itself infinitely.

Something cool to see. Sounds like it could be useful for variety or re-direction purposes.

When Supergirl dodges, she comes to a stop and slides a little. If you press jump though you can get rid of that slide, but she doesn't actually jump. She does this tiny hop. If you hold you'll transition into the flying dash, so you skip having to have to to hit jump twice.

Sounds very useful for time trials.

Haven't used her super yet.

How do you like the special attacks? I enjoyed Supergirl's the most since you can control it while its active. Wonderwoman's super is 2nd.

*Batgirl

>Bathook
Lets you zip to the top of buildings is you're close. Otherwise it seems to pull you to walls. It's acting weird for me as an attack. I can lock-on and hit small robots (only ones I've tested it on) and it will hit them causing knockdown. But sometimes it doesn't work.

Yeah, I think the game is calculating something vector-based or unobservable to the player. Generally, I felt it was 90% reliable.

Some interesting notes for Livewire. Why is she and Catwoman the only villains you fight?

Perhaps to evenly stack VS superheroes and VS supervillain scenarios.

>attack immediately from hitting your stuck shield to cancel out spring momentum allowing you to air slash 3x the speed you were doing air stalling
Does it cancel the high jump?

>favorite mission
None. I was pretty bored the whole time.

>time attack
Won't be going back to this.

>thoughts on building aspect
None. Wasn't interested.

>How do you like the special attacks?
Which are these? The cooldown ones or the unique like shield throw?

>Does it cancel the high jump?
Yes.

>None. I was pretty bored the whole time.
I was gonna write something about how going for shards 'recontextualizes' the missions but nevermind.

>Won't be going back to this.
All the mechanical depth you could dream of is in 'Go, Wonderwoman, Go'.

>Which are these? The cooldown ones or the unique like shield throw?
I mean the super special moves like Heat vision, Bracelet blast, Bat-rocket, etc.

>cancels high jump
That's insane. I can imagine it. Too bad it's limited to having to stick it somewhere.

>going for shards
I'd have to play better. Faster, avoiding damage, but it doesn't change much for me in this.

>all the mechanical depth you can dream of
You'll have to explain that one.

Compared to other action games, or compared to what I've currently played within this game?

Birdman wrote:
>all the mechanical depth you can dream of
You'll have to explain that one.

The totality of dynamic states attained in rapid perfectly-fulfilled succession: aerial / void, grounded / wall; rising, suspending, falling, rebounding; moving from, moving towards, moving against; peering down, fighting amongst, clinging to the edge, fighting an abyss.

Compared to other action games, or compared to what I've currently played within this game?

Just your thoughts in general.

>The totality of dynamic states attained in rapid perfectly-fulfilled succession: aerial / void, grounded / wall; rising, suspending, falling, rebounding; moving from, moving towards, moving against; peering down, fighting amongst, clinging to the edge, fighting an abyss.

I feel like you're making it sound way more complicated than it is. Aren't all actions games doing this stuff one way or another? I can do all this and a million times more in Okami which I'm playing now and still finding out stuff.

>Just your thoughts in general.
So only based on what I've experienced in this game.

There's not even close to enough tools or possibilities to keep me interested. I think I've given it a pretty fair chance.
Hell l put quite a bit of effort into tech development. It's a decent game but not nearly enough to keep me coming back.

No. The last mission for Wonderwoman really is that hype. And it's the major reason why I am big upping this game; it's a jump from gear 2 to gear 5. You might even get angry that the whole game isn't like that.

>You might even get angry that the whole game isn't like that.
Is this a post game thing?

What about this mission makes it that different?

Yes. It's for the final super hero costume too!

One, it's tailor-made for Wonderwoman. Two, the game is not holding back at all; it assumes you've come this far that it's fair to test you to see if you're a master of the game. Three, it's really unexpected being situated in that location making it a giant contrast to everything before. Four, it's gonna kick your ass.

>designed for WW
How so?

>not holding back
So it's just harder?

>master of the game
What does that mean? The whole game was pretty easy.

>that location
What location?

It shows off WW's abilities to the fullest with the shield and lasso and the way everything is orchestrated for the player to go through from the stage itself & enemy waves is peak creativity. (I would strongly prefer not spoiling the level giving you a walkthrough / play-by-play.) Location is an isolated place. 'Go, Wonderwoman, Go' requires real athletic determination and attack smarts. It certainly is a lot harder than the main game. Like I spent the whole day on this 1 mission hard. Again, you like this character...

You like this character.

Not completing this mission is doing yourself a massive disservice.

Where is this mission?

Just realized I've already done this mission. Was one of the last ones I did. It's on a platform in the water. Waves of enemies. I don't think I'm on hard mode but tried again and got it on third try. My character isn't fully upgraded though. Smash is at max though which was the most useful thing.

Still not really interesting to me. Just dodged around and hit stuff. Used the shield a bit more more than usual due to so many enemies crowded together so the wonky trajectory wasn't a huge issue. Didn't get much use out of the lasso.