R-COIL

A fun Asteroids clone where the game's 1 button control is both its unique aspect and the maddening challenge that sets it apart from the others.

I had to pick this up, as I was a huge fan of the original arcade cabinet. At the time (around 1980) I was also a member of the 100000 club. The big hype around the machine when it rolled into our local arcade was the graphics. It used the exact same vector screen that Asteroids used, but it came with an additional tech called PRISM (Photon Refractive Index Signal Modulation) to give it the vivid color scheme. This was basically a layer of sliding sheets on top of the vector display that featured small line grids, similar to how Polaroid glasses work. The color was great, but the extra layers of glass had the downside that it produced the blur effect that this adaptation manages to recreate so well. Another downside was the cost of the PRISM display. Only 150 of these cabinets were manufactured as a result, and they are near impossible to track down these days. This is a very faithful adaptation of the original and I'd say it's a bit easier to play with a gamepad. The cabinet used a...

In March this year (2020) some developers at Itchio including Vector Hat offered their games for free to help gamers get through the Corona lockdown and I downloaded a bunch of them, mostly shmups. R-COIL was the first game I tried since I recently played another Asteroids game and had seen the title before. To compete with others I later bought the game at Steam. R-Coil is a simple little Asteroids inspired game with vector graphics and a retro style view. It looks fine and some of the later weapons have some really nice visual effects. A game like this is all about gameplay and it offers something unique. You only have one button to shoot and to fly. When you shoot there's massive recoil, hence the name. At first the control will feel awkward and maybe even wrong. However if you give it enough time you'll learn how to control the ship. Once you've mastered flying the ship and its weapons it becomes a real joy. You can use a controller or a mouse. When using a mouse moving left/righ...

Really clever neo-arcade game. It's an arena shmup with momentum-based movement like Asteroids, but with the added twist that shooting and thrust are mapped to the same button: hold the button to thrust forward, and tap the button to shoot (which also has recoil, giving you a bit of backwards momentum). You've got to find a ballance between thrusting and shooting. As the game progresses, there are some nice enemy designs and some really cool powerups to keep things interesting (and colorful).

By now you know about R-COIL's gimmick: It's a very hard Asteroids clone where firing and thrust is the same button. Only it's not really Asteroids, and it's not the Dark Souls of Asteroids either. First off, the asteroids hardly matter. They increase your score a little, but more often than not you're happy that they're there so you can hide behind them. Secondly luck is too much of a factor here for this to be Dark Astersouls. One thing that's hard to achieve is precision, and that makes some enemies a lot more annoying than others. Snaking between two shots in a 20-shot arc of fire can be hard even in scrolling shoot 'em ups where you have precise control over your X and Y position, but here it sometimes simply comes down to luck. Did you fire one more shot than planned, shifting your trajectory a bit too much? Or is your shield rotated with the opening right into incoming fire? Tough luck. Luck is also a component with the powerups. In some scenes you'd really love to have a spr...

I bought this game because it looked like a modern Comet Busters and is available to play with my Steam Controller on my SteamOS Steam Machine and can do 4 player co-op. I the style of the game is pretty awesome, vector based objects and hitting those core mechanics right. I am new to the knockback on fire mechanic but I can see how it could be really fun with more people, I think I just suck at it. Some of the text on first boot is obnoxious but it seems to go away after first run. It was very difficult to figure out how to play on keyboard, I feel like the controls and menus could be improved to get out of my way a little more. Overall I would mark this a 4 out of 5 with some room for improvement in the menu and controls. It certainly fills a niche and takes a seat in my library as a cool core game I can chill out and play with friends on mr 4 controllers. Absolutely reccomend to people who like this genre.

A great throwback to old-school vector games with some clever twists on classic gameplay. Gamepad is pretty much required; other than that, this is so much fun.

LOOKS 10/10 This game is beautiful. SOUND 10/10 It has all the lazer goodness that you would need if you are nostalgic for asteroids or any space arcade shooters. The audio is something I really appreciate as well. There is a great sense of "chill" in the background music. GAMEPLAY 8/10 It's the "Dark Souls" of space shooters-- at least for me. This game is one of the most difficult space shooters I have ever played. It is unapologetically hard, and unless you are playing on stress-free mode, prepare to have you ass handed to you. I found that mashing the fire button and moving frantically was the most effective way to stay alive. Fun-- but hard. One problem that I would note is probably a bug, is that if you die near the center of the game, and there are ships that are "attracted do you"-- like heat-seeking missiles. When you re-spawn, you are immediately killed with no chance of escaping the feedback loop of death. I watched helplessly as my player was killed off multiple times. So ...

A pretty fun game, with a hard-to-master mechanic for a shoot-em-up. Your shoot and movement are tied to the same action and, more importantly, your shoots have recoil. This game is very simple, but there's a lot of content too: - The arcade difficulty is too high? Play through the game in the stress-free mode! - Have friends to play with? Try the co-op mode! - Got bored of jolly cooperation? Try the duel mode! There are a lot of "power-ups" that show up during gameplay too. It makes the whole shooting and moving all the more strategic, in my opinion. The orbiters are kind of overpowered, though (not that I mind, this game gets tough fast) If you're feeling the nostalgia for arcade style shoot-em-ups, you should try this game.

Super fun, very challenging twist on the "Asteroids" concept. The game has a large variety of enemies to keep you on your toes, but there are neatly designed, meaningful power-ups to collect to help you out. The sound and visual design are absolutely superb, which doesn't come across in screen shots, or even in videos. When you have it playing in front of you and you are interacting with it, it's like being transported into an 80s arcade. But how you fondly remember it, not how it actually was. The game is also a fascinating example of accessible design. Although it is recommended to be played with a controller, you can play one-handed with a mouse. I actually played on a trackpad on my Mac. I also have the highest score in the game right now, so come at me bro etc. etc. You also have a "Stress Free" mode, which gives you infinite lives (at the expense of not being able to register a score on the leaderboard). Multiple visual options are available for those with vision issues, or i...