Game of the Month: January 2020 - Soldier Blade

[Gredler]

YouTube longplays say it's about 45 minutes.  It seems longer, though, like at least an hour.

For score run secrets, you need to find all the hidden gold Z icons, destroy the snake thing from the inside after it curls into a circle, destroy the pairs of vertically moving blooming flower pot things simultaneously, get all the parts of the big balls that split into four smaller balls, and milk the 2 minute boss for points by destroying its purple shots.

So cool, thanks sir I'll try this on my next run for sure!

[majors]

... and milk the 2 minute boss for points by destroying its purple shots.

aka popcorn

[roflmao]

Woot, finally got around to spending some time with Soldier Blade this evening! And I made it to Operation 6, which I haven't done in nearly forever. It took me almost 45 minutes to make it as far as I did and looking at a run through on YouTube, there was still quite a bit of the operation left and then a final final boss. So an hour estimate probably isn't far off.

[Johnpv]

I came here all excited cause I also finally got a chance to put some time into this.  Then I saw your score lol.  Daaaayyyuummm well done.  I was excited to post that I got to Operation 3 and hit 617900.   The difficulty really ramps up when you hit operation 3, at least it seemed so to me. 



Really fun game, and it does seem like blue is totally the weapon to go with.

[cabbage]

I dug up my score from a Soldier Blade 2-minute caravan competition on instagram last year.

652,700
Now I'll pop it in and play a few rounds just for fun

[Necromancer]

Crazy score, man.  I've no idea where all those extra points are hiding!

[cabbage]

I think the biggest thing is to not milk the stage boss. If you clear him (and the preceding waves) fast enough, there is an extra hidden Z bonus on the island on the right side of the screen shortly after. And there is another Orb thing, so if you shoot that and all four smaller orbs it's another bonus.

Those brownish robots that run away from you are each worth a lot of points. You can stop shooting for a moment to let them get close, and then try to take them all out before they can escape.

Kill the snake from the middle once it completely closes around you.

Destroy both those eye-opening ships at the same time.

Shoot all four mini-orbs that come out of the big orb (at the beginning of the level and again at the very end after the boss).

You have a bit of invincibilty after picking up a powerup, so there are a few places were you can use that to fire directly on top of an enemy.

You can also use your booster thrust to damage enemies as you change speed. There's one ship that comes up from behind where this is useful (I could never get the hang of this... maybe with a 3-button pad...)

And remember, the next wave of enemies doesn't appear until the current one is gone, so kill everything fast and get more waves in. All while shooting everything in the environment.

I'm not sure of the maximum possible score, but it's definitely over 700k based on the contest last year!

[majors]

You can also use your booster thrust to damage enemies as you change speed. There's one ship that comes up from behind where this is useful (I could never get the hang of this... maybe with a 3-button pad...)

I'll have to try this. I know in the normal mode, the flying wing ships that come from the rear will fire missiles if you stay a head of them, instead of bullets. You can get a few extra points for if you destroy the missiles. I have been keeping my option below my ship when they come up to damage them, I'll try this speed change approach(I use a 3 button pad already)

Since it's coming to the end of the month, I'll attach a pic of my scores from playing of late.

Never did beat it yet, the mission 6 mid boss that grabs "arms" from earlier level bosses usually hands me my ass.

[Johnpv]

Your image isn't loading.

[geise]

Super late on this one. I did a few runs earlier this week with my kiddo. He's 5. He held down the and pressed the fire button while i moved the d-pad around. We got to the last level that way. I just did another run tonight. Got to the last boss and then lost all 6 of my lives. Lol! It's been a long time since I've done a run so I couldn't remember the pattern for the Final boss. I finally got it when i had only 1 life left. Then game over. Didn't get to doing any 2 min or 5 min runs. Sad....

I'm also to lazy to resize a pic. lol