Why the hell is this game so hard?

[Link Satonaka]

Let me preface this with I always choose the hardest difficulty before I start a game. I usually make a point to replay games where you have to unlock the hardest difficulty.

So naturally I chose "Normal" difficulty, the highest option available. Well the beginning "tutorial" (if it could be called that) left a lot to be desired- just flashed some text across the screen and most of it was nonsensical since I didn't have any powers at the time when it was attempting to describe how to use powers.

I made it to day 6 without assigning any powers, then I figured that out, sort of. As far as I can tell (in PS3 controller terms) triangle is the power button, and applying a direction to the joystick then pressing triangle results in doing the thing you set to the directional slot? It's confusing as hell, I still don't know if this is true because ever since equipping powers she does different things even when I'm pressing square (attack).

The practice mode is a joke- there are two enemies that hardly hit back and I'm not benefitting from hitting a sack around.

Well now I'm stuck on day 8. Tried 15 times and the best I can do is make it to the second wave with the vortex having one hit left. The screen is filled with enemies, Freesia gets knocked about if anyone so much as breathes, the range of the enemies is so long it's unfair (and freesia moves so slowly) and the skies are filled with projectiles so I can't really jump. Freesia's recovery time is also about a second longer than it should be so what usually happens is I get stuck between two enemies while one or two do a ridiculous amount of damage to the vortex and the rest of them just ♥♥♥♥ around or shoot projectiles aimlessly. This on day 8 and there are supposedly 99?!

Is this game one of the 'hard for the sake of being hard' titles or am I missing a large portion of how this works?

[AbyssalSoul]

You need to equip and purchase different skills with the mana you earn from beating up enemies.

You have a PS-like pad? Then you are in the same league as me as I'm using a Dual Shock lookalike. Here is what I assigned controls to:
Movement: D-pad (can't stand analog sticks)
Guard: Triangle
Attack: X
Jump: Square
Special Skill Trigger Button: Circle

With that set, you have to use special skills and move sets quite a lot. Notice that when you level up it says "new skill"? That signals you have to go to the skills menu and start getting things.

You have two types of skills: passive and active. Passive skills provide bonuses (like strength and more Hp, I highly recommend you to get those boosts at first, makes life easier!) and active skills are triggered by inputting any of the following commands along with the Special Skill button. You can assign up to four active skills:

Up+Special Button
Down+Special
Left+Right+Special
Special Button (don't input any direction, stay still, there are skills that let you counterblock, grab and enemy and use it as a bowling ball or charge up a MASSIVE attack for loads of damage called Mother's Breath, that one is also probably the best to get one of the achievements).

On top of this, Freesia obtains extra move sets the more she levels up. So you start with a basic three hit combo, then you get a juggling combo to launch enemies to the air twice (Ether Saber), then you can launch them three times (Ether Saber 2), then you can pretty much dance mid-air until maximum altitude by hitting everything loads of times.

You can also perform "perfect guards" (Just Defense) that won't add to your guard break bar. This helps you block more efficiently when things get cluttered. You have to time your blocks so you can block exactly when you were about to get hit. You also have a "Just Revenge" skill that turns that perfect block into the counterblock I mentioned above.

You'll also unlock several ranged magical skills, including laser guided missiles for more screen coverage.

About slow movement speed... The skill Silhouette Mirage lets you travel across the screen lighting fast. If that doesn't help, you can double jump or tap twice left or right to do a quick dash. (Combine with the attack button for a slash or jump for a flying kick.)

Check the skills setup thread for suggestions on cool builds too!

Hope this helps!

This has to be my longest post ever.

[Desudesu です]

Use guard! Trying to play this game without guarding is pretty much suicidal. You can tap left or right while guarding to "guard hop" which sort of acts as a dodge, too...it gives you some invulnerability frames, and is important if you don't want to get guard crushed frequently. Just remember not to rambo...most of the time you don't spend attacking, you'll probably want to be guard hopping. You'll get the hang of it in due time...just practice.

For assigning powers, the controls are kind of like special moves in Super Smash Bros. only you get to pick which ones you equip (provided you've purchased them with your mana.) The "X" is for the move you use when you just press the Special attack button with no direction, or Neutral Special. Then you can assign other skills to Up Special, Side Special, and Down Special. (Activated by pressing the Special button and a direction at the same time.) Basic moves are "always active" and some of them are triggered by pressing directions with the Attack button (Ether Saber, for example.)

Don't forget to assign Optional skills! These are basically passive skills, but you can only equip 2 at a time. Some have more than one level. Those 2 slots on the skills screen that don't correspond to any button are for your Optional (passive) skills. I'd recommend Regenerate and Berserker when you unlock them...they're the most useful for beginners, I think.

Also, there are only 25 days in Story Mode. You're over 1/5 of the way there. Plus, I promise you, the next boss you're about to fight is a lot easier than the first one. F*** that hulking golem, lol. (I'm kinda surprised you actually beat it so soon XD)

The 99 day thing is Guardian Mode, and there's only one difficulty setting for it (Normal.) It's appropriately challenging even if you've beaten Story Mode on Cruel difficulty. Don't worry about it for now, though. It unlocks when you've beaten the game for the first time.

Best of luck...hope this helps you ^^

[Dhaos the Anti-Gnosis Android]

The game on normal is not hard. The problem is that you're getting hit. Its very possible to play entire stages without getting hit. Infact on cruel difficulty you're basically dead in 2 hits IF they don't combo you. There are three things you can do to avoid being hit.

1. Guard. Easy peasy. Hold down a button and you stop taking damage. ALL of your moves can be interrupted into guard. If you're comboing someone and you see a bullet coming towards you, guard, and continue your combo. Is you guard being broken too quickly? You could learn to time Just Defense, where you guard at the EXACT time the attack hits you and your guard meter does not go up. You could also learn to Guard Hop, where if you push a side direction while guarding you avoid any attack, but become vulnerable for a split second. The Easiest option is to equip the optional skill Hard Turtle. Its one of the best skills in the game especially against bosses.

"But Dhaos, even with Hard Turtle my guard is still being broken!"

2. Escape. Guarding doesnt help you if you're stuck in the middle of a huge mob and you're constantly being hit. Do your best to avoid these situations. If you do get stuck Tears of Sol and Sillouette Mirage are great skills for getting out of trouble.

"But Dhaos, after I've teleported to safety they just gang up on me again!"

3. Interrupt. You know what kind of enemy can't hit you? A non-boss enemy in a combo. You know what mechanic in this game does huge amounts of damage and interrupts all enemies affected? The pinball mechanic. If you send an enemy flying into another enemy, they take almost three times more damage than if you just hit them yourself, any action they were taking is interrupted, and they go flying off into the next enemy. The easiest way to do make an enemy fly into another is to hold a direction and tap Attack twice. There are of course lots and lots of different way of making enemies fly into each other in this game. One very useful skill in this regard is Samurai Slash. Its range is a little short, but it can hit several enemies at once, including some behind you. If you effectively manage to knock enemies into more enemies, they won't be able to hit you at all and your damage output will be insane.

So there you go. Once you get used to not getting hit, Normal and Hard story mode should be a breeze.

P.S. Training mode exist so that you can test out your moves, develop combos or practice combos.

[fernandofina]

Use the guard button, equip your skills wisely and knock enemies into other enemies as much as you can.

: )

[Franc[e]sco]

What's the point if it's not challenging?

[Gregory]

i just went into guardian mode and reached day 68.there may be SPOILER ahead but.the guardian mode is basically the story mode without cutscenes and dialogue and in day 50 you face the last boss like in story mode but in story mode you face the last boss in day 24.there are just some more extra days in guardian mode.thats all.then if you keep going that way in day 58 i think you will re-face the first boss the hulk golem.i think that was his name.


anyway.thats the first boss but this time you will be getting annoyed to hell.even guard is useless against these days after day 50.the thing im doing is not holding any guard and i just keep spamming them with mother's breath magic move and i throw them away like domino all the time.btw im 45 lvls in the game in guardian mode.


in story mode guard is usefull especially on boss battles.at least there if you lose you have the opportunity to play again and again from the boss scene.that way you may learn sooner or later their weaknesses.in guardian mode you have only 3 chances to beat a boss.if you dont then youll have to do over again 4 days then reach again the boss and beat him within 3 continues.

[Rocket2049]

shouldn't have started at normal then... you can NG+ into normal (your level resets to 1 but you keep all the skills and mana)
but anyways, block, sidestep (towards the vortex), if you're near the vortex you heal HP and it's better you take hits instead of the vortex, if that fails knock enemies away from the vortex.
there's only 25 days in the story mode BTW, the Guardian mode you unlock later has 99 (and it is HARD)
and, honestly, Freesia doesn't move too slow if you airdash like, ALL THE TIME, or spam sidestep if you don't wanna jump all the time.
if you're having troubles on day 8... have fun when they have flying enemies that shoot lasers and minibosses AND a vortex.
but seriously though if it is too hard, play easy, you can play normal right after, then the next two difficulties (you think normal is hard? try the fourth difficulty CRUEL, you'll die in like 3 hits, FUN, i'm being sarcastic here...)
I LOL'd at "hard for the sake of being hard" this game is kinda in that category, but i've seen really difficult games, if you've seen any of the Touhou games playing anything past easy proves to be frustrating unless you got the hand-eye cooridination of a god, hell I can't beat touhou 12 on EASY since they made it BS difficult now.
then there's Gundemonium, do me a favor, if you get frustrated easily DON'T BUY GUNDEMONIUM COLLECTION, took me a week of practice to beat the last boss on NORMAL.

[PSC Fox]

its an fighting game from japan, what do you expect?
the rules of Japanese games:
Always play on easy or normal first.
Since here was "easy and normal" the only choice, you should have gone easy

i did:
Easy, difficult, crual and left normal out, since u get to keep your skills.

[Tap]

I played Normal on the demo and loved it, so I bought the game. I would say the game is just hard enough to keep me interested. Guarding wasn't obvious to me, but after a while, I just figured it out. Guarding at the right times is key. You want to use the guard button right before getting hit, whether you're in the air or on land. Guarding can also enable you to hop around as a sort of dodge. Once you have the mirage move, you can use that to dodge the special attacks sometimes, but I also think you will want to spend you mana on the strength bonus (optional skill) and make sure you equip it.

[Link Satonaka]

Thanks all, I suspect I invested my points into a terrible combination. Maybe I will try easy... though honestly I may have too much pride to do that :D

Rocket2049 の投稿を引用：

and, honestly, Freesia doesn't move too slow if you airdash like, ALL THE TIME, or spam sidestep if you don't wanna jump all the time.
....
I LOL'd at "hard for the sake of being hard" this game is kinda in that category, but i've seen really difficult games, if you've seen any of the Touhou games playing anything past easy proves to be frustrating unless you got the hand-eye cooridination of a god, hell I can't beat touhou 12 on EASY since they made it BS difficult now.
then there's Gundemonium, do me a favor, if you get frustrated easily DON'T BUY GUNDEMONIUM COLLECTION, took me a week of practice to beat the last boss on NORMAL.

Yeah I'll have to set a macro or something up on my controller to help me airdash (or perhaps just use the keyboard), because I physically cannot with the joystick. I was just pretending it didn't exist up until now.

I'm actually a fan of bullet hell! I prefer Cave's titles to touhou, but yes, I have played some of the touhou games. Bullet hell is supposed to be hard though, that's the point :D. When I say hard for the sake of hard, I mean a game, other than bullet hell, that is annoyingly hard and that is a touted "feature"... Or maybe, if I'm being honest with myself, what I mean is games that are hard that I''m not naturally amazing at (heh) or otherwise couldn't bother to practice. I do like this game though- I think my problem is I don't yet grasp the controls and the upgrade system. I suppose my frustration is that I am not playing well, not that it's absurdly hard.

[Cobalt Crucible]

Hard? Not really. But it IS challenging. Personally, I love it.

Play around with your acquired skills, go to training mode to see how your bought skills are put to play. It's one of those games that even if you lose, you'll just be more motivated to kick tail.

[It's Magic! P.C>]

it's fine to die
when you continue you keep the exp you earned to buy new stuff
the problem is if you get stuck on a boss level, you cant really get exp repeating it over and over
so save often just in case

[Silence]

I found my first playthough to be quite easy, actually. Just kick the mobs into each other and guardhop all over the place. The only time I had trouble (and I mean TROUBLE) was against Shynie.

[InnK | Gabrielwoj]

Francesco and his waifu <3 の投稿を引用：

What's the point if it's not challenging?

This^

[-=UGF=-Dixede]

I'd like to say it was hard on normal, but I'd kind of being lying... You can take quite a few hits, and once you max STR and Regenerate its like impossible to die... You can also do STR and Dying Rat, which makes you do an insane amount of damage when low on HP. Blocking is important sure, but their are other methods to fight. The Counter skill (Tensa... something or other, Atemi) lets you block + counter + ping pong ball effect on enemies without raising your guard bar. So it's useful to have. You can also use projectiles like peacock while your blocking, this helps throw enemies off you so you can move. You also have the option of Siloutte Mirage for getting out of a jam.