Crime Buster v2.5

[DARK HAYABUSA]

 

[Damon Caskey]

DARK HAYABUSA, stop spamming up the forum. Now.

DC

[Bloodbane]

Is this mod still being worked on BB? Or have you started a new secret project?

 No, I'm not working on this mod anymore aside of small updates.
 I'm working on new mod currently.

 What's wrong with you Dark Hayabusa?

[Fightn Words]

I'm tempted to ask what your working on- but instead I'll ask what genre it is in case you want it to be a surprise.

[Bloodbane]

 I must have slipped my tounge here. Anyways, hacking Pierwolf's mod give me inspiration to start 2D mod. I won't say anything more until I can make screenshot of this mod.

[Plombo]

I can't get this to work completely with the newest engine version.  What devbuild should I use to play this?

[Bloodbane]

 You should use this

OpenBoR v2.2011, Compile Date: Nov 22 2008

 Pretty old but this mod is one year old.

[DJPlace]

hey bloodbane i am wondering if you can reupload this on megaupload if you have the time ty.

[Bloodbane]

 Hmmm... it would take some time but I'll upload it somewhere than MegaUpload.

[bomon]

um, got a bit of problem here.. (and, sorry, im a pretty much newb of this stuffs)

i played this mod with PSP-2000, with OpenBOR v2.2068.
during stage 3 (the road stage with lots of bike), the pitfalls are strangely misaligned, like i can move at the floor which is supposedly the hole. the real hole is somewhere near the "supposed hole".

then after stage 4 (after the ninja boss), the openBOR crashed.

is there any suggestion which ver. of openBOR to play crime buster in psp? and links to download would be very appreciated ( i cant find the link of OpenBoR v2.2011, Compile Date: Nov 22 2008)

thanks

[Bloodbane]

 Sorry for the incompatibility. This mod should only use that old OpenBoR version.
 BTW that old OpenBoR is packed together with the mod so you should have it.

then after stage 4 (after the ninja boss), the openBOR crashed.

 5th stage is branched so I'm not sure which path you are talking here but either path has ninjas in it.

[bomon]

 

5th stage is branched so I'm not sure which path you are talking here but either path has  ninjas in it.

oh sorry. it is the twin ninja boss that spams big meteors.

and i forgot to say earlier. Your mod is great! I really enjoy it.

[zamuel]

On Monday some friends of mine got to play the original version of Crime Buster.  Calling the difficulty brutal seems an understatement.  I'll echo everyone else's "too many bikers" and a lot the things Damon said mirrored our sentiments.  They found the Jetpack boss especially hard, potentially harder than the final boss.  The saving grace of the playthrough was that the older version of the game had save/load that refreshed lives and continues.  Intriguingly, most of the frustration came from regular enemies as opposed to bosses.  I think the biggest annoyances with bosses were the Jetpack boss and Jack.

Sitting down and playing v2.5 today I see a lot of improvements over the older version like freespecials not costing life and a bigger variety in the character movesets.  I think they would like the newer version more though I'm not sure if they'd play it.  While they can respect the work that went into it, they were annoyed by specific enemies and were doubting the ability to beat it on the standard amount of credits.

As far as the new version, blocking feels sort of useless.  Either you're locked down by enemies or moves are unblockable.  Move variance helps with fighting enemies because there's more ability to control space which is the very thing you need to succeed.  Maxima's throws do  a great job of clearing enemies off him despite his slow speed.  Then again, I like the big slow guys so his update is nice.  However, I've got a feeling Kula may potentially be the best character in the game.  Attacks that hit far away from her, a counter move (though the command is difficult to do sometimes), and re-freeze infinite combos.

In my opinion, I think the biggest issue with the difficulty isn't the fact that it's hard--that's fine.  The problem is that it gets hard too soon into the game.  Know how I mentioned blocking?  You can block Jack's knives but Jill can just low punch through your guard.  If he had a slower rate of knife tosses his zoning would be easier to deal with.  Then, later in the game you could have a version the throws knives at the current speed.  The other issue is the number of enemies on-screen and thus the ability to get locked down.  I noticed a small delay on the invincible specials that can be fatal in some situations.

However, I discovered there are ways to locked down enemies after you've knocked them down that can be used to turn the tide of battle.

[Bloodbane]

 I couldn't deny your points. I noticed couple stuffs are too much. This is my first mod and balance is my biggest issue. Not to mention, I don't know people's playing skill so I can't tell if a boss or fight is too hard or not.
 Also another thing which bother me aside of blocking usability is that I spam the invincibility from slams alot while playing this mod. As player, it's okay but as game designer, it's not okay, it means there's something wrong in the design.

 I have plan on making beat'm up with better concept but now I'm still in 2D world .

 About Jetpacks, I noticed that players have tendency to spam credits and lives to beat bosses instead of finding strategy. To counter this, I created Jetpacks squad. Their low vulnerability makes it hard even for special spammer to kill them. However, just like original Jetpack from Streets of Rage 2, they require counter attack strategy to defeat. Each has her own attacks and how to counter them.

 The tough bikers are easy to beat since they'll go after player instead of going randomly so I don't need to tell how to defeat them. However, the single hit bikers requires a trick. I'll share it here:

 When you see a single hit biker (their remap varies but IIRC it's always different than tough ones), run to screen edge opposite their direction i.e if biker goes right, run to left edge. Continue running even tough player is on screen edge, wait til biker reenter screen. Once he/she enters, move up/down to put player in same z with biker. When biker is close enough, perform running jump attack. If done correctly, the biker will be hit by that attack and player will be safe.
 This require some practice but it's worth it.

 Jack and other shooters have one obvious weak spot: they can't shoot to front and back so if you meet one immediately get close either to their front or back or just grab them. This is how I defeat shooters in the mod.

 Oh about blocking, there's one aspect you should know. Character's blocking defense is not same. Kula and Bao have lowest blocking defense while Maxima has the highest. Maxima can block Bruno's ramming attack. Kula and Bao can block knives and bullets but not grenades and Skystar's beam. Kula and Bao are agile characters so they are supposed to dodge more instead of blocking.

[zamuel]

The issue with the bikers isn't the difficulty (I discovered the running jump trick) but the sheer numbers.

She requires 'outside the box' strategy. She can't be defeated by getting underneath her and hit her cause she'll fly back and shoot.

This is slightly incorrect.  My friends used a Maxima + Athena combo where Maxima sort of acted as bait due to the high HP and Athena strafed a bit until she was under Skystar and then hit her with Psycho Sword.