Bullet Hell Artistry #5 - MarchosiasNull

Bullet Hell Artistry #5 - MarchosiasNull
For this contest I'm using a 25 point rating scale because I feel like it.

Danmaku Quality: 15/25

Danmaku Quality encompasses the quality of the danmaku in your script. "Good" patterns will equal a "good" score in this category. What makes a pattern good is subjective, but the #1 factor is fun. A flashy, gorgeous pattern that isn't fun won't fare well here. Note that aesthetic factors can still factor into this - proper usage of sound effects and graphics can make an unfair pattern fair, and improper usage of those can make an otherwise-fair pattern unfair.

To be more clear, an "average" pattern is a 5. You can gain or lose points and I'll probably tell you why.

Individual patterns will be rated out of 10. The average of that will be taken and scaled to calculate the Danmaku Quality score.

Aesthetics: 5/25

This category encompasses how your entry looks (and sounds). While danmaku should absolutely come first, visual and audio elements are also a part of the gameplay experience. A high score in this category comes from your script being aesthetically appealing without being distracting.

Adherence to Contest Theme: 5/25

5 points will be dedicated to judging your choice of character and their danmaku. A high score in this category means you did a good job of integrating a character from another franchise into Touhou, and it means that both of your characters' danmaku works well together.
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Played as Reimu

Nonspell 1: I think this nonspell would benefit from the tiny dots rendering above Mike's rainbow bullets. Not a big deal, but I think that's a useful design tip. Otherwise, it's fine...it feels REALLY slow, so dodging is really easy as a result. Not much synergy between them either. 5.5/10.

Spell 1: I think this spell comes down to random dodging. It's harder, but still slow enough to be fine. I do like using coins for Mike though. 6.5/10.

Nonspell 2: It still kind of feels like they're doing their own thing, but Ciel is at least providing an aimed element to Mike's more distributed pattern. 6.5/10.

Spell 2: I think it's also a lot of randomness, though more controlled than the Mike spell. It's kind of disappointing that the keys (which look nice!) just dissolve into bullet blobs. 6.75/10.

Nonspell 3: How hard this is seems to vary a LOT depending on where Mike's rings go? They seem random to me. I think this would function better as a more structured pattern where the rain or Mike's rings form lanes to dodge the other half through. 6/10.

Spell 3: See, now this is the kind of working-together behavior I was thinking of! I think this pattern's fairly good, and you're incentivized to kill the cats if you can't handle their corrupting influence tee em. I like this idea. 7.5/10.

Nonspell 4: While they're doing the same thing which shows teamwork, they're also...doing the same thing. Not random, though, and actually fairly speedy compared to earlier patterns. 7/10.

Spell 4: Also a very solid idea and an example of cooperation. I didn't actually notice that I seemed to be pushed upwards, but it didn't seem all that relevant to the spell? Still good. 7.5/10.

Spell 5: I think this survival is a neat idea that ramps up VERY SLOWLY (besides being slow in itself) and is only really a challenge for the last ~10-15 seconds. The rest is real I-Sleep energy. Excellent concept, but I'd tune it to be quicker. 6.75/10.

Spell 6: A solid final spell that I find good to dodge, probably because of the increased speed from the other attacks. Good ender. 7.75/10.

Danmaku Score: 6.775/10 (scaled to 10.1625/15)
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Aesthetically it's above average. I think the aesthetic is well put-together, just not really my style? Everything is super slow, which is part of the pattern aesthetic and not something I really enjoyed. Additionally, the music looping seemed a bit improper and I think you'd benefit from more sound effects to distract from that fact, if nothing else. 3/5.
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I think the characters work together...a little below average? The solo spells and them shooting the same thing kind of detracts from the "cooperation" - it's more like "doing your own thing" and "doing identical things". The spells where they do cooperate are nice, so it's not a huge loss, just a slight one. 2.25/5.

OVERALL SCORE 10.1625 + 3 + 2.25 = 15.4125/25