Artifact III Judgment: Python (Ran)

Artifact III Review: Python's Ran - Normal Mode
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We're immediately thrown into the action with a dialogue event. Ran's overworked and absolutely needs that pocketwatch to do all of her chores. Poor Yuyuko is accused. Funny and certainly fulfills the story requirement.

Nonspell 1: Oh hey, this looks familiar! Infinitely recycled YukariRan kunai rings nonspell. This is the first one though, so maybe the next ones will bring something new to the table. Are they aimed around the player by any chance?

Spell 1: Streaming through some really cool looking squares. This is a streaming card in essence, but it manages to capture both Ran's character and the stopwatch, in a way. Really good! The fact that they're squares instead of circles means that there's times where the gaps are larger and times where they're smaller, which can add some interesting gameplay decisions.

Nonspell 2: Ah, here's the change. Keeps Ran's theme of kunai spam nonspells while adding Sakuya's wall bounce gimmick. I think it would've been a bit more interesting if you could give the player the option of macrododging the entire "blocks" of kunai, or slipping between them. Regardless this is a new twist on something old, fun to play. Rather easy.

Spell 2: The name had me skeptical but then they quickly got their revenge on me. A nice variation of another spell. The laser lines certainly help with knowing where to avoid, and the spell's gimmick isn't cheap at all. I'd say you maybe spend a tiny bit too long frozen, though. Maybe speed up the bubbles and reduce the amount of frames spent stopped? Have the bubbles make more stray bullets that you have to dodge through, or slow down the existing ones? Definitely a decent spell overall, but more can be done with the idea.

Nonspell 3: Ran is pretty mobile. A bit of a difficulty jump from the above spell, and I think those rings are a bit too dense, especially since the Sakuya player's focused speed is faster than many would be used to. Kinda boring but not horrible, otherwise.

Spell 3: Yay for vaguely funny spell names. Pretty good idea, seen it before so I knew what to expect. If you're too close to the bottom of the screen, some bullets seem to be deleted from the spirals. The intersection of the blue arrowheads and yellow kunai provide interesting decisions in how you want to dodge. Spells like this tend to have a lot of time where there's nothing to dodge, but you avoid that. My only gripe is that it's really short.

Nonspell 4: Spirals going in both directions, from what I see. Not bad, but also a bit harder like the previous non due to fast player speed + small gaps. Ran's movement pattern seems to be circular and adds some variation due to the gaps (and walls) this method of moving makes. Otherwise nondescript.

Spell 4: ...Really weird. The gimmick is explained by having the bullet waves take time to overlap, so I find it fair. I think this ends before it gets really serious, though. Fun but too short!

Spell 5: Good idea but rather bad execution in my opinion. During the first phase, it's great that bullets don't spawn on top of you. Instead they move towards the center at blazing speed and are kinda hard to dodge unless you know it's coming. Then when the first time manipulation happens, you're likely dodging through a wave when Sakuya speeds up. EDIT: This line was invalidated (at least for normal mode) due to an update. Meaning you're very likely to ram a bullet. The bubble phases afterwards are trivial compared to the ones beforehand, even with the player speed increase. The phase with the red needles has the same issues as the first phase: Sudden, fast bullet movement. The last seconds of the card are pretty easy. Good idea, needs better execution.

Spell 6: I'm not very sure where you're supposed to BE during this spell. I found a method of doing it by going inside the futo-esque net of sorts and killing it extremely quickly. I assume you're supposed to rotate around the screen? Regardless, this spell is rather unclear in what you're supposed to do and will probably kill you at least once. Once is probably enough, since the life is so low that it'll just die before it gets a chance to kill you again.



Overall, this script is good and has interesting ideas. The quality has its ups and downs, especially towards the end, but the good certainly makes up for the bad. For a first serious script this is great! You earn a 6.25 from me.

All of that was rather tiring, how about some tea?