Big Bang Mini Comments by Ellie Gibson

Look pretty tho

I like the caption on the bottom picture.

WORK IN PROGRESS 03/2008

How are we supposed to judge a review by someone who thinks Diner Dash is "one of the best DS games"? It's not, I might hazard to calculate, even in the top 2000. Also, 5/10 is what Ellie gave Carnival Funfair Games on Wii, which is actually fantastic and turned out to be one of the top 10 all-formats sellers of 2008. So, hmmm.

Carnival Funfair Games

Is that the Midway one? With the horse racing ball game?

If so, it was arse. I played it for a whole 10 minutes. I wept the whole time with pain and sadness.

@ Rev. Stuart Campbell
Everyone has a different opinion you know.....

turned out to be one of the top 10 all-formats sellers of 2008

It's sad when anyone blurts out ropey faux-justifications like these, let alone someone who used to be a journalist. I'll tell you what though, The X Factor final was the must-see TV event of the decade.

More importantly, has Ellie been told to rein in the irreverence? Where are all the twisted mind workings and outbursts of general wrongness that we've come to expect?

Oh noes. This looked promising, but it turned out to be shit?

Diner Dash is indeed awesome. Stuart Campbell eats babies.

/wants to play Fantavision

Stuart Campbell eats babies.

So? Who doesn't these days?

Quite. Sorry for not replying earlier, I had a toddler in the oven.

Wow. This review is a bit harsh. If you were thinking about picking up this game, don't let this dissuade you from it. This game is fantastic, polished and a lot of fun. It's impressive coming from a French development team of I think only 3 people. And it is priced to sell... it's only $19.99. I don't think this game is getting the reviews it deserves. It's the most fun I've had on my DS in quite a while. Everything from the art, control and music comes together wonderfully.

I don't disagree with some of the points made in the review about the difficulty spiking randomly, but it is really not that bad and definitely not a big enough flaw to detract from the overall experience. Please support this game! You'll be glad you did.

I smell marketing.

Ok I have been playing this for two day. Its BRILLIANT!
Most of what Ellie said is true... But I feel she was being overly harsh.
The touch screen use is good as well. It actually makes you feel like your part of the game.
The best part? Dodging a million bullets makes you feel like the boss!
If you like Bangai-O-Spirits you will absolutely love this.

"The main problem, however, is that the later levels force you to focus all of your attention on the bottom screen. "

The reviewer is correct. Its a fatal flaw in the game I think. Its just too frantically paced to be fun

Definitely a very harsh review...
Imho, while the reviewer is right about the frantic nature of the game that can often result in a quite frustrating experience, it's also pretty clear that she isn't really familiar with Japanese bullet hell shooters - clearly Big Bang Mini's main source of inspiration. In most of those shooters (Dodonpachi, Guwange etc.) very often you mainly concentrate on the area around your ship/character in order to dodge seemingly impossible patterns, after that you go (kamikazestyle) for your target. This fluctuation between defensive and offensive gameplay is also present in Big Bang Mini though the controls are much more "sensitive" due to being stylus based.
You really do need a good share of patience and discipline to master this kind of playstyle which the reviewer clearly didn't have. Resist the urge to fire blindly (therefore staying defensive), have a quick look at the enemies, then time your (short) bursts. Once you get used to this basic tactic Big Bang Mini can get very addictive!
Sure the game is not perfect, but what you get for your $20 is not only a very stylish touch based shmup but also the most original take on the classic arcade shmup formula I've seen in years. Everyone who liked Bangai O Spirits - also a test of patience with lots of trial and error - should definitely give this one a try.

My wishlist for a potential sequel:
scoring system
replay function
the option to go with a more traditional control method (d-pad for movement, stylus for weapons/shield etc.)
...and well, maybe a different title...one that doesn't sound like a midget porn;-)

Skeltor everything you say is sensible but it really comes down to liking the frantic play or not. There's just too many times when you have to move the "collector-thing" around constantly which leaves little time for offense firing, so you end up shooting off random blasts. The reinvented Space Invaders game is better at this sort of thing. There's real strategy there.

Here we go again Ellie, slags off a game. Far too harsh this is a great little game. Let's just say everyone other review scored it more highly and it averages at 7.9!

This game is a ton of fun!

Wtf? A 5/10 for a game that's one of the best and most refreshing games to come out on DS for a while, especially for being innovative in both the genre of shooters and stylus-based games? Now that's a BAD review.

And I agree with the other commenter, that unfortunately we have to take Ellie's opinions with more than a grain of salt, since, as a litmus test, she considered Diner Dash as "one of the best DS games". (Diner Dash is an ok game, but probably even not the best MOBILE phone game, let alone on DS, which has better capabilities and a far bigger range of games to choose from).

I think the biggest problem of the review is that's it's very biased. She does praise some things about the game, like the graphics and so on, but it becomes blatantly obvious that she doesn't like playing shooters. And she throws in some really stupid complaints, such as "(your) missiles will come back at you... to make matters worse it's sudden death if you mess up"- Isn't that a pretty normal fare for shooters? In some games you get a health bar, but more or less if you crash into anything you die. If you play Gradius, Parodius, Bangai-O-spirits, arcade-shooters etc, it would be pretty obvious that the fun IS in dodging crazy/impossible fire and missiles - not cause for ire. If avoiding lots of bullets in shooters is too difficult or unenjoyable, at least she could write more impartially so that she can give a useful review to people who may enjoy this wonderfully fun game. As someone else mentioned, the game averages 8/10 on other reviews, so it's not a bad game, just a bad review.

The review is so inconsistent, in suggesting that the game is both unbelievably hard or impossible with "sudden death mechanics" and "like solving Rubik's cute in the dark and balancing marbles on tightropes"; all the while, also lamenting it was also "too easy", "repetitive", and "boring". She complains about the early levels being "too easy" when in fact, that's usually how games are designed, easy at first, so you can get used to the controls. The later stages do get harder, but not impossible - it didn't feel harder than an arcade shooter, so don't be scared from her hyperbolic overreaction to the games difficulty, as it's not any harder than most sidescroll shooters. The only difference is that firing and moving your vessel out of danger uses only the stylus instead of joystick/pad and buttons. But the difficulty I found perfect - the challenge and new mechanics made it more fun. I didn't breeze through the levels; it's indeed awesome when a game makes you feel at some point, "Man, this is so hard/impossible", and then you sleep on it, try again and you pass! Games where, when you beat the boss, it actually feels like a real achievement, like "Woohoo!". That's how games should be. In fact, Big Bang Mini is very progressive in that it consists of very short levels per stage/setting, unlike some games where you do get more than one life, but you might play for an hour, only to get to some point where you die and have to start all over again... So there's no room for that 'sudden death' complaint when you only have to survive a few minutes at a time!

Big Bang Mini is much more challenging and fun than portrayed in the above review. In stark contrast to the writer's opinion that it's "repetitive", my experience with the game is that its fun, challenging, and very refreshing - the scenes and elements change in every new stage. It must have one of the widest variety of bullets/missiles in any game or shooter I've ever played. There's the bullets reflected from your missed shots, there's clamping walls in one stage, rotating falling crosses, different sized, shaped, speed of bullets, bullets behaving in different ways... This game is so beautiful and innovative, it puts a lot of games to shame. You can tell there's been so much attention to detail in this game and that the developers of this game love shooters and love games that are challenging and fun. It's so new and refreshing, and it reminds me of some other epic games, like Nights into Dreams, the kind of games which are so original. It's so pure, with great game play, great graphics, and it absorbs you into the game.

In short, Big Bang Mini is an innovative shooter/stylus game and it's definitely a must-try. Innovative game mechanics coupled with stylistic graphics make this a really fun and unique shooter.

I think that this was the first time in my life I ever read a review that categorised dying by being hit once as a flaw in a shooter. What next? "Oh, you know, it was good as fight games go but the enemies used special moves against me, therefore I am going to remove points!"

I enjoy Ellie's stream of consciousness style as much as the next man, but please just keep her away from anything that requires even a modicum of gaming skill in future. Not being good enough at something is not a justifiable reason to punish it.