Crisis Wing

Game Overview
Crisis Wing is a vertically scrolling shoot'em up game with gameplay reminiscent of the classic early 90's Toaplan games.

There are seven stages in the arcade mode. Extra Time Attack (caravan) and Boss Rush modes are included.

The game is currently available for Windows, macOS, PS4, PS5, XBox Series X and Nintendo Switch.

Controls

 * Stick: 8-way digital movement
 * A: Shots
 * B: Bomb

Game Modes
One-Player Game: The standard seven-stage arcade mode, played solo.

Two-Player Game: The standard seven-stage arcade mode, played couch co-op.

Time Attack Mode: Caravan stage.

Boss Rush Mode: Fight against the powered-up versions of the game bosses and mid-bosses in one long gauntlet. The difficulty is higher than in the arcade mode and continues are disabled.

Player Ship
Players control up to two space fighters, CW-01 (Red) and CW-02 (Blue). The fighters are identical in terms of performance but the CW-01 starts from the left half of the screen and CW-02 starts from the right half of the screen. From the game version 1.1.0 onwards player has an option to choose either CW-01 or CW-02 for the single player game - in two player games player one controls the CW-01 and player two controls the CW-02.

Weapons
Player ship has rapid firing shots as their main weapon. A sub-weapon system can be activated by picking up power-up capsules.

There are three different sub-weapons available.

Green: Power shots (P). Shoots four (4) forward firing projectiles in wide formation. Deals consistent damage - therefore this weapon is a decent all-around weapon against all targets. Powering this weapon up increases the damage and size of each projectile.

Red: Spread vulcan (S). Fires small projectiles in a large spread pattern. Damage per hit is lower than with the other weapons but the reach of this weapon is unparalleled. This weapon is especially good to take down hordes of smaller enemies. Powering this weapon up increases the number of projectiles fired at once.

Blue: Missile pod (M). Fires salvos of powerful missiles. The missiles take some time to accelerate to the full speed - therefore faster enemies have a chance to evade the missiles. If a missile manages to hit a target the explosion deals a lot of damage. This weapon is the most powerful against slow moving and heavily fortified targets. Powering this weapon up increases the number of missiles launched at once.

The first time you pick up a power-up capsule a sub-weapon is installed to your ship. If you pick up another capsule that has the same color as your current sub-weapon a P token is credited. If you already have the P token then both of your sub-weapon and main shot are powered up. You can power up three times - excess power-ups are converted to score. If you pick up a capsule that has different color than your current sub-weapon your sub-weapon is switched.

Items


Power-up capsules: Installs sub-weapons and upgrades weapon power. Power-up capsules are dropped by destroying specific power-up carrier enemies.



Bomb: Grants an extra smart bomb. Every sixth destroyed power-up carrier will drop a bomb item instead of a power-up capsule.



Medals: Medals are dropped when certain small enemies are destroyed. They grant from 100 up to 10,000 points depending on their size.



Extend: Grants an extra life. Extend is dropped from hidden super-power-up carrier if certain rules apply.

100,000-point super medal: Grants 100k points. Super Medal is dropped from a hidden super-power-up carrier if certain rules apply.

Rank
There is a rank system in the game. Rank is a decimal (floating point) value that is capped between min and max values; the rank value can not exceed the maximum value and can not drop below the minimum value. Rank is increased by killing bosses, picking up full-value medals and holding a fully powered-up weapon. Rank is decreased by dying and bombing. Rank affects the speed of the enemy bullets and enemy bullet pattern density as well as the durability of the larger enemies. Also some enemies might have additional attack patterns if the rank is high. When an enemy is spawned it gets associated with a rank value (the global rank at that time period); once the enemy has been spawned its rank is unaffected by the global rank changes.

Loops
The game loops infinitely. Each loop increases the minimum and maximum rank. From loop 2 onwards the enemies will get some extra attack patterns as well. Background graphics will get a palette change for every loop. The game difficulty is uncapped so in practice the higher loops will eventually become a sort of kill screen. When you complete a loop you will keep your score, weapons and bombs. Completing a loop takes approximately 40 minutes.

Scoring
Scoring in Crisis Wing is relatively straightforward.

Enemy Destruction:  each enemy destroyed will give a fixed amount of score - larger enemies will award more score than smaller ones. Also each shot hitting and damaging an enemy will award 10 points.

Medals: When destroyed the small enemies might occasionally drop a medal. If you manage to catch that medal you are awarded with a score bonus and the value of the next medal will be higher. If you miss a medal (let it fall out of the screen) the value of the next medal will be reset to the minimum value - unless you manage to catch a higher value just afterwards. In that case the value of the next medal will be the same as the value of the medal caught.

Bonus Waves: Most of the stages have a hidden wave of enemies which is triggered by destroying a fixed set of enemies. These enemies are not superficially exposed but they often appear in distinct patterns - keep an eye out for them!

If this set of enemies is destroyed without either re-starting from a checkpoint or continuing the game after a game over a Bonus Wave will appear. The enemies in a bonus wave have a distinct orange color scheme and pose a very little threat. Destroying every enemy in a Bonus Wave will award a 40,000 point bonus.

Super Power Carriers: In stages three (3) and seven (7) there are no Bonus Waves but Super Power Carriers instead. Super Power Carriers are triggered similarly to the Bonus Waves (destroy a fixed set of enemies). When destroyed a Super Power Carrier will drop either an extra life or 100,000 point medal depending on the state of the game.

Extra lives can be earned through score. The first extra life is granted at 250,000 points, second one at 500,000 points and then every 500k points (1m, 1.5m, 2m, etc...)

Story
There is no written story for the Crisis Wing but there are some visual narrative told by the game intro. In the intro the CW-01 and CW-02 ships seem to be strafing a canyon which houses a giant battle cruiser. The same battle cruiser that is seen in the intro is hinted to be constantly chasing the CW ships throughout the stages and appears to catch you at the end of the last stage initiating the last boss fight.

Development History
Crisis Wing is created alongside on the Crisis Wing: Caravan Edition that was created for the Assembly 2017 Game Development competition. Crisis Wing: Caravan Edition won the first prize and the development continued. The bug-fixed "Caravan edition" is the Time Attack Mode of the full game.

Features

 * Full Controller support
 * Tate MODE
 * 1:1 Pixel aspect or full-stretch of the game window
 * CRT Filter option
 * Color-blind mode which adds symbols to the power-up capsules
 * Support for screen-refresh rates higher than 60hz

Differences between the PC and Console versions

 * Boss Rush mode difficulty is higher than in the PC version - the difficulty is on par with the PC versions prior 1.1.2 Boss Rush Mode difficulty nerf
 * Eastasiasoft and Unity splash screens shown when starting the game
 * Eastasiasoft publisher watermark in the main menu
 * The console versions load up slower than the PC version with the Switch having the longest loading times
 * The Playstation (PS4/PS5) versions seem to have slightly muted colors compared to the PC version
 * The Switch version was shipped with broken controls when playing in handheld mode. The patch fixing these issues was deployed October 8th 2021

Steam/Itch.io Version History
Crisis Wing was released in September 20, 2020 for Windows PC systems.

1.0.1 - August 2020, press beta; not publicly released

1.0.2 - September 2020, Initial Steam version

1.0.3 - September 2020, Patch Version

1.0.4 - October 2020, Patch Version

1.1.0 - March 2021, Major Update. Includes new Boss Rush game mode! Released game through itch.io as well

1.1.1 - June 2021, Patch Version, ported the game macOS (macOS version is only available from Steam)

1.1.2 - September 2021, Anniversary patch. Improved controller support, easier Boss Rush mode, added an option to choose the difficulty (loop) in the Practice Mode.

1.1.2a - September 2021, Anniversary patch - Itch.io specific version. Similar to 1.1.2 but with the Steam profile features disabled.

1.1.3 - May 2022, Patch Version. Adds support for DualSense and Xbox Series S/X controllers. Bugfixes and performance improvements.

1.1.3a - May 2022, Itch.io specific version. Similar to 1.1.3 but with the Steam profile features disabled.

1.1.4 - December 2022, Patch Version. Adds borders graphics.

1.1.4a - December 2022, Itch.io specific version. Similar to 1.1.4 but with the Steam profile features disabled.

Screenshots