Video Game / Angry Laser Space

Like this, except more flashy.

Angry Laser Space is a Vertical Scrolling Shooter WIP by Søren "Comrade Shook" Ovesen, with coding and level design by Chartle, and music by Sebastian MRM.

For no given reason, you control a spaceship that flies out to fight armies of enemy ships with nothing but a couple of front-mounted cannons, a directional turret, and various upgrades to your ship that can be purchased with money and levels gained from shooting enemies. Lasers will be involved, and they may be quite mad.

Download the game and follow its progress here.

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• all lowercase letters: baby mode :c
  • CAPS LOCK: Every other difficulty.
• Armor-Piercing Attack: The second-to-last offensive skill lets you pierce enemy shields.
• Attack Its Weak Point: Leviathans can only be killed by destroying their head, every other body part just cuts off the rest of the tail. They also avert For Massive Damage by still being tougher to kill than most other enemies.
• Boss Fight: Every five stages.
  • Mirror Boss: The first boss has forward shots, aimed sideways shots, and periodically fires super shots. And it mimics your movements on the horizontal axis.
  • Flunky Boss: The second boss.
  • Turns Red: The second boss starts off with aimed bullets and rockets, but starts using it's insta-kill laser, more bullets, and a bunch of ships that fire even more bullets at you if hurt enough.
  • Bullfight Boss: The third boss.
  • Boss-Only Level: It's just you, the boss, and your various projectiles. Until the second boss sends its flunkies at you, of course.
• Bullet Hell: The higher the difficulty, the more bullets the enemies fire. And then there's the apeshit coefficient...
• Collateral Damage: The splinter shot upgrades make the enemies explode into multiple bullets that can damage other enemies.
• Collision Damage:
  • Several enemy tyes specialize in ramming you. You can get skills that reduce it, but they still suggest "Kamikaze: Don't".
  • The Stage 15 boss is possibly the worst offender, and you will die if hit.
• Deflector Shields: Some enemies will block your shots unless you get a certain upgrade. The player can also get one as an upgrade.
• Dodge the Bullet: The second defensive skill does this. It does, however, not work against lasers, because, have you ever tried to dodge a ray of light?
• Easier Than Easy/Easy-Mode Mockery: baby mode :c
• Energy Weapon : Lasers only flash up for a moment, instantly hit you if you're in the way, and cannot be dodged through. This makes the speed upgrade much less useful for the player's laser weapons.
• Guide Dang It!: The in-game manual doesn't actually tell you the controls, much less about the existence of the super shots. At least version 0.9 adds keybindings in the option menu.
• Harder Than Hard: HARD is difficulty level 4. The highest difficulty level is 8 (and appropriately named EPIC MAN MODE >:C).
• Hitbox Dissonance: Even though the shield is slightly larger than the ship, it's merely a cosmetic effect since your hitbox remains the same as without it.
• Idiosyncratic Difficulty Levels: baby mode :c ; EASY; NORMAL; HARD; NIGHTMARE; RUDE AWAKENING; DAMMIT DEVELOPPERS; EPIC MAN MODE >:C
  • In Hardcore mode (up to version 0.6): angry baby mode >:c ; STILL PRETTY EASY; BADASS NORMAL; ROCK HARD; HORRIBLE NIGHTMARE; REALLY FUCKING RUDE AWAKENING; SUCK IT, PLAYERS; HARDCORE EPIC MAN MODE >:C
• Kaizo Trap: Killing the enemies doesn't prevent their attacks from killing you in return, even after you finish the stage.
• Law of Chromatic Superiority: Red is more dangerous than yellow is more dangerous than green. Even the bosses follow that pattern.
• Dakka: More. Special mention goes to the bullet weapons, which specialize in weak, rapid-fire shots.
• Necessary Drawback:
  • Eventually averted once you're able to purchase all upgrades and acquire all skills. But until then...
    • Glass Cannon: If you pick offense over defense. Good for killing lots of enemies and thus getting more experience and money for more upgrades.
    • Stone Wall: If you go defensive. Great on higher difficulties where you're much more liable to get killed.
    • Master of None: It's suggested to upgrade one weapon and stick with it, as one great weapon (especially with spread shot and splinter shot combined) is more effective than having both weapons be moderately good.
  • The different weapons are also balanced one way or another.
    • Pulses are balanced.
    • Lasers are very strong and light-fast, but have a slow firing rate.
    • Bullets are weak individually, but are shot in rapid succession.
    • Rockets are relatively strong, but take some time to gain speed.
• One-Hit Kill:
  • The second boss' laser.
  • Subverted in EPIC MAN MODE >:C : You can survive the occasional hit, but more likely won't.
• One-Hit Polykill: With super shots, piercing shots, spread shots, and improvable splinter shots, you're gonna be able to do this on a regular basis before long.
• One Ship Army: As a direct result of the above.
• Permadeath: Hardcore Mode. The game even warns you if you attempt to start playing.
• Random Number God: Averted, except for the random chance (dependent on the apeshit coefficient) of an enemy spawning with faster and more irregular shot patterns.
• Robo Teching: The second boss' rockets.
• Skill Scores and Perks: A couple of Skill Ladders.
• Spread Shot:
  • A purchasable uprade for your weapons.
  • Apeshit enemies, as well as some normal ones, will do this, as does the second boss.
• Strong, but Unskilled/Weak, but Skilled: The difference between the frontal cannons and the turret is that you can aim the turret wherever you want, but the cannons deal more damage by virtue of shooting double the amount of projectiles.
• Suicide Attack: The wedges' MO. Red ones even aim straight towards your ship.
• Zerg Rush: Just look at the number of enemies attacking you◊ in level 1!