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Hardbadge gets a lot easier once you find the right strategy for the game. The game mixes up, dodge by sight, dodge by pattern and most importantly finding the sweet spot. The 2nd and 3rd boss can be killed without moving, same for 1st and 3rd mode of the last Boss. This makes the Boss fights much easier. Though you might need some attempts to find those sweet spots (or go watch one of the walkthroughs).
Another tip, if you don´t have a sweet spot against a cartain boss mode (or mini boss) and die often, then don´t bother absorbing more than one Orb. Just aborb one and use that to kill the enemy or get to next mode(sweet spot). Trying to absorb more is not worth it, you can do a lot of damage in the time it takes to absorb the next orb. Otherwie your likely to waste lives without doing damage.
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The absorption is a little too slow. The worst visual clutter happens when you absorb the omni-directional shot, along with the rotating backgrounds. The game is a little colorblind unfriendly. The hard badge is definitely hard and not impossible. Other than being too difficult for average players I actually love the concept and the game was fun when I wasn't exploding. This has potential to be something more.
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Wow, this game came out in 2008 and I've only NOW played it. This is one of the reason I like BotD; it shows me great games that I've missed even after playing on Kongregate for over 10 years.
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Anyway, annoying to depend on keyboard too when using the mouse, even though necessary since mouse button means one good button (I'm enforcing no right button rule), but it could still be used. IK game would probably be too easy if you could fire Steal beam and Regular at same time, but it's still a shame. Now for the real big problem: music is too loud and overbearing, and drowns out SFX. Even just a keyboard mute shortcut isn't enough: separate music and SFX mute needed badly. Other than that, pretty good game. Would be nice if dying just lost you one Option rather than start from scratch, even if as-it-is happens to be a bit more shmup purist.
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[Brain] "Whoops. Didn't mean to use steal beam on tutorial twice. WHAAAA!? It gave me 2 towards.... No way." Tis a great badge when you can claim it during the tutorial. It's literally a one minute badge if even, so there's no excuse not to have it.
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Finally beat it! The final boss actually targets you after the first phase so there's not much you can do but stay away and dodge stuff with lightning reflexes. I highly suggest zooming in to make things a little easier. The final boss's burst attack is extremely difficult to dodge, but I brute forced him with all my remaining lives (absorb/damage/die).
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I love shooting games like this. Was wondering why I didnt have the hard badge from long ago. Came to the 2nd stage boss and I understood why i never bothered with the trash mechanics again. The loss of all charges when killed, and way too slow buildup vs bosses with no shooting while you absorb. Just awful. StrikerX22s comment is so on point. Good game ruined by bad decisions.
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After absorbing boss skill 5x, if you shoot you start the slow motion mode: so much annoying. I've read the previous comm, ok this game is 12 years old, but badge does still exist. And today it's the badge of the day. Fantasy Online and Antaria online has been removed. Kongregate should remove some other games...
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It's kind of funny reading all these angry comments about a 12 year old game. Get a grip, guys; flash games have changed a lot since back then. Bring on the angry downvotes!
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I beat my first run through, but it was rather close. I can just how hard the game would be, because if I set the difficulty any higher, I don't think I would have made it to the end. Since there is basically no chance of the developer seeing this, I will leave the rest of what I have to say out.
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This is one of the worst games i've ever played, sod off am I staying for even the medium badge. And I'm willing to grind most games.
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The story is dumb. The game should have auto-fire with click to absorb. The visual clutter is astonishing and giving me a headache! This is embarrassing. 2/5
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Big middle finger to that cloud stage boss. I get wrecked every time that thing shoots because those yellow(?) bullets against that white background stand out so well.
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I got stuck in the tutorial. I killed the second enemy. Then the next tutorial screen says "Hold X" and I'm holding it and clicking it and my only option now is to quit the tutorial.
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Easiest easy badge ever, simply press X through the tutorial and then once the game begins, takes less than 30 seconds.
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Considering you can just repeat-absorb from the tutorial enemy 10 times for the badge, this is arguably the easiest easy badge on Kong. ;)
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Every single time I see that there is a HARD badge for beating NORMAL mode in a non-story/non-RPG-like shooter like this game, I immediately know it's going to be a 1 or 2 star game because of a degree of fake difficulty. I can only imagine the ridiculous "difficulty" of the two harder modes...
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On the 2nd boss my character would randomly suicide into the scanner... that added to the annoying mechanics of the absorb made that fight very unfun.
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The hard badge is straight out impossible, I found game play even on the lowest quality setting to be jerky. I died many times to stuff I had avoided. To say this game has bugs is an understatement... 1 star
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Too difficult to survive. Absorbing takes too long and you're too vulnerable while doing it. Boss is impossible to defeat. 2/5
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There is a little bug in the tutorial: if I destroy the second enemy by shooting at him before you tell me to click x to absorb, then I'm stuck and I can only skip the tutorial.
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At least the Easy badge is beyond easy. You can get it in the tutorial with the one unmoving enemy that fires a 2-spread that you can stay still between and just keep absorbing from until you reach 10. :P
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game stinks. second boss cheats. when he scans you and goes berzerk there is nowhere to hide and you can't move fast enough to dodge
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Striker pinpoints all the severe problems with this game. Boss 2, mouse leaving screen is the absolute most horrible thing which cant be escaped due to NO KEYBOARD option. "Safe spots are stupid, just make it playable" is such a perfect summery. Such a shame.
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Definately takes too long in critical areas to replenish your charges. There aren't a lot of these times, mainly phase two and four of the last boss. Dying quickly on these forms is pretty much a death sentence.
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2/5 for that st.... lvl 2 boss. I mean wtf! The sole purpose with the ability to absorb attack is the no need to have shields and stuff. But the scanner renders your only good weapon useless. The scanner boss ruins the game in my opinion solely because it disables your only advantage in this game.