A2 Zygon

A2 Zygon is a 2D, retro-themed, bullet hell indie game for PC and Mac. It features anthropomorphic characters and has its own unique gameplay mechanics. It has been solo-developed by Connor Gresko (SolDirix) using Unreal Engine 4.26. The game was released on Steam on December 1st, 2022. It took about a year to complete. A demo was released about halfway through production.

Plot

The game takes place on the planet of Vodos, a world fueled by magic and populated by anthropomorphic beings. It is however tainted by dark magic originating from the dark realm of Endrenold. A corrupt wizard by the name of Osilis steals a spell scroll that unleashes a dangerous entity from Endrenold and the A2 realm within it. Two rival wizards in training, Oren and Flair, decide to hunt Osilis down and get the scroll back before it is too late.

Gameplay

The game has a similar gameplay style to some of the older Touhou games, but with a mix of new elements including:

• Saving between levels and bosses during story mode.
• Status effects from enemy bullets.
• A strike attack in place of bombs.
• A split easy and hard path during story mode.
• A larger multitude of unlockables.
• A more in-depth story line with plenty of lore.
• A currency system that doubles as a scoring system.

Story mode

The player chooses between two playable characters:

• Oren - A male, gray-furred, Vodosian wolf. He is clad in blue armor and carries a large blade in his right hand with which he fires magic projectiles from and uses to strike his enemies. He has a wily personality and a slight temper.
• Flair - A female, white-furred, Vodosian cat. She specializes in fire magic and can strike her enemies by summoning an orb of fire which she swings around. She has a more stoic personality.

Oren has faster speed and more focused attacks, but has lower health. Flair has slower speed and spread out attacks, but higher health. Flair is recommended for beginners. The player travels from level to level, beating a boss at the end of each. Dialog for most bosses change based on certain actions made by the player. The player gathers hearts to increase health, spades to use strike attacks, and gets coins from defeating enemies and saving up health until the end of the level. The player can also get 3 hidden upgrades in most of the levels. Coins are used to activate the upgrades at the end of each level.

Upgrades include:

• Health - Increases maximum health points by 5.
• Bullet Distance - Increases bullet distance by a small amount.
• Bullet Quantity - Increases the number of bullets fired by 1, also changing the attack formation slightly.

On the upgrade screen, the player is also given a world map to show their current location and what levels they have completed. Any coins saved up after beating or giving up story mode get stashed. They can later be used to purchase cards the player has unlocked.

The player gets either a good or bad ending depending on the path they take.

Training mode

Lets the player get a hold of the controls and gameplay mechanics. Just like story mode, the player can choose to play as either Oren or Flair. The player can destroy targets and learn about the controls, collectables, and upgrades.

Extras

Challenge levels

These are harder levels that the player unlocks by meeting certain criteria. They are meant to be more of a challenge than the levels in story mode. Most contain new enemies, locations, and bosses.

Cards

Cards are the game's progress indicators and provide lore and hints. They all have their own unlocking criteria. After unlocking a card, the player can use the coins they have stashed away to activate them, flipping them over to reveal what they are.

There are 3 tiers of cards to unlock:

• Rose Gold - The top tier.
• Platinum - Second tier. Mostly bosses and special areas.
• Gold - Third tier. Mostly enemies.

Other

Players can view high scores as well as other unlockables.

Reception

Most reception has been positive, particularly from the game's reviews on Steam. Many praise the game's music and variety of difficulty. Some have criticized that the game does diverge a bit from the traditional bullet hell formula, such as the addition of player health instead of dying in one hit. In previous versions of the game, players noted the collectables were harder to collect since they didn't home in on the player in any way. Some users with older/weaker graphics cards have had technical issues running the game since it does require a stronger graphics card that supports DirectX 10, despite being 2D and retro-themed.

Trivia

• A lot of the art direction was influenced by games like Final Fantasy I, Undertale, and Kingdom Hearts.
• The creator has an entire walkthrough available on the Steam page that reveals everything except the lore found in cards, major easter eggs, and hidden achievements.
• The game itself was originally meant to be a 3D RPG made with a custom game engine many years before its production. It was scrapped for a top-down 3D bullet hell/RPG called 'A2 Rosen', which was being made in Unreal Engine 4. Eventually, due to issues importing models from Blender and the game starting to show it's design flaws, A2 Rosen was scrapped as well. A2 Zygon was revived as a simpler 2D bullet hell that was much more manageable.

Links and References

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1910490/A2_Zygon/

https://www.indiedb.com/news/a2-zygon-a-new-flavor-of-bullet-hell