The Shock Shield.

This thrumming bulwark of porpoise-punishing power might be the marquee item for Fingeance, and we’ve all but ignored it on this site. Stephen wrote a primer on it here, but it deserves a second look.

You see, the Shock Shield isn’t the only defensive item in Fingeance. Once done, the game will be packed with them. But right now, the Shock Shield is king. Check out this stopping power:

Let’s take two lessons from that image.

First, top-difficulty Fingeance can be insane. Just look at that bullet output. For anyone steeped in shoot-em-up culture, keep in mind that the player submarine’s hitbox is the entire submarine. That means dodging attacks like this is just as hard as it looks.

Second, players can overcome this difficulty by working together. A team carrying a Shock Shield plays much differently than a team without, since the shield provides brief moments of near-total protection. So, with all that power, when would you ever not play with a Shock Shield? To find our answer, let’s look at a few facts about Fingeance enemies:

• Many enemies change behaviors as they survive, increasing their threat over time.
• Several enemies enjoy summoning minions, increasing their threat over time.
• Most bosses have some sort of Soft Enrage mechanic, increasing their threat over time.

See the subtle commonality? High-difficulty Fingeance is about threat assessment and management. When you can put down the threat fast, you’ll save your team a lot of pain down the road. The tradeoff is damage vs. safety. The Shock Shield provides a lot of safety, but no damage. When you bash a foe with the Shock Shield, you shock them (stunning them briefly), but put them no closer to their demise.

Further – and here’s where we get to the delicate balancing act of Fingeance part design – many offensive items can be used in defensive ways. The Shock Shield is merely the easiest to use.

Introducing the Bouncing Burst:

This thing is capable of massive area-of-effect mayhem. The catch? You have get up close to do it.

With this part, we’re asking for a player to put it all on the line. Sure, it can be worth it (when our demo hits, try sneaking inside the Jellyfish Queen’s body, then unleashing this baby. Ouch.), but when you’re that close to a boss, things can turn sour fast. Worse, the Bouncing Burst doesn’t seem to offer any protection. Sure, your team needs the damage, but which part do you choose?

Decision-making in Fingeance relies on the needs of your team, and also on their skill. Remember how I said the Shock Shield was only the easiest defensive item? Basically defensive training wheels? Well, check this out:

[Editor’s Note] – This shot was taken by playing one-handed for the purpose of screenshotting. The Bouncing Burst can create a pause in the bullet stream large enough to allow passage without quite as much difficulty as this image would suggest.

There’s that same boss, executing the same attack as above. Now, the burst’s brief stun effect allows the player to (just barely) sneak through without taking damage. As players climb through the higher difficulties, we expect a certain degree of scrappiness. To battle the enemy superpowers – devastating attacks and growing threat – you’ll need to maximize every part, offensively and defensively.

As we careen toward our June 1st demo, we’ll be adding polish and balance to these parts and others. We can’t wait to see how you’ll put them to use.