{"id":789,"date":"2023-08-18T17:32:19","date_gmt":"2023-08-18T17:32:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ballpeenhammer.com\/?p=789"},"modified":"2025-07-02T19:35:14","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T19:35:14","slug":"bullet-hell-heroes-review-saving-the-world-doesnt-come-cheap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ballpeenhammer.com\/index.php\/2023\/08\/18\/bullet-hell-heroes-review-saving-the-world-doesnt-come-cheap\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Bullet Hell Heroes\u2019 Review \u2013 Saving the World Doesn\u2019t Come Cheap"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The mobile ecosystem has done pretty alright with shoot-em-ups over the course of its history. Indeed, some of the earliest cell phone games were shooters. When the iPhone launched, we soon had a bunch of great conversions of Cave\u2019s arcade shooters amid a number of indie games. Sky Force, Phoenix, Danmaku Unlimited, .Decluster<\/em>, and more have provided us with a steady stream of enjoyable experiences in the genre. I think we can add another log to that cozy fire with the release of Bullet Hell Heroes<\/em> (Free)<\/a>, a shooter that applies a less common theme to some familiar gameplay.<\/p>\n

\"\"Well, less common than spaceships or military craft, I guess. Fans of the genre will be more than a little familiar with the Touhou Project<\/em> shooters, which opt for cute characters instead of deadly craft. Bullet Hell Heroes<\/em> openly admits its inspiration from those games, and it\u2019s not as though it\u2019s alone in that. This game offers up a whopping twenty-five different heroes to use, each with their own shot and special move. Sure, there\u2019s a shrine maiden in there, but you also get more typical RPG-style heroes to round things out. There\u2019s a good variety here, and it\u2019s fun trying to find the heroes that fit your play style best.<\/p>\n

But a hero shouldn\u2019t set out alone, right? In this game, you don\u2019t just choose one hero for the quest. At first you can bring three with you, with additional slots available via IAPs. These effectively function as extra lives. If your first hero is shot down, the next one will jump in. Run out of heroes and you fail the quest. It\u2019s up to you how you want to build your team, but there isn\u2019t a whole lot of strategizing since the means of swapping characters is to kill the current one. It mostly comes down to whether you want to put your strongest character first or last. Well, that\u2019s not nothing.<\/p>\n

The controls work as you would expect if you\u2019ve played any mobile shooters in the last decade or so. Drag your finger around to move your character, and tap a second finger down to use your character\u2019s special move. You can only do that if you have sufficient MP, of course. Each hero starts off with a full MP bar and the amount consumed depends on the move. You can rebuild MP by grazing shots, nudging you towards that popular mechanic. If you\u2019re bold, you can tee up your special moves at a surprisingly steady pace, and that\u2019s always fun. Since your MP bar caps out, you can\u2019t stockpile too many of these moves, which encourages you to use them instead of just trying to hoard them for the boss battles. Oh, I should also mention that if you have an external controller, the game offers support for that. Either method works fine.<\/p>\n

There are more than twenty different quests to play, each one consisting of a short stage followed by a multi-stage boss battle. While the stages aren\u2019t anything special, I do appreciate that the game isn\u2019t just a series of boss fights. I like to have that little warm-up before the main event, so to speak. The boss battles are naturally the stars of the show, and each one of them is a blast to tackle. They all have their own patterns that can often surprise you, keeping you on your toes as you whittle down their life bars. You can play each of the quests at five different difficulty levels, though you\u2019ll have to earn the right to play the two highest ones. There are also Boss Rush stages to challenge if you\u2019re looking for more to do, adding up to a rather substantial amount of content all-up.<\/p>\n

\"\"Since I\u2019ve briefly mentioned the topic of unlocking, let\u2019s talk about how everything works in that regard here. At the start of the game, you have access to three heroes. The rest of them are all locked, and the means of gaining access to them varies. Some require you to beat a specific number of quests at certain difficulty levels. Some are bought with the money you collect by playing stages and checking off the game\u2019s achievements. Almost half of them are bought with real money via IAPs, selling for a couple of bucks each. If you\u2019re unlocking the non-IAP characters legit, you\u2019ve got a bit of a task ahead of you, but it\u2019s one that gives the game a solid sense of purpose and a pleasing trickle of new things to try. I kind of like that set-up. That said, even once you have the heroes there are lots of ways to spend your in-game cash. Each hero can be upgraded in various ways, and it will take a lot of playing to max out everyone.<\/p>\n

Alright, let\u2019s talk about the monetization. Dirty business, but when a game is free to download and play there has to be some way to pay the developer\u2019s air conditioning bills. First up, there are ads. Unskippable ones, and they\u2019re fairly frequent. The game will compensate you for watching them, but they can be annoying. Drop four bucks and they\u2019re gone forever, with an additional hero slot and a coin doubler thrown in for your pleasure. There\u2019s an IAP you can buy for a couple of dollars for an extra hero slot, and it\u2019s available to buy twice. You can pay a couple of bucks for a ton of coins, and that\u2019s available to buy as many times as you like. Finally, there\u2019s an IAP you can pick up for four bucks that unlocks every hero in the game. Don\u2019t buy those individual hero unlocks, in other words.<\/p>\n

If you want to fully unlock everything in Bullet Hell Heroes<\/em>, you\u2019re looking at spending a rather reasonable twelve American dollars. I think the quality of the game supports that price, and you can certainly get by with one or two IAPs if you feel like it. Heck, you can get by with none of them if you don\u2019t mind ads and the idea of missing out on heroes. But I do want to talk about that IAP that unlocks all of the heroes, because I think it\u2019s in a weird place. It really does unlock all of the heroes, including the ones you would normally get by completing certain objectives and spending coins. That takes some of the fun out of the meta progression, in my opinion, so I think you\u2019re almost better off waiting until you\u2019ve unlocked the non-IAP heroes before buying this one. There are a lot of wrong ways to spend your money with this game, and that isn\u2019t something you want to worry about while trying to enjoy a game.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

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