User:Rick/Proto:Strider(NES)

This article is a work in progress. ...Well, all the articles here are, in a way. But this one moreso, and the article may contain incomplete information and editor's notes.

To do: NOT make this look like a rip from a forum, which is pretty much what this is. Also, lots and lots of images and details and cool jazz.

General

• You start with 10(!) Health and 10 skill points. This is thankfully doubled in the final.
• The music track doesn't switch when going into the sub-menu in the proto.
• All the "tricks" are listed in the proto, but you can't highlight them unless you've leveled up sufficiently. The final doesn't even have them show up until you earn them.
• Enemies that take more than one hit to kill seem to take at least twice as many more hits to kill in the proto.
• Spikes launch you up far higher upon touching them in the proto.
• Zain bosses aren't quite finished. They don't speed their attack patterns up, nor does the machine itself spit bombs at you after you finish off the square thing. This means the boss is a completely defenseless for the second half of the battle!
• Sheena seems to not even exist on-screen in the proto!

Map Screen

• Where the portraits and the text are switch places in the final.
• The grid thing scrolls over to the right before showing the speaker, which is kind of cool.
• There is an extra point on the map in the middle of Europe/Asia! It's basically the second "part" of the first Los Angeles venture that brings you to Faceas Clay's secret chamber. It's labeled as "sutoraida-hosobu" (Strider Headquarters)

[IMG]http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h59/rickcressen/beta%20stuff%20misc/Secret%20Thing/StriderHiryuJPrototype-11_zpsfcb783ea.png[/IMG] [IMG]http://i61.photobucket.com/albums/h59/rickcressen/beta%20stuff%20misc/Secret%20Thing/StriderU-5_zpsef8a9035.png[/IMG]

• Silly Intelligence Unit, Egypt isn't in South America!

Kazakhstan

• No lightning effects at all.
• The regular knife guards have orange sleeves as opposed to green.
• The standing gun guards are orange instead of purple.
• The robots spawn...oddly in the prototype. The spawn facing away from you, only actually doing something if you're in front of them.
• The flying guards are orange as opposed to purple in the final (notice a pattern?).
• There are breakable walls in the proto after the area with the flying guards! There's a bug here too where breaking the uppermost blocks with a jumping upward stab will delete the graphic of the regular wall here (The wall is still there physically, just invisible).
• File #1 does not appear in the proto right before going into the building.
• No purple flash in the proto when entering the building.
• The room where the magnetic boots are used (in the room to the left after getting File #2) has the magnetic area slope up in the proto! In the final it's a flat square. Additionally, the magnetic panels flash between orange and purple in the proto instead of orange and grey in the final.
• The room where you get Key #4 has a tube sending you back near the outside in the final. This doesn't exist in the proto (?)

[s]Brazil[/s] Egypt

• The cannon at the end of the train fires a single (what looks to be) glitched projectile. This is changed to a three-way shot in the final.
• The enemies perched on the slopes that send down balls are (surprise!) orange in the proto instead of purple.
• A scientist gives you the aqua boots in the proto, complete with dialog! In the final, the room is altered so you have to drop in and slide under a small opening to grab them with no scientist to be found.
• There are only two aquatic robots in the proto before you fight the shark robot. There is an additional one in the final.

Japan

• The samurai enemy respawns after you kill him in the proto. While he respawns in the final, he only does so if you leave the level entirely and come back.
• There is a gun-toting enemy in the proto that spawns in the air slightly above the exit of the tube to the right of the master. Judging by the placement, it's probably a bug that he spawns there, though this guy spawns in other weird locations too (see Los Angeles).

China

• The third enemy you encounter in the stage is changed from a third hidden cannon
• The first enemy you meet after going inside the building after the long drop is an invincible, vertical moving spiked wheel in the proto. This is replaced with one of those lever-bot things in the final.
• The room the Attack Boots has been altered a bit. In the proto it's a basic square room with a background statue in it. The final changes this so you have to slide underneath an overhang to get the boots, much like in Egypt.
• The forced battle with the large robot (from Kazakhstan) that jumps is missing.

Los Angeles

Seems rough in the enemy placement. Gun enemies appear in odd spots.

Africa

• There are two additional hanging snipers after the crocodile pit surrounding the area you need to go up.
• The foliage on the tree right before entering the cave has been altered in the final to make the cave easier to get into.

Red Dragon Headquarters

Overall, this is probably the only level that is not quite "finished". The layout and all the important things are there, but it's quite obvious that this needs a bit more polish once you defeat the ninja with the helmet and claws that spins in a tornado.

• The area with one of the mainframe enemy brain things you need to defeat (after the section climbing up the wall with the magnet boots) has been altered slightly. Since the area you need to slide under is right beside the tube, attempting to slide into it from there will simply eject you down the tube. The final corrects this by making the tube an extra tile longer and reducing the overhead significantly.
• Later mini-bosses are different. The unused caped fire ninja shows up here twice! [More on this later because yaaaaay lazy right now] He replaces the samurai guy (who only shows up in the proto once, in Japan).
• The first boss in the boss rush (the shield guy) is a completely obvious placeholder. His graphic is there but it does [i]nothing[/i]. It's not even tangible! You can bypass him completely and just take the tube down to the next room The final has him working.
• The second boss in the boss rush is not even there, but strangely enough a collision box is! Moving into the area immediately in front of the tube will damage you. You can also just skip this room entirely too. The final adds a rematch with the whirling dervish ninja.
• The third boss is the unused fireball-throwing ninja! Unlike the previous two bosses, this room is actually working and you have to beat him to proceed.
• The fight with Matic is a lot easier than the prototype due to the fact that attacking him does [i]not[/i] knock the cipher out of your hands! However you still have to use a charged shot to make him drop his cipher, then attack him while he leaps back to get it. Matic's palette is also incorrect, hilariously. Even more hilarious is the fact that you can actually [i]walk right out of the fight[/i] without killing him! However he'll still follow you down the hallway.
• "Yugdrasil" spawns in the hallway before you're supposed to fight him. Unfortunately all that spawns are the two bouncing blade projectiles and his bombs that explode harmlessly out of your reach, rendering the fight unwinnable anti-climatically. The final version, obviously, fixes this terrible error.

Unused Enemies

This mini-boss shows up! He's in the final as a graphic rip. He's also buggy as holy hell.