Duality ZF is upcoming dual play 2D shooter (shoot'em up / shmup) for the Xbox 360. Release date - Summer 2009. Price: 400 Microsoft Points.Duality Innovation: Duality ZF introduces a few innovative duality features:
DUAL-SL, a weapon system with spread and laser features. It morphs from spread to laser and back via trigger controls.
DUAL PLAY allows you to control two players at once. Its an underground concept born in Japanese arcades by expert gamers. DUAL PLAY offers double the firepower. It suits newcomers in easy modes and allows experts to challenge extended expert modes.
DUAL-HL, a prototype weapon system in development; may not make launch date.
Firsts:
Duality ZF is the first video game to support DUAL PLAY natively.*
Duality ZF is the first 2D shooter (shoot'em up, shmup) video game to support eight independently controlled fighters simultaneously.
Game Modes (NEW):
Duality ZF features multiple games modes:
HOME
ARCADE
BULLET HELL
SURVIVAL
SCORE RUSH
BOSS RUSH
HOME is the regular game. ARCADE is what Duality ZF would have been had it been an arcade. It is more exciting, more intense, and more difficult. If you are a hardcore "shmup" fan, ARCADE was born for you, but will be enjoyed by all.
Each game mode has online scoreboards.
Gameplay:
Duality ZF has high-action, intense, quick-reflex gameplay.
Simplicity:
Duality ZF has simple gameplay. Move and shoot. No bombs that blow up everything on the screen. No powerups that power you down or switch weapons against your wishes, only powerups that improve your 32-stage spread/laser weapon. Move and shoot. That's it. Playing is about skill of missing enemy bullets with skill of shooting enemies down. There are no complex controls or weapons to master. Move and shoot.
Weapons and Powerups:
Duality ZF features two massively upgradeable weapons in one: a dual spread/laser weapon that can be switched to spread or laser, or various hybrids, at will. It has 32 stages. If you can stay alive long to experience the maximum firepower, it shoots 65 individual bullets per shot, all calculated independently of one another. With a maximum of four shots onscreen at once, that's 260 individual bullets per fighter, for more than 2,000 individually calculated bullets onscreen at once with eight fighters.
The powerups have an artificial intelligence system that lures them to the players most in need, to always promote a balance of power. These are guidelines only, and do not need to be followed. Upon final death, the remaining powerups you would have had, had you had an extra life, spit out to all remaining fighters and friends. The final fighter left standing will have be boosted in powerups to help battle out the remaining fight on its own. (Also read the "revival" section.)
Revival:
Lost fighters and friends are revived at the beginning of each stage, so when you are the last fighter standing, try to beat the stage and kill the end boss to bring everyone back.
Control:
The Duality ZF fighter has the maximum and most responsive control possible. It is extremely agile and powerful. When you die, it is your fault, not because of poor controls or a slow fighter. We challenge you with challenging stages, not with an inferior fighter with inferior controls, to realize your true 2D shooter potential.
Release Date (NEW):
Summer 2009 in Xbox LIVE Community Games (XBLCG), available to all Xbox LIVE users in the New Xbox Experience (NXE).
Philosophy:
Duality ZF is a 2D shooter made by 2D shooter fans. It is the 2D shooter that we have always wanted to play. It gives us great pleasure to realize this goal and (soon) share our dream with other 2D shooter fans around the world.
Scoring System (NEW):
Duality ZF's scoring system matches how much you dominate the game. It is the most fair scoring system possible. It cannot be exploited by tricky means. The more you dominate the game, the higher your score. Kill everything as fast as possible. Kick the game's ass to get the highest score.
The scoring system awards points proportional to the enemy strength and attack. The same formula is used everywhere in the game, across difficulty modes and even across game modes. If the enemy is twice as hard to kill, you get twice the points. The scoring system does not "care" about the difficulty mode or the game mode, only how tough the enemies are.
There is no maximum score or scoring caps. If it were possible to kill an enemy one million times faster, you would get one million times the points.
Online Scoreboards (NEW):
Xbox LIVE Community Games does not permit us leaderboards, yet. However...
Duality ZF uses a clever peer-to-peer score sharing system to implement online scoreboards, but peer-to-peer only works with Xbox LIVE Gold subscriptions. We highly recommend subscribing to Xbox LIVE Gold to fully appreciate Duality ZF's scoreboards.
Soundtrack (NEW):
Duality ZF features a beautiful Imphenzia soundtrack, strong in club, trance, goa, and dance music. It is a perfect unity to our hyper action gameplay. Imphenzia tracks have exceeded one million downloads. The Duality ZF Soundtrack will be made available for purchase and download on www.imphenzia.com upon release.
More here...