Steam Hearts
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| Steam Hearts | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | GIGA |
| Publisher(s) | GIGA |
| Designer(s) | Takehiro Kimura |
| Platform(s) | NEC PC-9801, PCE, Sega Saturn (JP) |
| Release date | September 23, 1998 (Saturn) |
| Genre(s) | Vertical scrolling shooter |
| Mode(s) | Single player, Two player |
Steam Hearts (スチームハーツ) is a vertical shooter game developed by GIGA and initially released on the PC98 platform. It later made its way to the PC Engine and then the Sega Saturn. It features action mixed with adult content, as well as a two-player mode.
It is an adult game in which the player must battle their way through a stage before battling the stage's boss. Once the boss is defeated, the player character will then engage in sex with the female boss character in order to return the character to normal.
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[edit] Gameplay features
Unlike most vertical shooter games, Steam Hearts uses a different system of locomotion for the players to take advantage of. For instance, both player's ships have jet boosts which quickly increases the player's ship so as to avoid tough situations and eliminates the need for speed pick-ups.
Also unlike most shooters, the player's ship has a damage meter with six bars total which helps in laser- and bullet-littered screens and is a break from the standard one-hit-kills that is featured in most games of this genre. A player's health could be replenished throughout the course of the game either by retrieving engine shaped pick-ups or yellow M's which act as full-health power ups.
One unique (though not particularly original) aspect to the gameplay was the addition of dialogue before and during battle between characters. When the main characters wanted to talk amongst themselves or to the bosses a picture of the interior of the character's cockpit would show up on screen either all together or one character at a time and the characters conversed with each other either to brief each other on their current location or to advance the plot.
[edit] Weapon system
Players had an impressive arsenal of weaponry to choose from in the game, most of which was both common and unique to the vertical-shoot-em up.
Standard firing weapons included the typical vulcan cannon which could be fired in either full auto or semi-auto and with the right upgrades could pelt the screen in a wide spray of bullets. Alongside the vulcan was the laser weapon which started out as a long thin beam of light that could be fired at the same speed as the vulcan, but with appropriate upgrades the laser increased in width and strength. Along with standard firing were bombs which served as defense against ground forces, all of which were automatically dropped once the standard weapon was fired.
Players could also pick up shields which would take a certain amount of damage before being diminished by enemy fire.
Side-arms could also be selected which also served as ultra-bombs that changed depending on which side arm had been picked up. Such included a large laser sword. The sword could rotate the perimeter of the ship when the player ceased firing and could also guard the player's ship against enemy fire.
Others included Homing Lasers, a pack of deadly ROV bots that hunted down enemies and fired automatic lasers at them, missile launchers that fired streams of miniature missiles and a bomb upgrade that acted as napalm fire against streams of ground forces. These side arms could be used as ultra-bombs depending on how many the player had collected and each one was different. For instance, the laser sword enlarged so much that the blade encompassed the entire screen and the hunter bots could act as a quick rotating shield that encircled the player's ship and allow them to safely dive into enemy vehicles and cause great damage to the enemy.
[edit] Story
The events take place in the Earth-like world of Westina, a fictional planet that is inhabited by thousands of elvan/animalistic people. The Westinans had advanced greatly in technology and had already worked their way up to space travel, so much that they were able to create impressive mechs and even battle ships. There are five main parts to Westina, each of which are ruled by a young and beautiful female guardian. Each guardian treated their part of Westina with a diplomatic peace, but each of them also controlled their own fleet of fighters and had their own custom mechs so if they ever needed to defend their area, they had the power to do so.
One day, each of these five guardians alongside their fleets began to ravage their own areas in a flurry of violent assaults; as they were the leading authority of their areas, there was little to no opposition to stop them. Leaving the chaos, two fighter pilots eventually learned of the center of the guardian's madness: each guardian had contracted a space-born virus that made them go crazy. The two also learned that there was an antidote to the guardian's virus which by an odd twist of fate happened to reside within the semen of the male pilot, Blondia Varandy.
So now the elvan Blondia and his (apparently) adopted catgirl sister Fallandia set out to save their planet by destroying each guardian's fleet and bringing the guardians back to normal, as well as eradicating the source of the virus.
[edit] System changes
As Steam Hearts is an adult or hentai oriented game, there were various changes made to different versions.
After every boss battle, the player is treated to an array of surprisingly well drawn scenes of foreplay, molestation and even BDSM fetishes practiced within the scenes that go on between the heroes and the boss-guardians. As different versions were made however, various parts of the sex scenes were cut out, particularly in the Saturn version.
For instance, in the PC98 version of the game, many body parts were exposed including nipples. Yet in the Sega Saturn version, none of the aforementioned parts were shown, even in a few instances where nipples would normally be visible.
Other system changes include a few obvious notes: particularly of gameplay and graphics as the PCE version only allowed one player mode and the graphical value (and ultimately the flow of the game) increased in the Saturn version.
