Although you stated this project was mainly a test of programming experience, I'll critique it from a game design standpoint, because I think it both deserves it and because when judged as one, I think it can hold its own pretty well.
So as far as vertical scrollers go, this one is quite enjoyable. I like the different ships, the different enemies (especially the ones that shoot at you) and the huge amount of enemies that show up at a certain point. Generally, I think you did a good job, although I have a few things you could improve on.
It really feels good to read this kind of feedback, firstly I thought it was very generic and unoriginal.
But I find it still a good concept to start developing own programs.
First of all, the player has no progression: they starts with a set amount of lives that can't be replenished (personally I feel three green lives is a little on the low side) and a set attack speed and damage that can't be increased, or in other words, the player doesn't get stronger. I know power-ups are a cliché, but they do work wonders in games like this, because they give the player more control over their surroundings. You could also reward the player as they progresses through the game, such as giving him a blue life every time they gains a level, or giving them a score multiplier.
I was indeed thinking about this, but I'll rather like it that they'll start weaker instead of getting stronger than they already are, power-ups are indeed likely to happen, maybe even very strong power-ups for a limited time.
Because I enjoy those too.
I think the difficulty ramp up is well paced: I last about two minutes per game, which I think is a good duration for a game like this. The enemy increase doesn't feel too sudden and the green and red enemies appear at appropriate times. All in all, good job.
Thanks a lot, I've been messing around with spawnrates and level progress for some time.
As for movement, I don't much like the 'sliding' effect when you let go of the arrow keys, I feel it takes some control away from here. A simple move-on-key-down, stop-moving-on-key-up would work fine here, I think.
Yeah, the ship movements has become the thing where most have been bothered around, I'll see what I can do about.
I really like the small particles on the foreground, they really help give the impression of speed to your game. The background parallax feels a bit cluttery, however, and some of the sprites (planets, for instance) look blurry (which could be filtering, but I assume it's the sprites themselves). You might want to reduce the amount of background objects a bit. Apart from that, you could try and speed up the parallax as the game gets on, which gives the player the impression he's going faster (even though he isn't).
I think the blurry part is happening because it's enlarged, I'm not quite sure how to fix that.
Balancing wise, Silvyne is clearly the superior choice, the damage of her rockets (which can one shot everything up to the red dudes, haven't survived long enough to find out if there are any more) doesn't outweigh the attack speed reduction. As an iteration, I suggest you up the attack speed of the Trex rather dramatically, which I think will both balance the ships better as well as give the use of Trex's ship more satisfaction to the player. I could be completely wrong, but hey, that's what iterations are for.
I'm not quite sure about this, I think it fits better to nerf Silvyne's ship a little. starting with that it needs 2 rockets shots to take out a green one.
(Just pointing out, the green alien has more health than the red one)
User feedback wise, I think there should be a little indication (a small sound would do) when a ship passes the player and they lose one of the blue lives, because it gives them a better idea of how much they still have left without having to look at the life bar itself. Something similar could enhance the level gaining experience, which currently is almost unnoticeable.
A minor bug I found is that the horizontal limits are not symmetrical: the player can touch the left border of the screen, but not the right one. Nothing game breaking, just my neurosis acting up.
That's indeed something minor that I'll probably add.
and I havn't looked at the screen with + ship width for quite some time, I'll look at it.
This might feel like a lot of criticism, but these are actually just quite small details. All things considered, I think this is a solid arcade game, if perhaps a bit generic. Spice it up with some uniqueness, make it your own, and I think you have a nice little web game on your hands.
I'm okay with the criticism, specially after I already got one from W1K
It was formely designed to be forced to use 2 ships at once, that was kinda the 'unique' thing I had in mind, but I had to agree while testing that singleplayer might not be a bad option after all.
It's great feedback, just saying 'it's good' doesn't really help me to improve it further, that's what I like about.
Thank you for the criticism, I've enjoyed the read