Shmups

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Stanshall
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Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

Great stuff! I suspected as much from reading between the lines! :)

After only a month or two, it's already one of my favourite games ever. Really pleased to hear you've got a copy and I'll hope to hear a few more thoughts once you've had chance to get stuck in.

I find it really satisfying to point blank bigger enemies and see the little bonus gems spilling out and then getting the bigger gems once it blows up. I also love the green-blue explosions, such a gorgeous aesthetic, and the music is also sensational, bright and colourful and slightly mysterious, a perfect fit. And the TLB music (as chosen for the shmup episode of Sound of Play) is one of my favourite boss themes from anything.
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Shmups

Post by KSubzero1000 »

Stanshall wrote: June 8th, 2019, 11:36 am Really pleased to hear you've got a copy and I'll hope to hear a few more thoughts once you've had chance to get stuck in.
Thanks! And yeah, I'm gonna have to sit down sooner rather than later for this one. It's the kind of game that just demands to be played. But I'm loving it already.

Stanshall wrote: June 8th, 2019, 11:36 am I suspected as much from reading between the lines! :)
There, read between those:
Spoiler: show
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Image
&
Spoiler: show
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Image
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Stanshall
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Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

Huh, nice. I didn't realise that Traction Control Native American Fist was region free.
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Shmups

Post by KSubzero1000 »

Put a few more hours into it.

The different shot types in 1.5 are really interesting. Reco Normal is the classic all-rounder. Reco Abnormal is as weird as a platypus due to its Focus shot actually accelerating the ship instead of slowing it down. My brain doesn't work like that so I had to bid it farewell for now. Palm Normal is a bit limp, but by Cthulhu, Palm Abnormal just deletes fools to the point where I think it basically breaks the game. This is obscene. Go try it out if you haven't already, mate. :shock:

Those differences are less pronounced in Black Label, but I agree that the rest of the game's systems are more fun to play around with. Those slow looming patterns, constant deluge of amber and bullet cancel opportunities are dope as hell, so I think I'll stay on this mode for the time being. Still haven't settled on a favorite ship, though.

I should probably clarify, I'm still learning the ropes and cowering at the bottom of the screen dodging projectiles all day like a panicked rat. No grinding the top and annihilating off-screen baddies for MAX SCORE COUNTER for me yet.

There is a nice summary of the different ships and scoring systems over on GameFAQs: HERE.

Btw Stan, are you playing Score Attack without continues or Normal Play?
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Stanshall
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Re: Shmups

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Abnormal Palm is the boy for 1.5, so I believe. I actually really like that the BL shot types are both very legit but Reco is my favourite for the 'options' which often save my skin with a bullet cancel on the other side of the screen, stuff like that. Once you get a feel for their movements, it's really satisfying to have some kind of control over them while you're off doing your thing somewhere else on screen.

I'm playing 100% Score Attack but after putting a lot of time into playing for score on the first couple of stages, I've largely been focusing on the 1CC for the past month or so. More often than not, I get to the second half of stage 3 with one bomb used but there's so much RNG for me after that midboss because I haven't yet worked out a consistent strategy. Sometimes I cruise it, sometimes I die from nowhere, sometimes I just get trapped by all the spears. Stages 4 and 5 are hard and intense but in a somewhat more manageable and predictable way, they're difficult because of the tension and because you need to dodge well for quite a long time. Stage 3 has so many moments in the second half where you just get squeezed out.

Anyway, I'm now just talking to myself but really glad you're into it and that I didn't oversell it with all my insane ravings. It's really something special.
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hazeredmist
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Re: Shmups

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Started playing Ghost Blade HD

What a blast! Sensory overload, sheer excitement constantly. Got to stage 5 a couple of times and feel like I’ve had six cans of red bull through playing this so should probably go to bed. Stick play is getting more and more natural too. It’s unlocked 15 trophies in one sitting!

Checked the scoreboard and ksubzero is 2nd for global score attack! That’s really impressive you must be class at this. I can’t see myself ever troubling the higher difficulties to be honest (some situations seem impossible to get out of even on easy to me) but man it is cool seeing a familiar name on that board :D
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Michiel K
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Re: Shmups

Post by Michiel K »

KSubzero1000 wrote: June 8th, 2019, 10:38 am My Ketsui & Co. are still stuck in customs for some inscrutable reason, but I managed to grab myself a physical copy of Mushihimesama Futari in the meantime.

Now that is a video game. :o
You're goddamn right.
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Shmups

Post by KSubzero1000 »

hazeredmist wrote: June 9th, 2019, 11:59 pm Started playing Ghost Blade HD

What a blast! Sensory overload, sheer excitement constantly. Got to stage 5 a couple of times and feel like I’ve had six cans of red bull through playing this so should probably go to bed. Stick play is getting more and more natural too. It’s unlocked 15 trophies in one sitting!
Nice! Yeah, Ghost Blade is a lot of fun to play. It doesn't really hold up in direct comparison to any of Cave's heavyweights, but it's a perfectly satisfying little game in its own right. It's also a very good entry-level title that teaches most of the fundamentals of the genre, I would say. Glad to hear you're enjoying yourself! Once you're past that initial hurdle, it's all uphill from there. Come September, you'll be schooling the old guard with your MF BL God Mode 1CC NO MISS and superior stick skills. :)

hazeredmist wrote: June 9th, 2019, 11:59 pm Checked the scoreboard and ksubzero is 2nd for global score attack! That’s really impressive you must be class at this. I can’t see myself ever troubling the higher difficulties to be honest (some situations seem impossible to get out of even on easy to me) but man it is cool seeing a familiar name on that board :D
Thanks, man! I'm not that great honestly, I haven't 1CC'd the main game or even touched Hard mode. As usual with these things, it's all about memorization and perseverance for me. In comparison, Clippa has 2 1CC videos on his YT channel and is top of the Steam leaderboards on Score Attack.
Spoiler: show
He's also been playing dead for two weeks while hoping that we all forget about his abject failure to back up his trash talk, but that's a different story. :P
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Chopper
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Re: Shmups

Post by Chopper »

clippa wrote: June 10th, 2019, 4:07 am
Chopper wrote: June 7th, 2019, 12:18 pm Came *this* close to beating BLACK BIRD just now. On Easy mode of course. The simplistic bullet hell finale just makes my brain freeze. Those damn feathers!
This should make you feel a lot better - https://streamable.com/87j86
Convinced that I subconsciously ran into that last feather just to end the humiliation.
:lol:

I'm only doing one run a day, if I can remember, but it's a great little game. Brimful of character.
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hazeredmist
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Re: Shmups

Post by hazeredmist »

Has Ghost Blade got a bad rep or something? Why's it bargain bin? Or am I just used to low quality shmups so it seems good to me :D
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Chopper
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Re: Shmups

Post by Chopper »

I was wondering what happened that challenge. So KSub still holds the ruby slippers (for now) eh?
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Shmups

Post by KSubzero1000 »

hazeredmist wrote: June 10th, 2019, 3:14 pm Has Ghost Blade got a bad rep or something? Why's it bargain bin?
As far as I know, Ghost Blade doesn't exactly have the greatest reputation in the wider shmup community, but I think we're mostly hamming it up for comedic purposes around here. :P

I certainly like the game. But when compared to some of Cave's games for example, the simplified scoring system and basic boss patterns become rather apparent. Among other little things.

Chopper wrote: June 10th, 2019, 3:55 pm KSub still holds the ruby slippers (for now) eh?
Don't you jinx it now! :lol:
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Stanshall
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Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

I think it's a good game, but just a bit stiff and mechanical and subdued next to the Cave stuff it's trying to emulate. It doesn't have anywhere near the same flair or sense of spectacle, and that's before you get into the scoring systems and balance. I also find the graphical style pretty generic and while it's very readable, individual elements seem to stick out, rather than form part of the whole. To my eyes, anyway.
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hazeredmist
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Re: Shmups

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Jeez. I just read a thread on the shmups forum on Ghost Blade HD, i have a query that's troubling me slightly now:

Is "the wider shmup community" outside of this wonderful thread / forum full of elitist wankers?

There are people on there saying they like the game, only to be shot down by some arrogant tosser - as if to say how could you ever possibly enjoy a game we have decided doesn't meet our standards - which is the kind of bullshit I can only laugh at these days. Some hate for the dev as well. How dare they make this game. People even genuinely asked why, and got no reply. You're just supposed to dislike Hucast by default apparently.

Honestly, people like that need their heads examined - it's sad that when people get into this genre and do a search online that they may end up in places like that, with people mangling your head spitting bile. Which could turn impressionable folk. Yeuch.

I enjoy Ghost Blade HD thank you very much 8-)
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KSubzero1000
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Re: Shmups

Post by KSubzero1000 »

As a rule of thumb, roughly 95% of the wider internet gaming community outside of this wonderful forum is full of wankers, elitist and otherwise. And I'm probably being generous. It's unfortunate, yeah. Like you said, this type of behavior is bound to be really off-putting for someone just getting into the genre (or anything else, really) and looking for a friendly community to be a part of.

Confronting people over the internet accomplishes very little, so I think it's best to just ignore this kind of stuff altogether.

hazeredmist wrote: June 10th, 2019, 5:00 pm I enjoy Ghost Blade HD thank you very much 8-)
casul skum 8-)
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ratsoalbion
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Re: Shmups

Post by ratsoalbion »

Haze, that is precisely the sort of discourse we were trying to get away from with both the podcast and the forum here.

I think we’ve largely succeeded so far, and though it may have cost us some wider popularity, it also seems to appeal to good people who are sick of the grim normality that is games discussion elsewhere. Even outlets that post progressive and unbiased content are plagued by cancerous comments and responses.
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Stanshall
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Re: Shmups

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I find the shmups forum sometimes useful as a resource but it's a bit hard to engage with, in my experience. I follow a few decent folks from there on Twitter and have the odd little chat, some encouraging feedback and stuff, but fundamentally it's not that open to beginners. I have more meaningful interaction on Twitter which is saying something.

I suppose they've had enough conversations about Futari or whatever over the years and then some, so not many people are excited by another discussion about it. That's normal. I'm on a couple of band forums and while five years ago I might have made a big effort to welcome someone raving about just finding such and such record, unless I'm in the mood I'm more interested now in looking forward rather than recycling an old conversation.

That's a separate point, though.

One of the first shmups I got into was Danmaku Unlimited 3 and I really loved it. I still think it's a lot of fun and I fire it up once in a while to try for a somewhat casual 1CC. It's not as good as the absolute best of the genre, but does that make it shit and me a dummy? Absolutely not, at least not for that reason. I really like and respect the fact that this thread is full of people having a great time with a range of games. Clippa especially is always celebrating some new PC indie whatsit and while I'm not likely to play them unless they get a port, I respect the enthusiasm for the wider genre not just the C A V E B O Y Z mentality which, to be honest, is a little bit where I'm at, I know.

To offer a little mea culpa, I would like to say that I'm still pretty new to the genre and I've been dreaming of playing these Japanese 360 games for about a year and so I've basically OD'd on the absolute top tier shit for the last couple of months and it's so good I don't know whether I'm coming or going half the time. I'm trying to keep my mind open though and dip into the lesser known or just not as directly relevant to my tastes stuff and it's actually been brilliant. The Darius Cozmic Collection and Konami Arcade Classics collection have both been an education and a hell of a lot of fun, where I found those games annoying and slow and harsh for the longest time. Likewise, something like DariusBurst Chronicle Saviours took some investment before I started to get into it but I enjoy it more every time I fire it up. It would be quite easy to think 'I know what I like best, I just want more of that exact thing' and it's possible I'll end up with that mindset, and I suspect that's part of the elitism you read out there. Once you try everything and find what you like best, it's tough not to narrow your horizons and stay wide eyed.

Anyway, we got you covered here, man. Glad you're enjoying it!
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hazeredmist
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Re: Shmups

Post by hazeredmist »

Aye, I’ve been active here for many years now and am not really active elsewhere and haven’t been for some time - it’s clear to see why. I guess visiting another larger but more hardcore genre-specific gaming forum and seeing an immediately obvious tonal shift - talking about the same thing - makes you realise you are somewhat insulated from things at C&R. Which I like. A lot.

It’s a little part of the internet which isn’t ruined :)
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Stanshall
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Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

Amen to that!
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hazeredmist
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Re: Shmups

Post by hazeredmist »

Image

Woo! Small wins here but that’s a level done without losing a life, must be a first as it’s unlocked a trophy

Watch out lads, I’m coming. I’m waddling, dragging an anvil behind me, but it’s happening
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