Shmups

This is where you can deliberate anything relating to videogames - past, present and future
User avatar
Alex79
Member
Posts: 8423
Joined: September 2nd, 2012, 12:36 pm
Location: Walsall, UK.
Contact:

Re: Shmups

Post by Alex79 »

Inspired by this thread, I set about checking which Shmups I already owned on Vita. Aside from some 19xx games on a couple of PSP collections, I have Sine Mora and Soldner X2 or something like that. I remember bouncing off Sine Mora when I tried it. Is it worth sticking with?
User avatar
Flabyo
Member
Posts: 3576
Joined: August 8th, 2013, 8:46 am
Location: Guildford

Re: Shmups

Post by Flabyo »

Yeah, arcade sticks for the current consoles are tuned for fighting games. Long throw, usually octagonal gates, because they’re about needing to spin through those quarter circle and half circle motions rapidly.
User avatar
Stanshall
Member
Posts: 2370
Joined: January 31st, 2016, 6:45 am

Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

Wowzer. You're probably talking a good eight hundred quid of games there on eBay, you know? Serious collection! I've got a few physical at decent prices but mostly digital via JPN and HK stores. Just waiting on Mushi Futari still, on its way from Japan though! That's the one I've really wanted to play for ages.

I'll have another go at the stick and keep what you said in mind. That makes sense. Cheers.
Joshihatsumitsu

Re: Shmups

Post by Joshihatsumitsu »

:? Information overload!

I will definitely second Gundemoniums - plus it's cross-play and very affordable, so low risk for the curious.

Received my Switch Brook Adapter by Friday afternoon, so I had not only a little bit of time to catch up with Rolling Gunner, which is really good, but also got to play it using my PS3/4 Madcatz TES+.

In a nutshell, it works! You have to flick on Pro Controller Wired Communication in the settings first before it will register anything (otherwise you get a warning screen asking you to reset, like I did), and there's a little bit of an adjustment period where you figure out what button is doing what, but past that point it functions as it should.

I'd love dedicated Switch stick at some point, but as a cheaper (assuming you already own other joysticks, so not really cheaper) option, it does what it says on the box.
User avatar
Stanshall
Member
Posts: 2370
Joined: January 31st, 2016, 6:45 am

Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

Re: Rolling Gunner.

Starting slowly to work out some of the scoring potential stuff. My score for stage one has gone from 15m to 33m and I've not really done much different than experiment with when to use my hyper and double hyper. I guess some of this is explained in the game but because it's in Japanese I'm utterly clueless and just trying and failing, and then having the odd run like...oh, I see...

Part of it is activating hyper to cancel as many bullets as possible, standard stuff, but also hammering the midboss and boss from close range to boost your multiplier/bonus counter (or whatever the big number is below your hyper meter) when you've activated and then triggering double hyper to basically cash in on a load of cancelled bullets with a high multiplier AND boost your score by hammering the boss with double hyper activated AND cancelling a screenful of bullets to hit max multiplier. Your score can go from 10m to 30m in the last five seconds or something. I'm now working on the timing to be hitting the 40m plus which is what I've since seen in 1CC runs. I think it's doable.

While it seems a bit daft to just hammer the same two minute stage again and again, unlike with Ikaruga or DOJ, I think this is an easier game overall, less memorisation required, and a better understanding of the scoring from stage one will really pay off in later stages even before I've learned the best moments to trigger hypers. By just going with the flow and focusing on the basic principles of cancelling massive bullets and immediately hammering the multiplier before triggering double hyper, I've massively improved my score over just playing for survival.

Yeah, I really really love this game.
User avatar
Stanshall
Member
Posts: 2370
Joined: January 31st, 2016, 6:45 am

Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

There we go. 47.9 million on stage one. Ichimen bancho strikes again. Tripled my previous high score in an hour or so. It's all about the hypers!

Image
User avatar
Michiel K
Moderator
Posts: 1295
Joined: October 13th, 2015, 9:37 pm

Re: Shmups

Post by Michiel K »

Very cool. Hope this gets released in EU eShop sooner rather than later.
User avatar
Stanshall
Member
Posts: 2370
Joined: January 31st, 2016, 6:45 am

Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

52m now on stage one with a Pro Controller. If you're going to try, go all the way (to the end of stage one and restart). No doubt I'd be going full Jaimers if I had that knock-off Saturn job.

A real shame about the Steam version and about the lack of online leaderboards so far. Hopefully they will be patched in at some point but until then, well, we all know the score to beat (on stage one).
User avatar
KSubzero1000
Member
Posts: 3365
Joined: August 26th, 2015, 9:56 pm
Location: Germany

Re: Shmups

Post by KSubzero1000 »

...Where and when is Psyvariar? :mrgreen:


EDIT: Holy shit. One minute after I posted this, Saurian uploads:



:P
User avatar
KSubzero1000
Member
Posts: 3365
Joined: August 26th, 2015, 9:56 pm
Location: Germany

Re: Shmups

Post by KSubzero1000 »

Thanks for the links! Although I don't use Steam and don't really want to set up a JPN PSN account for one game which is going to be localized sooner or later anyway. I think I'll just way a bit longer - they're thanking me for my patience after all.
User avatar
ratsoalbion
Admin
Posts: 7918
Joined: August 28th, 2012, 9:41 am
Location: Brighton, England
Contact:

Re: Shmups

Post by ratsoalbion »

There are quite a few reasons to set up a Japanese PSN account though, and it’s not too tricky.
Joshihatsumitsu

Re: Shmups

Post by Joshihatsumitsu »

ratsoalbion wrote: March 12th, 2019, 11:35 pm There are quite a few reasons to set up a Japanese PSN account though, and it’s not too tricky.
Seconded! And a Japanese Switch account is even easier, to which Psyvariar Delta is also on.

Though to each there own, and even has to decide what's best for them.
User avatar
ratsoalbion
Admin
Posts: 7918
Joined: August 28th, 2012, 9:41 am
Location: Brighton, England
Contact:

Re: Shmups

Post by ratsoalbion »

Absolutely.
Joshihatsumitsu

Re: Shmups

Post by Joshihatsumitsu »

I recently got Radirgy Noa for the Naomi... but until the current cab is finished I can't really comment on it! But it's in the collection at least, waiting to be played.

It's the older version on the Naomi cartridge, not the GD-Rom version (Radio Allergy), which has an old and new version in and of itself.

Considering the history and troubles of Milestone, I'm not surprised Radirgy hadn't seen much light, so a new game would be good to see.
Joshihatsumitsu

Re: Shmups

Post by Joshihatsumitsu »

clippa wrote: March 14th, 2019, 5:54 amPlease tell me the novelty wears off. That's all I need to hear.
Hmmm... nope! I can't do it, I can't lie!

What I will say is: obviously, it's an expensive hobby, there's no two ways about it. The upside is that PCB's either hold their value, or go up in price (assuming they are well looked after, have original artwork, etc), so from an investment point of view, over a long period of time, you can't really lose.

The other way I look at it: I had an uncle who passed away a few years ago (super aggressive cancer), and his hobby and joy was restoring/building Corvettes, cars which are not native to Australia! And I can imagine he probably had others tell him its a dumb/expensive hobby, waste of money etc... but in the grand scheme of things, it brought him joy, and he didn't even live until retirement age anyway, so spending the time/money on those pursuits, while he had the opportunity, were worthwhile.

The last year alone in my private life has had plenty of drama, death, etc (Don't worry, I'll save it for my therapist!), so yeah, it's expensive, and I could spend that money elsewhere, but it brings me genuine joy to dig into the hardware and the history. Rather than complain about modern AAA games, I just don't buy/support them, and double down on preservation.

Sorry, that was a longer response than I planned! :shock:
Joshihatsumitsu

Re: Shmups

Post by Joshihatsumitsu »

Helps to be single and have no kids too... further personal financial context!

The interesting thing about the exA is seeing the list of Western/non-Japanese game announced, like Akyrios (more widely known as Danmaku Unlimited 3), Super Hydorah, Shikondo and Lightning Knights. Seeing a Western interpretation of a Japanese subgenre reflected back to a Japanese consumer base... the circular nature of trends.
User avatar
Michiel K
Moderator
Posts: 1295
Joined: October 13th, 2015, 9:37 pm

Re: Shmups

Post by Michiel K »

clippa wrote: March 15th, 2019, 12:48 am It's a bit weird that they're changing the names of certain games, presumably to distance them from their home versions. Their flagship fighter, for example The Kung Fu Vs Karate Champ is Shaolin vs Wutang.
Ummm, apropos, thanks for making me aware of this game's existence.
User avatar
Flabyo
Member
Posts: 3576
Joined: August 8th, 2013, 8:46 am
Location: Guildford

Re: Shmups

Post by Flabyo »

I have Steel Empire for my Megadrive, it’s another one of those carts where the name on the title screen changes depending on where I set the region switch.
User avatar
Flabyo
Member
Posts: 3576
Joined: August 8th, 2013, 8:46 am
Location: Guildford

Re: Shmups

Post by Flabyo »

Games don’t get a pass from me just cause they’re old.
User avatar
Stanshall
Member
Posts: 2370
Joined: January 31st, 2016, 6:45 am

Re: Shmups

Post by Stanshall »

Aside from Rolling Gunner (and I promise to stop going on about Rolling Gunner, at least for one week), I've been playing a fair bit of Danmaku Unlimited 3 again. It's one of the first shmups I played on the Switch shortly after a formative trip to Arcade Club opened my mind to Dodonpachi DaiOuJou and Ketsui and Armed Police Batrider. They blew the bleedin doors off, quite frankly, and I've been chasing that overwhelming intensity and stultifying euphoric destruction ever since. DaiOuJou, in particular, was like nothing I'd ever experienced in a game.

Anyway, DU3 was the closest I could get to it at home (at that time) and I found it to be a reasonable facsimile of that feeling, albeit a bit Canderel compared to DOJ's golden syrup. I found it really hard though and despite getting a little better and getting a 1CC on infant difficulty or whatever, I ended up putting it aside after ten hours and getting into the Psikyo stuff and then, most significantly, Ikaruga (stage one!).

Fast forward twelve months or so I guess and I'd hardly touched it until the past few days. Turns out I'm now much better equipped to deal with its challenges and I got to the stage 3 boss first go on one life. It's really satisfying to find that my shit tier coordination and grasp of the genre have improved significantly through putting a lot of time into a wide range of shmups over the last year or so. I'd also say that through trying to exploit the scoring systems and focusing on grazing over survival, I've never enjoyed the game quite so much, either.

Alongside that, and probably another reason I've found it much easier, I've been hitting DDP SaiDaiOuJou pretty hard across a range of modes. I do really enjoy the 360 exclusive mode and the accompanying ship. It seems a fair bit easier than regular Arcade but a relative challenge compared to Novice. I have been doing OK with Arcade though and manage to get to stage three pretty regularly now. It's just so punishing and chaotic but when you get into a rhythm, it's so exciting and destructive and frankly insane. It makes DOJ look almost quaint. Now, I probably prefer the very relative restraint of DaiOuJou (and the harder, industrial, non-moe aesthetic) but SDOJ is a blistering game and up near the top tier.
Post Reply