M2's Hisshou Same! Same! Same! Collection

[Steven]

Vol. 1 (Oct 2021): Tiger-Heli & Kyukyoku Tiger
Vol. 2 (Apr 2022): Flying Shark & Fire Shark/Same! Same! Same!
Vol. 3 (2nd half 2022): Tatsujin/Truxton & Tatsujin Oh/Truxton II
Vol. 4 (1st half 2023): Hellfire & Zero Wing (the side scroller collection)
Vol. 5 (2nd half 2023): Daisenpu/Twin Hawk & Vimana (a bit less star power here so perhaps they split these two up, mix them into collections with 3 games per release, pair them with more notable non-STG "bonus" titles like Snow Bros. 1 or 2, etc.)
Vol. 6 (1st half 2024): Out Zone & FixEight (as run-n-gun games, these two naturally fit together and they feel notable enough and STG-like enough to warrant being the focal point of a release; but I suppose it's conceivable that they could be split up and paired with more traditional shooters, as bonus games, etc.)
Vol. 7 (2nd half 2024): Slap Fight & V-V/Grind Stormer (basically a spiritual sequel to Slap Fight)
Vol. 8 (1st half 2025): Dogyuun & Batsugun (my god, what a thought)

As for the bonus games, the list would look something like the below. And hey, this is 8 games... a perfect match for the 8 two-in-one volumes noted above.
- Guardian/Get Star
- Wardner
- Rally Bike
- Horror Story/Demon's World
- Snow Bros.
- Snow Bros. 2
- Ghox
- Knuckle Bash

I think these predictions are gonna be pretty close to reality. Though a few comments:
- I don't think Hellfire and Zero Wing, or Daisenpu and Vimana are deserving of their own standalone releases. Maybe they'll make one with "all the games with no star power", but it might be more likely they'll just accompany other more popular games down the road. Though, if that was the case we probably would have seen Daisenpu alongside the Sharks.
- Given the above assumption, I'm sure Outzone/Fixeight are going to be next after Tatsujin. And apparently M2 have already confirmed those two will be the last of the initial four releases, so that seems pretty on point.
- I've said this before, and given even stuff like Tiger Heli gets its own branded release, it would be crazy not to do the same for Snow Bros. The only "issue" is that it doesn't fit the shottriggers label, but I'm not sure that matters. It's probably Toaplan's most popular title by a long shot if you don't limit yourself to the STG community. It has a full sequel that's been an arcade exclusive so far, and the original has multiple ports that are interesting in their own way, and typically considered coveted collectables. There's no way they'd just throw that in as a bonus game that doesn't even get billing on the box art.
- Batsugun is probably gonna get its own stand-alone release (still with a bonus game or two, but they won't share top billing with Batsugun), but obviously include Special version, and I wouldn't be surprised to see this game get a new arrange mode similar to the other non-Toaplan shottriggers. A lot of people don't care about older Toaplan games and are only waiting for this game, so if M2 knows what up, they'll be sure to milk that.

Yeah, I know Snow Bros. is pretty popular outside of the shooting games community as far as Toaplan games go, and I have seen plenty of comments in various places online where people are specifically looking forward to Batsugun and not the rest.

Hellfire and Zero Wing... I've only played the Genesis/MD versions of those and not the arcade versions (this is my experience with most Toaplan games, unfortunately), but I actually enjoy MD Zero Wing, and right now for the Toaplan documentary I'm in for signed Zero Wing, as I think that game does a little better on the MD than Tatsujin does because unlike Tatsujin, Zero Wing doesn't suffer from having the screen size reduced. I am very much considering switching to signed Tatsujin while I still have time, though, as I know it's a better game than Zero Wing is. Every time I play MD Tatsujin after playing it at the arcade I can't help but think to myself "Why am I playing this when I could be playing the real arcade version instead?", although I imagine that I might have a similar experience with Zero Wing. It's on the MiSTer now as a public beta, so I will probably try it soon.

Hellfire doesn't really do much for me, though. Need to play it more to judge it fairly, but there are other games on the Genesis/MD that I'd much rather play instead, so I don't think too highly of it right now.

As for Snow Bros. not being a shooting game and therefore maybe being weird to get the ShotTriggers branding, Teki-Paki has the ShotTriggers branding and it's definitely not a shooting game, so it's possible. I'm looking forward to whatever M2 decides to do.

[XtraSmiley]

I would guess the timeline gets moved up a little faster because the small team probably had to initially spend a ton of time perfecting their Genesis, PCE, and NES emulator for all the console ports, but now that is done, as well as the emulation for the PCBs, all they really are doing is menus and gadgets, which I would assume is really quick and easy to do.

My guess is now the delays will be shorter, or conversely, they will intentionally keep them the same only for a weird marketing idea, like to spread out sales or something.

[Sumez]

I don't know, M2 have been doing NES, MD and PCE emulated games for many years at this point.

[heli]

I want a LRG-ENGLISH version of tiger-heli PLEASE, waiting.

Batsugun 2025 ?, for playstation 7.
They promised december 2020 on playstation 4.

[pablumatic]

I want a LRG-ENGLISH version of tiger-heli PLEASE, waiting.

Batsugun 2025 ?, for playstation 7.
They promised december 2020 on playstation 4.

At the rate the west is getting ShotTriggers releases, digital and physical, I'm not sure we'll be getting any of these Toaplan collections. Where is even a western digital release of Aleste Collection?

[subcons]

At the rate the west is getting ShotTriggers releases, digital and physical, I'm not sure we'll be getting any of these Toaplan collections. Where is even a western digital release of Aleste Collection?

Agreed. And it kind of makes sense. I frequent the Reddit shmup subs and most people in the west just aren’t interested in these releases. They’re just waiting for the later titles to come.

Younger fans of the genre grew up on Touhou and bullet hell and think this stuff is just uninteresting, which is kind of fair. I got into the genre right before Cave blew up and never really got into playing older stuff until recently starting with the Aleste series and branching out from there. I’m loving these M2 releases and plan to grab every last one, but I seem to be the exception; maybe because I’m slightly older than the younger players.

[CRP]

I would dissagre that there is no western interest/market in Toaplan games. There are plenty of people who played them in the arcades in 80/90's or on nes/md etc. I think enough ppl would buy flying shark etc if the saw in the eshop to justify a western release. Really hope M2 get them translated and released atleast in digi form.

[XtraSmiley]

Considering how few people backed the Toaplan documentary (under 500 people world-wide), the surprise is that M2 makes these, even in Japan.

[Creamy Goodness]

I am probably going to get the Same! Same! Same! Collection and I usually defend M2's pricing, but the physical copies should not be over $40 especially for these games. I know Shottriggers games tend to be a little more pricey, but I feel like they went overboard with these.

[subcons]

I would dissagre that there is no western interest/market in Toaplan games. There are plenty of people who played them in the arcades in 80/90's or on nes/md etc. I think enough ppl would buy flying shark etc if the saw in the eshop to justify a western release. Really hope M2 get them translated and released atleast in digi form.

Not saying there’s “no western interest,” I mean, I’m highly interested in these releases and I fall into that audience. Just that the fan base for the genre is already so small, and only a smaller subset of that group is interested in these compilations of earlier games that draw a lineage to games western audiences are more familiar with.

I’d love to get these releases in the west with translated menus, but I just don’t see it happening at this point. I think Dangun was the most recent physical western release (just shipped last year) and that came out in 2016.

[OmegaFlareX]

Considering how few people backed the Toaplan documentary (under 500 people world-wide), the surprise is that M2 makes these, even in Japan.

500 English-speakers, you mean? That's the draw of the documentary. I'd be interested to see what this exact same project, but by Japanese people for Japanese people, would pull in.

[CRP]

Considering how few people backed the Toaplan documentary (under 500 people world-wide), the surprise is that M2 makes these, even in Japan.

But thats for hardcore fans. People that grew up playing tiger heli on nes or flying shark on comptures consols arcade dont find a documentary that appealing and probobly didnt even know about the kickstarter. But if they scrolled through the estore and saw tigerheli collection with all ports included would have a more appeal in buying and could play instantly then supporting a documentary that will be released in june 2023, dont think you can make that comparinson at all. Also its 600 backers now on the documentary.

Btw: Who did the translations of thoses western shottriggers releases on ps4 estore, inhouse ?

[CRP]

Just that the fan base for the genre is already so small, and only a smaller subset of that group is interested in these compilations of earlier games that draw a lineage to games western audiences are more familiar with.

I think the reach of both the tigeheli and flying shark releases would have a appeal outside of the current shump base. That its the people that played and recognised them from the 80's and proboly dont know about cave etc or are active shump fans. Few of those toaplane games where played alot in the 80s in europe atleast. Flying shark got released on these platforms Arcade, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, Commodore 64, FM Towns, MS-DOS, Nintendo Entertainment System, X68000, ZX Spectrum and got pirated alot so even the sales figures would capture exact reach. Probobly quite a bit of these people now have kids that play on switch and would impulse buy these toaplan collections if they saw them on the estore for themselfs.

[XtraSmiley]

Considering how few people backed the Toaplan documentary (under 500 people world-wide), the surprise is that M2 makes these, even in Japan.

500 English-speakers, you mean? That's the draw of the documentary. I'd be interested to see what this exact same project, but by Japanese people for Japanese people, would pull in.

No, I mean world-wide. It's Japanese first, which would be where I would think most of the now 600 backers are from.

I love Toaplan games, I am backing the movie as the most expensive pledger! I'm not disparaging this, I'm just saying, the fan base for these games is likely only in the thousands, and at best, the tens of thousands.

[Jeneki]

Also keep in mind that Kickstarter projects do occasionally burn people. Many people will never do business there.

[Steven]

Most of the backers appear to be from the USA. You can subtract one from the Japanese total and add one to the USA total to represent me, for that matter, if you really want to be specific. Whatever. As long as it happens, in Japanese or English, I'll be happy.

Anyway, I'd never heard of Toaplan until they put Slap Fight MD on the Mega Drive Mini, but I'm buying all of these Toaplan collections, no matter what M2 is doing with the release schedule, unless I die or become comatose or something like that. If I do die, I'll resurrect myself and buy them anyway in my zombie form.

I wish they'd release them faster instead of taking what is likely to be several years to release all of them at the current rate, but with only 1 release on the market and the details, including the release date, of only the very next collection announced and none of the subsequent releases, it's far too early to see a pattern. If whatever they announce next happens to release on October 28th, then maybe it's safe to say that these will be 6 months apart in such a case. Maybe there's some sort of marketing reason that they are taking their time to release these, like that they don't want to cannibalize sales or something. I'm not a marketing or sales dude, so I don't know.

[XtraSmiley]

Most of the backers appear to be from the USA.

How can you tell this? Is there a way to see from the KS site? Genuine question, because I'm not super familiar with the site.

That being said, I'm with you, I wish these would come out a lot faster! But I'm sure if they did, they would lose some sales as the price has been pretty high and some people would likely start prioritizing their purchases, while those of us who would buy them all, will do so regardless of release time.

As for release schedules based on past games, I think we should include all the ST releases, not just the Toaplan ones.

Dangun Feveron (Cave)
ESP Ra.De. Psi (Cave)
Battle Garegga Rev.2016 (Raizing)
Sorcer Striker (Raizing)
Ketsui: Kizuna Jigoku Tachi (Cave)
Darius Cozmic Revelation (Taito, G-Darius HD, G-Darius Ver. 2 and Darius (Extra Version) only)
Aleste Collection

[Steven]

Most of the backers appear to be from the USA.

How can you tell this? Is there a way to see from the KS site? Genuine question, because I'm not super familiar with the site.

Click on community.

I don't know what all M2 STG team is working on right now aside from Toaplan, though. I absolutely hope some of them are R-Type Leo, Batrider, and Bakraid, but you know. Maybe they don't have anything else they are working on or something, or maybe they're working on a home release of Senjin Aleste or maybe they're making another original game.

[Sengoku Strider]

I don't know what all M2 STG team is working on right now aside from Toaplan, though. I absolutely hope some of them are R-Type Leo, Batrider, and Bakraid, but you know. Maybe they don't have anything else they are working on or something, or maybe they're working on a home release of Senjin Aleste or maybe they're making another original game.

Probably a mini console or something profitable. They don't have an STG team so much as guys who do this stuff in their spare time as passion projects. It's their contracted work that pays the bills.

[Steven]

I don't know what all M2 STG team is working on right now aside from Toaplan, though. I absolutely hope some of them are R-Type Leo, Batrider, and Bakraid, but you know. Maybe they don't have anything else they are working on or something, or maybe they're working on a home release of Senjin Aleste or maybe they're making another original game.

Probably a mini console or something profitable. They don't have an STG team so much as guys who do this stuff in their spare time as passion projects. It's their contracted work that pays the bills.

Yeah, they have... um, that one dude whose name I forget who is the director of the ShotTriggers program or whatever it is that he does. I forget his name, but it's a dude who is not Horii. I forget exactly how their thing is structured, but yeah, like you said, it's the other stuff that they do that keeps M2 around. No way that they'd still be around if ShotTriggers was what they relied on for most of their profit. I'd be quite interested in seeing the profit margins for ShotTriggers releases, but that will probably never happen.

[OmegaFlareX]

Anyway, I'd never heard of Toaplan until they put Slap Fight MD on the Mega Drive Mini

Cool, so you're an actual newbie? I remember as a kid, playing Tiger Heli on NES at more than 1 friend's house, trying out Truxton and Fire Shark on Genecyst when I was first dabbling in emulation as a young adult, then I had physical copies of Kyukyoku Tiger, Hellfire S, and Daisenpu Custom for PC-Engine and Genesis Grind Stormer during my collector phase. But I didn't really know who Toaplan were (aside from the console port title screens) or knew much about them until around 2015-ish when I started watching arcade streamers on Twitch. The stuff on Shmuplations helped a lot with that.

Guessing you're a lot younger than I am.

[Steven]

Anyway, I'd never heard of Toaplan until they put Slap Fight MD on the Mega Drive Mini

Cool, so you're an actual newbie? I remember as a kid, playing Tiger Heli on NES at more than 1 friend's house, trying out Truxton and Fire Shark on Genecyst when I was first dabbling in emulation as a young adult, then I had physical copies of Kyukyoku Tiger, Hellfire S, and Daisenpu Custom for PC-Engine and Genesis Grind Stormer during my collector phase. But I didn't really know who Toaplan were (aside from the console port title screens) or knew much about them until around 2015-ish when I started watching arcade streamers on Twitch. The stuff on Shmuplations helped a lot with that.

Guessing you're a lot younger than I am.

I'm in my early 30s. I'd play a shooter for like a single credit and then call it good enough when I died for about a decade or so. I finally started to actually play them seriously about 6~8 months ago. My account here possibly predates that, as I don't remember exactly when I started playing seriously.

While I'm here, there are about 30 hours left until the Kickstarter ends. I'm in for signed MD Zero Wing, but I'm considering changing to Tatsujin instead. I'm really not sure which one I should choose, as I know Tatsujin is a better game, but I think MD Zero Wing might be closer to the arcade version since at least it retains the same screen size, which Tatsujin does not, and of course MD Tatsujin's music is too fast. If anyone wants to make an argument in favour of either MD Tatsujin or MD Zero Wing, I'd appreciate it, as I'm not really sure which one I want to go for. I have them both already because of the Retro-Bit rereleases, but...

[Angry Hina]

Iam not quite sure how hard Zero Wing is in normal but I played yesterday a bit zero wing on easy and its surprisingly easy and its surely great to geht into and learn the game. Tatsujin is even on easy a bonebreaker. At least for me ^^ its the hardest 1cc ive earned till now but possibly your 1cc list has more harder games listed compared to mine ^^

But if not: take zero wing.

[Steven]

Iam not quite sure how hard Zero Wing is in normal but I played yesterday a bit zero wing on easy and its surprisingly easy and its surely great to geht into and learn the game. Tatsujin is even on easy a bonebreaker. At least for me ^^ its the hardest 1cc ive earned till now but possibly your 1cc list has more harder games listed compared to mine ^^

But if not: take zero wing.

Yeah, it is pretty easy to get into MD Zero Wing even on normal, I think. My 1CC and no miss list is very short so far, as I'm still relatively new to this and haven't spent that much time on shooters. I think the hardest things I've done so far are no miss Thunder Force IV on Saturn on normal and no miss R-Type Final 2 on Bydo (with Leo II, of course). Zero Wing's difficulty on normal is probably about right for me, now that I think about it. I played it maybe last week and I made it all the way to stage 7 on 1 credit but lost all 10 of my credits on a single annoying checkpoint, as I just couldn't get out of it.

[Angry Hina]

The Midboss of the alien stage? This is the only checkpoint Ive found on my two runs on which I am not sure how to beat it with the stage one weapons. (even on easy)

[Steven]

The Midboss of the alien stage? This is the only checkpoint Ive found on my two runs on which I am not sure how to beat it with the stage one weapons. (even on easy)

It's this one that spawns you basically spawns you right here: https://youtu.be/D_WaqY7vMgw?t=1968

The strangest part is that I beat the game early last year on the Nomad of all things with little trouble at all. I think I might try to go get revenge on the game now.

Revenge complete, on easy mode this time. This adds another 1CC to my list. The game was nice enough to give me a 10 up on stage 2, the secret weapon on stage 3, and another 10 up on the final stage, but I only died like 4 or 5 times, so I ended up with a ton of extends that I didn't need.

[Angry Hina]

Is it random, when these items do spawn?

This checkpoint is tricky to but I was more clueless on the one after, before the midboss^^

[WeedyRainfall]

Younger fans of the genre grew up on Touhou and bullet hell and think this stuff is just uninteresting, which is kind of fair

As a new fan of the genre, the reason i'm not interested is because of the format and the price. The price of these toaplan ports is fucking nuts.

Mushi is 20 bucks. Look what i get for that 20, look at all the shit in that port. DFK is 20 bucks. The toaplan ports are over 2x the price, and the amount of content is pathetic in comparison. Not to mention the quality of the original games.

I'll pay 8 bucks for a hamster port of flying shark. Or i'll pay full price for a collection of all toaplan shmups. I'm not paying full price for 2 or 3 ports of stone age shmups.

[Johnpv]

Also keep in mind that Kickstarter projects do occasionally burn people. Many people will never do business there.

This. I've been burned by too many kickstarter projects to ever back anything again.

[Sumez]

and the amount of content is pathetic in comparison

Ports of three full arcades games, new modes, training and challenge features, plus ports of the original ports of the same games?

I don't hink I've seen any other dedicated shoot'em up release with as much pure content and just allaround effort as what M2 throws into their ShotTriggers releases.

Sorry, but the reason you're not interested isn't "the format and the price", but the fact that you consider Hishouzame and Same! Same! Same, two absolute milestones in the genre, "stone age shmups".