Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

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Xyga
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Xyga »

Ugh. The 32MP58HQ.

I've noticed, seems someone recently found about that monitor on whatever arcade forum, because some dude posted a middle bar measurement from it, and now everyone sees it as THE monitor for LCD cabs now.

I've posted measurements for it a few years ago, top bar is 3ms at mid-brightness, about 2ms at max (top bar = actual lag, and only measurement that matters, middle bar and displaylag's averages are nonsense) but that went unnoticed elsewhere.
Arcade hardware communities have always been rather self-centered and incredibly backward when it comes to flat panels because they never paid much attention to those, even LCD cab owners strangely-enough.

Anyway it's a good entry level panel but aside from that everything is pretty much sub-par, the VX3211-mh bears the same panel but is superior in almost every other area, for the same price.
Hell, if it's for a cab it is even fully compatible with GrovyMAME+CRT_Emudriver so the value is like much, much greater.


EDIT: back on topic, is A&B that laggy? seriously? °0
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nem
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by nem »

Xyga wrote:I've noticed, seems someone recently found about that monitor on whatever arcade forum, because some dude posted a middle bar measurement from it, and now everyone sees it as THE monitor for LCD cabs now.
Well, no. Actually, it's of case someone finding out the monitor fits as is in an original monitor enclosure of a cab. Cab owners just want an easy way to upgrade their monitors. Fitment is way more important than any specs.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by iconoclast »

Cagar wrote:Well now that I've tried it, the biggest input lag shmup award goes to...? :|

From video footage I captured, I count 6-7 frames. So pissed because the game seemed awesome otherwise.
Is this the Power of the exA that we've heard about?
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parodius
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by parodius »

So, anyone tried it on a CRT yet ?
If I'm not mistaken 4:3 is supposed to be supported ?
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by trap15 »

A local friend has this and doesn't feel even remotely close to 6-7 frames. Maybe 2-3 (that is, not much different than PCBs of old). That monitor is probably quite bad (a number of vewlix models have very laggy LCDs).

He's also ran it on a trisync CRT cab, looks great. Personally I prefer the 4:3 HUD over the 16:9 HUD :lol:
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by StarCreator »

parodius wrote:So, anyone tried it on a CRT yet ?
If I'm not mistaken 4:3 is supposed to be supported ?
Yes, there's 3:4 as well as the default 9:16, and the game will pillar/letterbox both as needed.

The system is only capable of producing digital video so a DAC is needed to use a 31khz CRT.
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Zaarock
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Zaarock »

trap15 wrote:A local friend has this and doesn't feel even remotely close to 6-7 frames. Maybe 2-3 (that is, not much different than PCBs of old). That monitor is probably quite bad (a number of vewlix models have very laggy LCDs).

He's also ran it on a trisync CRT cab, looks great. Personally I prefer the 4:3 HUD over the 16:9 HUD :lol:
That's great news then if its not the game or EXA hardware.

I saw some of that footage cagar took and looking at it frame by frame on that particular setup it was at least 5 frames for player ship to start moving from lever hitting edge position. If that were normal input lag it'd be worse than SDOJ 360 port & Garegga on baseline MAME. Looking forward to giving it a shot over the weekend.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by StarCreator »

nem wrote:So according to that the monitor in mine (same as C) is as fast as the one in the Diamond Black.

Anyway, if someone local wants to bring me a top of the line PC gaming monitor and Cagar wants to try again, I'm happy to oblige.

I think I remember shou mentioning the Taito JVS IO is one of the slowest polling IOs, but we're talking a matter of milliseconds there.
One thing I leaned quickly is that your monitor lag is always an unknown unless you test it yourself. I've made purchases both on the consumer and arcade levels based around other people's lag measurements only to find my purchases had 3 more frames of lag than advertised. There's always a chance of variance even between two monitors with the same model number.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by caldwert »

I didn't experience any noticeable lag while playing mine. Got caught out by Taito and had to get the Sega JVS I/O adapters and Sega I/O's on a Diamond Black. So I'm using those for right now and it feels fine to me. Game is just a ballbuster other than that, but think I've figured out a bit of strategy.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by zak »

trap15 wrote:A local friend has this and doesn't feel even remotely close to 6-7 frames. Maybe 2-3 (that is, not much different than PCBs of old). That monitor is probably quite bad (a number of vewlix models have very laggy LCDs).

He's also ran it on a trisync CRT cab, looks great. Personally I prefer the 4:3 HUD over the 16:9 HUD :lol:
Did anyone get past stage 3 on 1 credit? :mrgreen: most of us are struggling with the dificulty.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by SuperPang »

trap15 wrote: He's also ran it on a trisync CRT cab, looks great. Personally I prefer the 4:3 HUD over the 16:9 HUD :lol:
Do you know which DAC he used?
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DoomsDave
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by DoomsDave »

How are people liking the game? I have the mobile version and enjoy it but it feels like it was very much designed for mobile. I'm sure they've adjusted things for standard controls so curious what people think. The only impressions I've heard so far is that it's very very hard but is it still fun?
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by spmbx »

People playing it now have paid 3.5k or more for the privilege, it's very unlikely you're getting unbiased feedback out of that :lol:
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Sumez »

Nevertheless, everyone who got it on AO seem to be complaining that the game is too hard. :P
(seems like the criticism is pretty genuine though, and not scrubby)
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Udderdude »

An arcade shmup made by ex-CAVE devs is hard? Well, I never.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Zaarock »

I tried the game at Sugoi a bit today and got one run to stage 4 midboss.

From first impressions I think it's at least much easier than any mode in SDOJ. Probably other CAVE games as well once you get hang of the system? I'd guess most of the difficulty curve for just clearing the game is figuring out good bomb timings rather than doing some crazy dodging. If you think everything is meant to be dodged it will look super hard. Maybe stage 5 is an exception.
The bosses starting from st2 might feel like SDOJ expert levels if you're trying to do a no-bomb run like some CAVE game. But why would you unless trying to score & bank your chain on a later pattern? Stage 2 midboss feels like a straight up tutorial for bombing the big bullet cluster. Considering both bullet cancels and bullet grazing charges bombs, patterns with a lot of bullets are giving you a new bomb in a couple seconds even when not chaining them back to back because of the grazing.

Within the first 4 stages there seems to be only a few sections where you have to dodge a difficult pattern for more than a second or two (the bomb reload period). Stage 2 boss last attack being one of those where you have to dodge for a moment even while bombing because of the side shots. The bosses and midbosses seemed generally harder than stage sections. The stage patterns outside bosses are way tamer than something like SDOJ and looked totally reasonable to no-bomb. A no-bomb run of this game would be cool to see.

The visual presentation of the game is super nice, 10/10. As a small gripe it's hard to see some enemy bullets when there's star items flying everywhere but that's a personal problem I had with Crimzon Clover as well.
Was hard to hear the music at all in an arcade setting though voice and sfx seemed fine (audio mixing thing?)
Similar to Akai Katana Shin I guess the ship type that can aim the bomb around might be superior

It did seem like the cab at sugoi has ~6 frames of input lag like cagar posted which is exceptionally bad. Someone else giving the game their first shot said it's like playing SH3 games on an emulator, sounds about right. I'll try and help with testing the game hooked up to a CRT and do another lag test recording. It's certainly playable in a way and I can see how people might have cleared it on similar setups in japan, just like how people played SDOJ 360 port despite the lag.
Last edited by Zaarock on Sun Jan 26, 2020 8:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.
GFoyle
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by GFoyle »

Zaarock wrote: It did seem like the cab at sugoi has ~6 frames of input lag like cagar posted which is exceptionally bad. Someone else giving the game their first shot said it's like playing SH3 games on an emulator, sounds about right. I'll try and help with testing the game hooked up to a CRT and do another lag test recording. It's certainly playable in a way and I can see how people might have cleared it on similar setups in japan, just like how people played SDOJ 360 port despite the lag.
Yeah, there was definitely lag there, but playable. If you go and play some Futari right after playing A&B, like I did, the the difference in input lag feels even more dramatic. But even with the input lag, I still felt I was in some control and it felt surprising accurate even a bit too sluggish. Weird to have such input lag in a real arcade setup though. I haven't played SDOJ recently on 360, but from what I remember, the input lag in it felt less than this.

Fun game anyway.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Sumez »

Thanks for the valuable feedback, ZAA!

I'm really super curious, and would be willing to travel just to try out this game. Now to figure out which location is the closest to me...
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Photons »

I had a night in Mikado arcade with the Aka to Blue arcade and after playing the mobile to death it was a smooth transition, I managed to get a poster and CD soundtrack too but missed out on the cassette! Apparently the guy who worked there plays on the soundtrack, hope we get it on console one day.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Bananamatic »

Zaarock wrote:From first impressions I think it's at least much easier than any mode in SDOJ. Probably other CAVE games as well once you get hang of the system? I'd guess most of the difficulty curve for just clearing the game is figuring out good bomb timings rather than doing some crazy dodging. If you think everything is meant to be dodged it will look super hard. Maybe stage 5 is an exception.
The bosses starting from st2 might feel like SDOJ expert levels if you're trying to do a no-bomb run like some CAVE game. But why would you unless trying to score & bank your chain on a later pattern? Stage 2 midboss feels like a straight up tutorial for bombing the big bullet cluster. Considering both bullet cancels and bullet grazing charges bombs, patterns with a lot of bullets are giving you a new bomb in a couple seconds even when not chaining them back to back because of the grazing.
so you pay 3.5k for a mobile game you're not even allowed to stream
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by StarCreator »

Bananamatic wrote:so you pay 3.5k for a mobile game you're not even allowed to stream
I'd suggest investing a few more points in reading comprehension
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Bananamatic »

they said the games would be retuned for arcade yet it sounds the same as the mobile version where bombs gave you more bombs so you didn't have to dodge anything whatsoever
enlighten me on what's the difference here aside from slapping the 5 mobile stages together to make a full game that's nowhere near "arcade" difficulty
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by M.Knight »

I haven't played said arcade version for the record but AFAIK the chain is now reset after you use the bomb. Bombing at specific spots through the stage to cash in on the chain value that you built up previously is the top scoring strat instead of spamming it.
I don't know if that removes the possibility to use them continuously against bosses though. Unless you can build up your chain a lot again during said boss fight after you've cashed in once, you could theoretically do the same trick and spam the bombs you've gotten by unleashing the previous ones.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Zaarock »

Bananamatic wrote:
Zaarock wrote:From first impressions I think it's at least much easier than any mode in SDOJ. Probably other CAVE games as well once you get hang of the system? I'd guess most of the difficulty curve for just clearing the game is figuring out good bomb timings rather than doing some crazy dodging. If you think everything is meant to be dodged it will look super hard. Maybe stage 5 is an exception.
The bosses starting from st2 might feel like SDOJ expert levels if you're trying to do a no-bomb run like some CAVE game. But why would you unless trying to score & bank your chain on a later pattern? Stage 2 midboss feels like a straight up tutorial for bombing the big bullet cluster. Considering both bullet cancels and bullet grazing charges bombs, patterns with a lot of bullets are giving you a new bomb in a couple seconds even when not chaining them back to back because of the grazing.
so you pay 3.5k for a mobile game you're not even allowed to stream
Tbh I'm going to pretend they didnt make that statement for now. If they start taking out videos from western players / EXA owners then can fuck off and get a bad reputation. It's super bad for transparency and convincing people like banana who might be skeptical anyway (and why wouldn't a large part of buyers be skeptical at that price?).
Like how does someone
A. demonstrate the input lag of the game
B. show/review possible flaws in the games mechanics
without capturing a video.

If someone didn't like the mobile version then it's reasonable to ask questions like banana's imo. If they wanted a very different system that's not here. Never played the mobile game myself.

And yeah the bombs are super spammable. Patterns get 'hard' when theres bullets from the side / behind in such a way that the bomb can't cover them, or the pattern is overwhelming enough that a 2 second gap requires some dodging. I don't think that makes it a bad game straight up, it's not a typical IKD/CAVE style game and def has high enough production values to fit in an arcade. Gameplay wise something more different like Pink Sweets maybe. Can't say much about scoring personally and haven't dug into stage 4 and 5 yet, gonna try those out in stage select next time I get a chance. I would say it's arcade difficulty but not up there with something like SDOJ, plenty of easier 1CCs out there.

The dialogue during stages is done nicely, it feels like SDOJ story mode pulled off correctly and doesn't get in the way of playing the game.

edit: I just remembered this game was made in the Unity engine, that might explain lag differences between other EXA games if there are any (Unity games on PC usually have slightly higher input lag and weird fullscreen implementation unless using special settings)
Last edited by Zaarock on Mon Jan 27, 2020 3:10 pm, edited 6 times in total.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by GFoyle »

It felt actually quite similar to the mobile version, which was surprise, I was expecting a lot more differences.

In the mobile version, at least the main mode (story?) I play, if you have charge and get hit, the charge goes to zero and you don't lose life, but in the arcade you do. Otherwise the charge felt similar, if you do it at right times, the charge can get quite high pretty immediately. The chain counter goes to zero after using the charge, but during it goes up fast too for a couple of seconds. Not sure is the point to try to manage without using charge much at all or trying to use it in places where it would score as much as possible + help you survive at the same time. It feels really difficulty trying to avoid using charge though, so I suspect it's designed around the idea that you should be using it.

I think it's fun with charge / bomb spamming, but no idea how much depth there is with it.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by zak »

I was getting frustrated with this game over the last week, but then I played stage 3...what an awesome stage!
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by Zaarock »

Stage 3 is great, I only found it a little weird how easy the stage portion is compared to the boss. Normal enemies start ramping up in 4 & I hear that's similar to the mobile game.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by zak »

Zaarock wrote:Stage 3 is great, I only found it a little weird how easy the stage portion is compared to the boss. Normal enemies start ramping up in 4 & I hear that's similar to the mobile game.
The thing which really frustrated me was that mid level boss on stage 2 - there's this little ship which teleports left and right while shooting straight bullets. There's enough crap going on without adding that little asshole! :mrgreen:
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

Post by zak »

StarCreator wrote:
Bananamatic wrote:so you pay 3.5k for a mobile game you're not even allowed to stream
I'd suggest investing a few more points in reading comprehension
Also, the kit did not cost 3.5K. It was closer to $1500 ;)

The Exa Hardware is almost $600 cheaper if you buy the game at the same time.
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Re: Aka & Blue Type-R (Exa Arcade 2018)

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