Variant Schawnzer (arcade, Seta, 1999)

[postman]

I was flipping through an Arcadia when I saw this little heard of shooter, and was wondering if anyone had played it......looks to be dragon based......

A quick google search came up with little to nothing.....;(

[hd]

Variant Schwanzer was never released for the Aleck64!
I would like to screenshost of it. Are there some in your arcadia ?

[postman]

There is a one page feature in black and white, including a few screenshots..

I'll try to get them online in a few days.......watch this thread

[parodius]

There is half a page in color, on page 41 of Arcadia Mag Vol 2 2000, in the AOU coverage.

And two more pages (46-47) in Vol 6 2000.

[hd]

could u post a scan please ?

[parodius]

There you go :
Arcadia Vol 2 2000 page 41
Arcadia Vol 6 2000 page 46
Arcadia Vol 6 2000 page 47

That's the best I can do without the help of a proper scanner.

It certainly looked interesting, it might even have been the only reason to purchase an Aleck 64 if it had been released.

[egret]

There you go :
Arcadia Vol 2 2000 page 41
Arcadia Vol 6 2000 page 46
Arcadia Vol 6 2000 page 47

That's the best I can do without the help of a proper scanner.

It certainly looked interesting, it might even have been the only reason to purchase an Aleck 64 if it had been released.

Mag. Gamers Republic (US) wrote a short note about it in may 1999. Subject AOU 1999:
Variant Schwanzer (Seta)
The first big game to come to the Aleck 64 (N64 based hardware board) is a great shoot 'em up where, instead of ships, you get to fight against mysterious life forms in an Atlantis-like setting.

Photos now also hosted in Sweden @ www.stgfan.com I hope it's okej
http://stgfan.jovnas.com/viewtopic.php?p=26149

[parodius]

Of course, feel free to use the pics

[PC Engine Fan X!]

After looking at the Arcadia pics that fellow shmupper parodius scanned of this lost fabled Aleck64 arcade shmup title of Variant Schawnzer, does a prototype Aleck64 cart of this game exist? It seems that a full three stages were completed in their entirety. Was VS playable at the 1999/2000 AOU show?

It'd be interesting to learn if it still does exist and who owns the IP to it nowdays (considering that Seta shut their doors down for good some time back). It seems that it would've certainly been a cool arcade shmup title to play/own.

Hudson Soft's "Star Soldier: Vanishing Earth" yet remains the sole arcade shmup title on the Seta Aleck64 arcade platform to date. It requires the Aleck64 analog stick endowed control panel to play it though.

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[ZOM]

Good you revived this thread: I never heard of this interesting title before, and now I'm actually sad that this newver saw the light of day in a commercial, or better, playable form.
A video of the promo-demo in action would make me very happy.

Variant shot is used to capture and fuse an enemy. When the player fuses an enemy, you can get an weapon and use the special attack.

The 3 weapon types:
- Fire (red) - concentrated shot : SP = Meteo Flame
- Water (blue) - wide shot : SP = Aqua Storm
- Thuder (purple) - homing shot : SP = Homing Thuder

yum

[Obiwanshinobi]

I read "Variant Schwanzer". Which is the real name again?

[ZOM]

I read "Variant Schwanzer". Which is the real name again?

Variant Schwanzer is right - awesome name, ain't it? (especially if you understand german)
BTW, "Schwanzer" is the name of the player's ship/dragon.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Yeah, sounds like a remedy for this girlish fad in recent shmups getting on many people's nerves...

[undamned]

Came across an old announcement: http://gamez.itmedia.co.jp/games/gsnews ... ews01.html

Refreshing after seeing almost nothing but copy pasta on various sites.
-ud

[Ed Oscuro]

Cool! I thought the other screens show a more traditional view, but they were sky so it would be hard to tell.

[Mero]

Video of this has turned up


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d6vG6Id ... e=youtu.be

[Xyga]

So 1999 !

Looks like it borrows from G-Darius (capture) and Brave Blade (for the crappy polygonal 3D vertical presentation).
The level design seems uninspired and the game overall too easy, hopefully more challenging and interesting difficulty modes are selectable.

Anyway is this related to the one Shou scored some time ago ?
Dunno if it's the actual hardware or emulation (I've never tried any Aleck64 driver/emu) I would be surprised if it's the latter..

[Imhotep]

I like the looks of the game a lot, a bit trippy but coherent and innovative art direction. I'd say the same about Brave Blade and Night Raid, though.

The animation of the charge / collapse attack reminds me a lot of the one from Nostradamus. There seems to be a scoring system around killing stuff right after collapsing, similar to G-Darius (the guy doesn't really use it for scoring purposes though). The pink items that are all over the place fill up the gauge when in possession mode (nod to Metal Black), after it's been filled collapsing is enabled.

Other similarities to G-Darius are the frequent laser and homing attacks.

To me it looks like a decent challenge, the guy clearly knows what he's doing and survives some really busy situations. The game clearly pics up with the second boss, as many STGs do. I really like the second form of the second boss with its varied sources danger. Visually, the fourth one is great.

I'd love to play the game, the visuals, enemy attacks and the system that combines scoring with survival sure look promising.

[BulletMagnet]

It looks like "capturing" an enemy gives you a sub-weapon and a one-hit shield - you can also "spend" it on a super-shot (which gives you bonus points for kills) once you've filled the meter. Kind of interesting, since you can keep the shield around most of the time if you'd prefer to survive or spend it constantly to score; still seems pretty lenient, since any old enemy can be captured, but I'd still definitely give this a try.

[system11]

Someone should archive that video just in case.

I don't think we'll see the dumps of this for a while.

[Ed Oscuro]

Someone should archive that video just in case.

Done (I use Savedeo.com for grabbing videos).

This looks to have neat gameplay. I haven't really played G-Darius or Brave Blade, but the charge attack waiting reminds me a bit of Layer Section (without the lock-on requirement). The scenery looks pretty cool too. Thanks for turning this one up

A real shame Seta never released this one - it may have become their best title yet.

[BrianC]

This game looks interesting. Too bad it wasn't released in arcade or on N64. Would have been nice to see another N64 shmup.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

Fascinating that a lone "prototype" Variant Schwanzer cart would pop up sooner or later -- I'd have to say that it'd be running on a real Aleck64 motherboard setup (judging from viewing the Youtube vid of it). Interesting to learn that the demo runs clearly show that a typical 8-way digital joystick with a 2-button scheme to play it properly (unless Seta decided to go with an "analog joystick" setup instead which would require the optional Seta Aleck64 control panel -- considering that there are four separate colored player controller inputs on-board the Aleck64 mobo itself).

(Of course, the only Aleck64 shmup of "Star Soldier: Vanishing Earth" uses the obligatory Aleck analog joystick setup to play it properly -- simply using a digital 8-way joystick of the Sanwa or Seimitsu branded variety wouldn't work anyways.)

If and when the rom of VS is finally released down the road, it'd be ace to have it burned to an Aleck64 cart to play on an Aleck64 mobo for posterity -- that'll be one shmup title for the ages indeed.

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[kyapiko]

I was in Tokyo last week, visiting the Mikado game center and I surprisingly stumbled upon a cab running Variant Schwanzer.
I've played it. The game is pretty good and looks finished.

Here are a couple of pictures (sorry for the bad quality):

[Xyga]

SOON... :p

[geosnow]

update?

[glide]

Looks really good, someone has to dump this

[Despatche]

This really looks like Nostradamus. It's probably not all that great, but it looks like something worth messing with for inspiration. Lots of cool weapons.