Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & PS4

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BloodHawk
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by BloodHawk »

Klatrymadon wrote:Yeah, it seems spot-on so far. I have a minor issue, though; I can run the game at 60hz in any resolution other than the highest one (my native res of 1920x1080), which caps at 59hz. Any idea what that's about?
That's strange, for me the in-game settings let me change the refresh rate all the way up to my TV's max of 120hz at 1920x1080.

Is your monitor set at 59.94hz within your windows display settings?

Reason why I ask is that I have seen some other games round the numbers within the settings menu:

setting of 59 = really means 59.94hz
setting of 60 = really means 60hz

Since you can select 60hz at every other resolution that's probably not the issue, but that's all I can think of...
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DietSoap
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by DietSoap »

The port is actually good, what the fuck. Like, there are actually options to customize the graphics a bit. I've learned to not even take 1080p resolution for granted when it comes to shmup PC ports, so this is shocking.
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Klatrymadon
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by Klatrymadon »

Appreciate the tip, BloodHawk! I didn't even think of that, because my monitor runs in 60hz by default, but it turned out it had dropped to 59hz. I've had this issue before, but that was when I was using a crappy LCD TV as my main PC monitor, which presumably did run in 59hz - I've no idea why this current monitor would drop down to it. Weirdly, though, it hasn't fixed the issue with Ginga Force, which still only offers 59hz at max res (and up to 75hz for some others). Baffled!

Thankfully, 1600x900 @60hz looks great for now.
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scrilla4rella
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by scrilla4rella »

Can anyone tell me if Ginga Force supports 1440p? You just never know with these JPN devs on steam....
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CloudyMusic
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by CloudyMusic »

scrilla4rella wrote:Can anyone tell me if Ginga Force supports 1440p? You just never know with these JPN devs on steam....
It does!
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supergrafx77
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by supergrafx77 »

Super Ultrawide display settings works @5120x1440p.
Looks great.
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scrilla4rella
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by scrilla4rella »

Awesome! thanks guys. Looking forward to digging into this. Qute seems to have really done a great job bringing a new spin to STG mechanics and presentation.
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KAI
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by KAI »

Still can't believe this is exclusive to win10, way to cripple a good game.
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NeoStrayCat
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by NeoStrayCat »

KAI wrote:Still can't believe this is exclusive to win10, way to cripple a good game.
Specs mention its also playable on Win 8.1 OS.
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DietSoap
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by DietSoap »

Klatrymadon wrote:Appreciate the tip, BloodHawk! I didn't even think of that, because my monitor runs in 60hz by default, but it turned out it had dropped to 59hz. I've had this issue before, but that was when I was using a crappy LCD TV as my main PC monitor, which presumably did run in 59hz - I've no idea why this current monitor would drop down to it. Weirdly, though, it hasn't fixed the issue with Ginga Force, which still only offers 59hz at max res (and up to 75hz for some others). Baffled!

Thankfully, 1600x900 @60hz looks great for now.
What framerate do you actually get if you try to run it at 1080p 59hz? Because I have that same issue for whatever reason. My frame counter is locked at 60fps regardless, but I have v-sync on. Weirdly enough, if I try to run at 900p @60hz, the game drops to 30fps.
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Klatrymadon
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by Klatrymadon »

Ah, I didn't even think to question that, but I've just tried turning the Steam FPS counter on and it stayed at 60 even in the nominally 59hz mode, with or without v-sync on. Lower resolutions (including 1600x900) were the same...
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banjoted
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by banjoted »

KAI wrote:Still can't believe this is exclusive to win10, way to cripple a good game.
Catering to the largest platform OS audience is hardly "crippling" a game, dude.
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by soupbones »

picked this up on Friday on my PS4- wow i forgot how fun this game is! More so now that i can actually understanding what im actually upgrading without having to use a translation guide.

Hope more people check this out - it’s really an great game with amazing depth and strategy.
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by Bawa »

Got it at Steam and I'm having a blast playing this game.
Really interesintg mechanics and the graphics are nice with no performance issues so far.
I have no idea if the original ran that good but I feel this is a really well done port.
I suck at these games but I do enjoy them.
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To Far Away Times
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by To Far Away Times »

So I played Ginga Force for the first time and it's really not my cup of tea. Which is really disappointing since I went in blind and Eschatos is in my Top 10 favorite shmups.

Does it get better? Is there an arcade mode?

This chapter select with increasing lives thing is definitely not the fullest extent of the jam.
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Klatrymadon
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by Klatrymadon »

The Score Attack mode is still broken up into individual missions/chapters, so there's no traditional 20-30 minute mode, but it does limit you to a selection of preset, balanced ships, and doesn't have the 'permanent extends' of the Story Mode. That's your best bet for a more straightforward arcade experience. Also, yeah, I think it definitely does get better as you spend more time with it. Some stages are heavily focused on specific challenges that may seem gimmicky and overwhelming at first (e.g. stage 2's searchlights and the penalties for being caught), but everything falls into place once you understand what to expect from the game. You'll start to enjoy it for what it is instead of being thrown off by everything it isn't. I think its bitesized structure is crucial to this process, in fact.
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soupbones
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by soupbones »

To Far Away Times wrote:So I played Ginga Force for the first time and it's really not my cup of tea. Which is really disappointing since I went in blind and Eschatos is in my Top 10 favorite shmups.

Does it get better? Is there an arcade mode?

This chapter select with increasing lives thing is definitely not the fullest extent of the jam.

I’d say it gets better as you accrue more upgrades, weapons etc. I think its designed with a little grinding in mind - replaying stages for money, experimenting with different weapon/upgrade combos, etc.

I wasn't in love with it my first go around, but once i approached it like that, it really clicked for me.
Wilsoncqb1911
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by Wilsoncqb1911 »

I gave up on it as well. I played it for several hours and almost completed the storyline. I upgraded and did some grinding on those bonus levels. I kind of got used to it but the thing that kept bothering me was how much stuff was going on on the screen. I would die every now and then because I just couldn't see bullets and enemies with all the mess on screen.
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by CnRM »

The Steam version of Ginga Force is solid, but I noticed a couple minor oddities.

Some shadows, particularly in the intro movie, seem to behave somewhat differently than the PS4 version. This is most noticeable during the first five seconds when it cuts to the frontal view of the ship; the shadow effects don't appear to render quite identically, and so there's a bit of glitchy flickering on the vehicle that's not in the PS4 version based on the footage I've seen. (This is all I can go by since I don't have it on PS4.)

There's also a momentary loading screen before the opening cinematic when you launch the game which inexplicably locks the game to 30 frames per second until it's finished loading. The PS4 version doesn't appear to have this loading screen on startup, either. This 30 FPS loading screen is present when you view the opening(s) from the Gallery Mode menu, too, but I don't know whether the PS4 version does that there or not.

While none of this affects gameplay, if they're genuine wrinkles or oversights, it would be nice to see Qute and RSG release an update that would address them.

Incidentally, there's a MSAA option in the PC version's configuration file (%APPDATA%\Qute\GingaForce\display_setting.ini) which doesn't look like it does anything.
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by EmperorIng »

Finally playing this game up to stage 8, I can say I have no idea why xxx1993 has been obsessed with Natsuki all these years. This story in the game is horse-shit - turn off voices immediately to save your ears from anime tripe.
The talking in Raiden V is unironically better even if it's 55 minutes of talking about coffee. The virgin Qute vs. the chad MOSS.
soupbones wrote:I think its designed with a little grinding in mind - replaying stages for money, experimenting with different weapon/upgrade combos, etc.
Going through story mode, I can say I am not really jiving with this aspect of the game. The game's hints flat out tell you to keep on playing till you have earned enough lives to get through the level. :roll:

Score Attack is better (even if it hands out a ridiculous number of extends), but you have to beat these story mode missions to play them, which is lame.

I prefer playing with the stronger/balanced ship types of Score Attack, without the expectation of having to try a bunch of goofy weapon combos to see which won 'wins' the stage. People have compared it to Mega Man, but what if Mega Man isn't that well-balanced or good?? "Equip the Rock Protection Item to trivialize the mine stage" = strategy??
I like the gimmicky stages actually. The different twists to them are pretty inventive and fun. Searchlights, mine-carts, etc. I almost wish there were more out there gimmicks. It does get a little exhausting playing 5 minute levels over and over to gain lives to get through them.
Last edited by EmperorIng on Sun Sep 27, 2020 9:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
xxx1993

Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by xxx1993 »

Because of its connection to Ginga Force. Of course, I stopped caring all that much once I found out that it actually took place around the same time as the first game.
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by DietSoap »

Kind of upset there's no strategy thread for Ginga Force.
EmperorIng wrote:"Equip the Rock Protection Item to trivialize the mine stage" = strategy?
Yeah I thought that was lame too, but it doesn't affect bigboi score-attack mode so I don't mind too much.
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by Oniros »

Heads up for any people here with a medium-sized Youtube/Twich channel, RSG have a campaign to ask for reviews: https://twitter.com/RisingStarGames/sta ... 1391910914
DietSoap wrote:Kind of upset there's no strategy thread for Ginga Force.
Probably better to start a page at Shmups Wiki at this point, the Strategy board is archaic.
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by CStarFlare »

A strategy thread would be better for discussion, the wiki would be a great place to put the compiled knowledge (or for one person to info dump what they already know - pestro87 plz?). There's also probably specific strategy questions that have answers which don't really have a place on the wiki - how do I no-bomb this one attack on the stage 2 boss? is something that doesn't really fit into the wiki template, for example. The wiki's great, but it supplements the strategy forum, not replaces it.

For anyone wanting to dig into what already exists for Ginga Force knowledge:

STG Weekly Episode
First score forum thread with some assorted discussion, including a recap by Aquas about the score system, I think there's a slight bit of info in the 2nd thread as well
Original thread, starting at release
Restart Syndrome::
Shmup leaderboards and Video Index! | My score history on RS
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by Jonpachi »

The character designs in Ginga Force are so awful it's keeping me away. Is there a true Tate option, or is it locked into the horizontal view with sidebars?
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by EmperorIng »

The game wasn't made in TATE so there's no magical screen orientation that would make it look like a normal vertical shmup. Consider it vertizontal. The char. design is pretty bad, perhaps charmingly so (see: Flying Red Barrel?).
CStarFlare wrote:
For anyone wanting to dig into what already exists for Ginga Force knowledge:
Thanks for these links CStar! This helps a lot in understanding how the scoring system works. It's natural that the game would lie dormant in the long period between its 360 release and now. The medal system seems to encourage a lot of tactically-timed kills of enemies vs. killing everything asap (like you would in Eschatos). Kill enemies to generate bronze medals, kill more enemies while bronze medals are onscreen to get silver medals, kill enemies while silver is onscreen to get gold, etc. etc.

Right now (as of this posting) I can minorly gloat about being the 'best' Ginga Force player on Steam. :mrgreen: Not a lot of competition at this point. I didn't even understand how medals worked until late last night. But still, #bestindawest

It's a shame that -as far as I can tell- you have to beat stages in Story Mode to unlock them for Score Attack. I prefer Score Attack by a wide, wide margin! Is there any workaround to this? I don't want to grind away at Story Hard Mode to play the games with the ship I actually want to fly in Score Attack (Type-C). Story Mode seems like a case of just banging your head against enemies with too much health until you have earned enough lives to limp through. I can see what Qute wanted to try with Story Mode but I don't think it works; I'd rather play the focused score attack... But they burn me out by playing through story mode first.
dmk1198
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by dmk1198 »

On PS4 now to
dmk1198
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by dmk1198 »

I'm so bad at this lol
Heavily influenced by fifth element love it
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miwa
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by miwa »

PS4 physicals for both Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles will be up for pre-order starting tomorrow:

https://firstpressgames.com/collections/qute-stg
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Re: Ginga Force and Natsuki Chronicles heading for Steam & P

Post by ratikal »

I have to admit that Ginga Force has not aged well. It'd be a sick game if Score Attack was unlocked right off the bat. But the fact that you have to grind through Story Mode, and Story Mode is extremely unbalanced (especially in Hard), it doesn't make me want to play again.

By unbalanced, I mean the fact that enemies and bosses have huge amounts of HP. It doesn't help that your weapons weaken after use, making you at pretty much no power if you are focused on dodging. You are sometimes intentionally suiciding just to have your weapons back to power. Shitty design choice. Intentionally suiciding should give you a more deep advantage and feel like a more advanced strategy rather than doing it cause you have to just to have fun again. I also remember when trying to beat Stage 4, the only viable strategy for me to beat the boss without timing out (and this was with all the top upgraded weapons btw), was to literally point blank and suicide over and over. It's basically high rank Garegga.

Score Attack is rad though. Stages are more balanced, things die at a reasonable rate, there's nuance to the multiplier, there's a general goal you want to achieve in each stage. Extends don't really mean much, and you'll end up with like 15 at the end of the stage, allowing you to solve the whole ammo crisis by just suiciding constantly. I don't like that aspect, but it doesn't detract too much from the experience.

I'm glad Natsuki Chronicles addressed most of these issues and is overall the better game, but the whole extend idea is still present as well as some other jank I feel. The TLB in example can be completely invalidated by just pointblanking if you got enough extends, lame. :cry:

If there's a hidden unlock code like in JSS, let me know.
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