M2 Toaplan collection

[Rastan78]

Might be easier to just log into your Japanese account and purchase it at that link from your phone or computer?

That is frustrating though. I know if you type M2 on the Nintendo eshop all the Shottrigger stuff shows up.

[Creamy Goodness]

Can anyone remind me how to find Sorcer Striker on the Japanese PSN store?

https://store.playstation.com/ja-jp/pro ... AISAKUSPS4

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Any tips for an english term to use? Nothing I try works. I've searched for Sorcer, Maho, Mahou, Striker, STG, M2, Eighting... NOTHING comes up.

I could only find it by browsing the shooter genre. It wouldn't even come up in the recommended games for other Shottriggers games. I'm playing this right now and man it can be frustrating.

[pulsemod]

can always add Japanese input in settings>language>input>keyboards>japanese>romaji, you can still have english enabled and switch back and forth freely at any input prompt. you won't have any trouble typing 'mahou' and selecting 魔法

this game's deceptively difficult IMO, but I really appreciate how every single part of the game feels unique and memorable!

[Jonpachi]

Found it! I did it the hard way and went through every "shooter" and "arcade" game listed. TOP TIP: It's at the bottom!

[Creamy Goodness]

can always add Japanese input in settings>language>input>keyboards>japanese>romaji, you can still have english enabled and switch back and forth freely at any input prompt. you won't have any trouble typing 'mahou' and selecting 魔法

this game's deceptively difficult IMO, but I really appreciate how every single part of the game feels unique and memorable!

Most of the game is actually not too hard. It's the bosses that really kick the difficulty into overdrive. A lot of that challenge comes from them being really big and them pinning you to the bottom quarter of the screen making dodging stuff incredibly difficult. But it's one of the few Shottriggers games that I have found I've gotten a lot of use from the gadgets. The difficulty meter, power up status, and enemy HP meter really come in handy.

[pulsemod]

can always add Japanese input in settings>language>input>keyboards>japanese>romaji, you can still have english enabled and switch back and forth freely at any input prompt. you won't have any trouble typing 'mahou' and selecting 魔法

this game's deceptively difficult IMO, but I really appreciate how every single part of the game feels unique and memorable!

Most of the game is actually not too hard. It's the bosses that really kick the difficulty into overdrive. A lot of that challenge comes from them being really big and them pinning you to the bottom quarter of the screen making dodging stuff incredibly difficult. But it's one of the few Shottriggers games that I have found I've gotten a lot of use from the gadgets. The difficulty meter, power up status, and enemy HP meter really come in handy.

the power up status is definitely useful. I haven't gotten into the intricacies of rank at all, so maybe that's part of the reason I find it challenging! even the second boss can range from being super easy to a pain in the butt.

[Austin]

Finally bit the bullet on the physical Same! Same! Same! and Tiger collections for PS4. That cost, uh.. stung. That said, I can't wait to finally play them.

[Steven]

Random question: are there any reasons to choose either the preset 30Hz synchronized autofire or the other non-synchronized 30Hz autofire over the other? I've been using the synchronized 30Hz for point-blanking (yes, it feels super dirty, but insta-killing bosses is fun, occasionally causes the M2 Gadgets to glitch and temporarily stop working properly when you kill the Kyuukyoku Tiger stage 3 bosses too fast, and Same! 1P deserves it), but I wonder if there is a reason to choose the non-preset 30Hz. I imagine the synchronized one will slow down in instances where there is slowdown and the other one won't. The only thing I can think of is that the synchronized 30Hz has an optional fix for the flamethrower in Same! that lets you use it properly, but that's about it.

Finally bit the bullet on the Same! Same! Same! and Tiger collections. That cost, uh.. stung. That said, I can't wait to finally play them.

Yeah, they are very expensive at 7480 yen each or something like that. The yen just hit its 24-year low against the USD a few days ago, though, so if you pay in USD that will help a lot. Have fun with Same! Same! Same! 1P version. That thing is insane.

[Steven]

What the heck? I just downloaded patches for both collections. Time to see what they do.

Tiger-Heli leaderboards display stage numbers properly, they fixed some of the music information in K Tiger, Tiger-Heli, and Hishouzame (I noticed a while ago that some of Uemura's stuff was credited to Yuge, or maybe it was the other way around, or maybe both. I don't really remember, but I imagine that's fixed now), and they made the K Tiger lives gadget go into the triple digits. That's about it.

[XtraSmiley]

I've got this installed on my PS5, via my Japanese account, but I play via my US account. I just realized I cannot play or see the replay video's of the high scores.

Is this b/c I'm trying to see them via a US account? I don't have PS+ (or whatever it's called now) on the Japanese account.

[Rastan78]

Are you downloading the replays then loading them up via the menu called "materials room?"

[XtraSmiley]

Are you downloading the replays then loading them up via the menu called "materials room?"

Uh, no, is that how you're suppose to do it? LOL, it's in Japanese and my Japanese is reaaaaaly bad.

[Rastan78]

Yeah, it's not the most intuitive thing. I don't understand Japanese but sort of just stumbled on it fiddling in the menus.

If you kept clicking on replays not knowing why they wouldn't play you'll go into the materials room menu now and see that you downloaded the same replay a million times lol.

[XtraSmiley]

^^Thank you!

[Samuray]

Every time this gets bumped I'm hoping for news on the next iteration….

Hopefully we'll be getting one. So strange that there has nothing been announced.

[Jonpachi]

So strange that there has nothing been announced.

Megadrive Mini II, Rayforce Collection... There have been M2 announcements, just not dedicated labor-of-love projects. I'm sure we'll get there. Just have to be patient rn.

[Samuray]

So strange that there has nothing been announced.

Megadrive Mini II, Rayforce Collection... There have been M2 announcements, just not dedicated labor-of-love projects. I'm sure we'll get there. Just have to be patient rn.

I mean, yeah, of course. I was just talking about Toaplan Arcade Garage thingies in this thread.

Unrelated, just popped into my mind: Weren't we supposed to get not one but two new Aleste games this year?

[kid aphex]

Unrelated, just popped into my mind: Weren't we supposed to get not one but two new Aleste games this year?

This has been driving me nuts. One of them has already been completed and released (senjin)... but where's the console port?

[heli]

Batsugun : december 2020

[Yoshi]

The yen just hit its 24-year low against the USD a few days ago, though, so if you pay in USD that will help a lot.

I took advantage of this to get both games delivered for $103, which I can live with. The shipping from Amazon.jp has noticeably risen though.

[BrianC]

Batsugun : december 2020

Is that when George Jetson started playing it?

[Steven]

I finally made some progress on Kyuukyoku Tiger. I'm at stage 8 now, finally. I really hate the second half of stage 5, which is what has been preventing me from getting any farther than stage 5 for some time now, but it was mostly the Otakebi enemies and not the actual boss, as you can kill the boss really fast with 30Hz autofire + bombs to protect you from dying. The enemy placement in the second half of the game is really good.

I may pick up a Kyuukyoku Tiger PCB to go with the New Astro City cabinet that I just bought, so maybe I'll start playing that game on PCB, but I have not decided yet. I hope M2 starts releasing these collections faster because I may start buying PCBs due to impatience... and because I want an excuse to buy every Toaplan PCB anyway.

[heli]

You buy a PCB from 1985 = 37 years old.
Dont you worry about those chips past the minimum expected lifetime ?
Can you find replacement parts ?, it might break.

[Sumez]

What chips, and which expected lifespan are you thinking of? It really varies depending on the parts. Capacitors are always super easy to replace.

[Redfox]

While I have never owned arcade PCB's I am a pinball machine collector (and have machines today from the 70's all the way to 2012) and I can say that yes, PCB's can definitely degrade over time. Boards in games I owned from the 80's did have swollen caps that I needed to replace, cold solder joints, and in some cases, battery acid damage that destroyed traces on the PCB that were VERY difficult to repair and costly. That said, arcade PCB's may not be that complex and or, Steven might be handy to fix it or know people in Japan that can should something arise. If he wishes to go that extra step for those few extra frames, who are we to judge

[Sumez]

Fwiw I have around 100 old arcade PCBs ranging from 1981 to 2007, and yeah some times they will break, but it usually has more to do with build quality than age. I've never seen a board break in a way that wasn't fixable, and it's usually not expensive if you know what you're doing. Most solid state electronics can last for decades with no issue, it's not like they are manufactured to just break on their own after 30 years. Also like you said, Redfox - pinball PCBs are often built to handle much higher voltage due to driving solenoids etc, which in my experience is the parts that are most likely to break on those PCBs.
In the future it might be harder to source old electronics to fix issues, but I think it's gonna take a long while yet before we reach that point. Arcade PCBs isn't the only thing that needs repairing.

At the end of the day, if you don't have any arcade games and you are considering getting one, that's definitely not the first thing that should be holding you back.

[hamfighterx]

Not M2, but quite a surprise to hear there is another Toaplan remake coming: Pipi and Bibi's (WHAT?? lol)
https://www.gematsu.com/2022/08/spy-bro ... -switch-pc
https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2022/ ... -on-switch

Very weird! This is most likely one of the handful of Toaplan/Tatsujin games that M2 did not plan to include in the Toaplan Arcade Garage series due to the eroge nature... but I guess we don't know that for sure yet!

Anyway, this gives me similar vibes to the recent Snow Bros remake (which I thought looked hideous so I never played it). Was that actually any good?

[Steven]

At this point it seems that all you have to do to get the license for a Toaplan game is to call/email Yuge/Tatsujin and you're basically good.

Anyway, this gives me similar vibes to the recent Snow Bros remake (which I thought looked hideous so I never played it). Was that actually any good?

The new stages are pretty shitty, but if you like Snow Bros., the first 50 floors are basically identical to the original game's but in widescreen.

[Redfox]

I own the Snow Bros remaster and even got the DLC where you can use enemy characters. It's not bad, though the original "felt better" to me if that makes any sense. It's definitely a remake, not a port or emulation.

[Steven]

Here's the website for the game, complete with a few screenshots. Looks like they are not changing the graphics at all. The screenshots are in 320x240... PLEASE have proper scaling.

https://www.rawrlab.com/spybros/

Not really sure what to think of this, but it's Toaplan, so I'll buy it.