M2 Toaplan collection

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TransatlanticFoe
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by TransatlanticFoe »

Removing a Toaplan soundtrack is a serious crime :shock:
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BIL
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by BIL »

OmegaFlareX wrote:
BIL wrote:When I think of home Flying Shark versions, it's mostly Micronics' customarily anaemic NES one (didn't get FC release AFAIK, like a few others eg Thundercade... not missed at all)
Micronics didn't do the NES Sky Shark port. It was Software Creations, and it's not half bad, IMO. The BGM is completely different and I prefer the original but the quality is good. Give the game a try (or another look if you already have) sometime.
Blimey I'm way off on my home Sharkology. :o Thanks, will have to give it another go!
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BrianC
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by BrianC »

OmegaFlareX wrote:
BIL wrote:When I think of home Flying Shark versions, it's mostly Micronics' customarily anaemic NES one (didn't get FC release AFAIK, like a few others eg Thundercade... not missed at all)
Micronics didn't do the NES Sky Shark port. It was Software Creations, and it's not half bad, IMO. The BGM is completely different and I prefer the original but the quality is good. Give the game a try (or another look if you already have) sometime.
The hit detection in the port is off. Definitely has nice graphics for NES, though.
SuperDeadite
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by SuperDeadite »

It's a real shame that this release isn't going to include the FM Towns music. :(
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by bigbadboaz »

I had asked about that above, and the Marty soundtrack is exactly what I'm hoping for. You've seen this confirmed (denied) somewhere?

M2 included the Saturn arrange soundtrack in the Garegga release, for example, so this seems like something they would do.
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Despatche
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Despatche »

Damn, they really found a 2P version of Kyukyoku Tiger, just like that. Get Star by the way.
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Redfox
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Redfox »

Not that this will ever happen but My favorite Toaplan title is Dogyuun. I would kill for an M2 release with rollback netcode so you can play that cooperative with someone else online and maybe have special leaderboards and data tracking showing which player had control and did so and so at in specific levels etc... Oh well, I can dream lol...
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Sengoku Strider
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Sengoku Strider »

Redfox wrote:Not that this will ever happen but My favorite Toaplan title is Dogyuun. I would kill for an M2 release with rollback netcode so you can play that cooperative with someone else online and maybe have special leaderboards and data tracking showing which player had control and did so and so at in specific levels etc... Oh well, I can dream lol...
There was a comment from them a while back that they hope to eventually get to the whole Toaplan catalogue. I don't think that's beyond the realm of possibility at all, considering Toaplan both developed and published that title.
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Marc
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Marc »

Sengoku Strider wrote:
Redfox wrote:Not that this will ever happen but My favorite Toaplan title is Dogyuun. I would kill for an M2 release with rollback netcode so you can play that cooperative with someone else online and maybe have special leaderboards and data tracking showing which player had control and did so and so at in specific levels etc... Oh well, I can dream lol...
There was a comment from them a while back that they hope to eventually get to the whole Toaplan catalogue. I don't think that's beyond the realm of possibility at all, considering Toaplan both developed and published that title.
That's my main concern about the 'premium' way they've gone about the collections - if sales aren't up to expectations, I doubt we will see some of the more obscure stuff.

Weren't the previous ShotTriggers a but of a bust sales-wise?
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Sengoku Strider
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Sengoku Strider »

Marc wrote:That's my main concern about the 'premium' way they've gone about the collections - if sales aren't up to expectations, I doubt we will see some of the more obscure stuff.

Weren't the previous ShotTriggers a but of a bust sales-wise?
They've gone on record that they're doing this as a passion project, their day job is doing things like Sega's mini consoles or Konami's collections. So it can keep going regardless.

That said, Ketsui & ESP Ra. De. were reported to have had multiple print runs, and I know the Game Gear LE helped Aleste Collection do alright. They have very low expectations going in.
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Rastan78
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Rastan78 »

M2 seemed happy with the sales of Esprade especially on Switch as they said something like, "Now we wish we had also done Ketsui on there."

The Shotriggers series seems to be chugging along quite happily at it's own pace. Meanwhile the Sega Ages series on Switch by M2, priced at 7.99 each was disappointing for Sega, especially in Japan, and has long been on hold. Too bad since it would've been great to see more of the Technosoft stuff get released eventually.
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by bigbadboaz »

They long insisted they couldn't do Ketsui on the Switch.
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Rastan78
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Rastan78 »

IIRC they also said they couldn't get Garrega running as well as they would like on Switch and that they couldn't get Batrider running well on PS4.

Kind hard to know how to take these statements without more context. They could mean it would be impossible. They could just mean that to release would take a lot more optimization than what they've done so far.

Don't Batrider and Garrega run on similar hardware to a lot of the later Toaplan releases? Like Batsugun, Dogyuun, Tatsujin OH etc. Guess it's safe to assume that if they run on similar boards there were many revisions to them over the years?
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Sengoku Strider
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Sengoku Strider »

Rastan78 wrote:M2 seemed happy with the sales of Esprade especially on Switch as they said something like, "Now we wish we had also done Ketsui on there."

The Shotriggers series seems to be chugging along quite happily at it's own pace. Meanwhile the Sega Ages series on Switch by M2, priced at 7.99 each was disappointing for Sega, especially in Japan, and has long been on hold. Too bad since it would've been great to see more of the Technosoft stuff get released eventually.
Sega AGES was successful everywhere except Japan, according to quotes from various Sega people. Even there it's not like it tanked, I'm guessing the numbers just bore out better on the mini consoles & Genesis collections. They've said the AGES series is over, so I guess that's the direction they headed in.
Rastan78 wrote:IIRC they also said they couldn't get Garrega running as well as they would like on Switch and that they couldn't get Batrider running well on PS4.

Kind hard to know how to take these statements without more context. They could mean it would be impossible. They could just mean that to release would take a lot more optimization than what they've done so far.

Don't Batrider and Garrega run on similar hardware to a lot of the later Toaplan releases? Like Batsugun, Dogyuun, Tatsujin OH etc. Guess it's safe to assume that if they run on similar boards there were many revisions to them over the years?
Garegga never ran that well to begin with, even the pcb has ~4 frames of lag. Garegga was also the first ShotTriggers release, and hit the year before the Switch was even out. So I'm guessing the Switch middleware in its first year was near-nonexistent and the documentation lacking, so given the system's inherent added frame from the dock, anything they tried likely would've come out at 6-7 frames and they said forget it.
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Rastan78
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Rastan78 »

Yeah, too bad Garrega or Ketsui didn't work out, but I'd say the presence of Esprade means they won't have trouble with any of the Toaplan stuff on the Switch hardware.

Personally I find anything 4 frames or less to be fine. Owned the Garregga PCB for years and never had any problems there. All the M2 stuff on Switch is good for me.

I would choose the 1 extra frame of lag for the portable factor every time. I've found the training mode and replay features on the M2 ports to be perfect for portable. Sometimes if I'm a bit too tired to do full runs, I'll just lay on the couch studying high scoring replays (which can be viewed frame by frame with input display on) or just set up specific situations in training mode/save states and use the screen shot function to help compare different score gains or make note of an ideal ship placement.

Then for full runs I'll go to the docked mode with a decent Hori wired d-pad controller. Of course for those who don't value the portability the PS4 makes more sense and that extra frame of response is a nice bonus to have as well.
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Marc
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Marc »

[quote="Sengoku Strider"]Sega AGES was successful everywhere except Japan, according to quotes from various Sega people. Even there it's not like it tanked, I'm guessing the numbers just bore out better on the mini consoles & Genesis collections. They've said the AGES series is over, so I guess that's the direction they headed in.[quote]

Yeah, I read that in a bunch of places, which is just weird.
Virtua Racing aside though, so many of these games had been previously released, appeared on compilations, were available in other games already (Yakuza).... does make you wonder if there'd have been more interest if they'd have gone with lesser-converted stuff like Power Drift, OutRunners, AB Cop.... Still, they did say it wasn't the end of their plans for their earlier stuff......
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Rastan78
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Rastan78 »

It was pretty clear from a survey that fans were really wanting to see the Sega Ages series move into the Saturn and DC era. Games like Jet Set Radio, Shenmue and Panzer Dragoon were most wanted. I agree with you, Marc that maybe they shouldn't have gone over too much old ground. They just did some of these on 3DS as well.

Also M2 has this interesting way of working where they will get a lot of stuff partially up and running either as a pet project, experiment or proof of concept to present to a license holder. Sometimes though they make the mistake of teasing things that are in development too soon. They did this big time with Sega Ages saying they already had Naomi stuff up and running on Switch, going so far as to say there was one specific title they were planning to release one way or another. Not the best way to get people hyped for yet another Fantasy Zone port.

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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Atariboy »

I think the big mistake was doing too many Genesis ports. The focus should've stayed on arcade games. In particular, the Super Scaler games always are a crowd pleaser and never before ported material (Revenge of Death Adder would've been an excellent candidate).

When $30 nets you over 50 Sega Genesis classics with reasonable emulation (For the casual crowd at least), the premium price point for things like Sonic the Hedgehog were a tough sell. Especially when much of that crowd probably has bought them digitally before in the past, purchased a past compilation like Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection, etc.

Excellent releases and for most of their Genesis ports, likely the definitive way to enjoy them today. But only the dedicated classic gaming enthusiasts like ourselves is likely to appreciate the TLC that went into one of them when for a few more dollars, a collection with dozens of additional games is going to be a good enough way in their eyes to revisit a few childhood memories.
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heli
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by heli »

I would only buy M2 Gley Lancer as megadrive game, the rest dont intrest me very much.
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by evil_ash_xero »

Siontis wrote:Tiger heli? Really? Am I the only one that thinks this game didn't deserve the M2 treatment? A Hamster port would have been fine for it. Hard pass.
Yeah, I feel the same way.
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by ATTRACTS »

evil_ash_xero wrote:
Siontis wrote:Tiger heli? Really? Am I the only one that thinks this game didn't deserve the M2 treatment? A Hamster port would have been fine for it. Hard pass.
Yeah, I feel the same way.
I think you guys don't realize what a big game this was in Japan. There's a lot of history behind it and it was the catalyst for many of the games that followed that we are still playing today. You might not like it but if M2 is focused on preserving the finer points of shmup history, this is a correct move.
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by OmegaFlareX »

ATTRACTS wrote:I think you guys don't realize what a big game this was in Japan. There's a lot of history behind it and it was the catalyst for many of the games that followed that we are still playing today.
I'm aware it's the first shmup with the modern superbomb mechanic, but what else is there to its story? Can you give us some more info about its history?
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by scrilla4rella »

OmegaFlareX wrote:I'm aware it's the first shmup with the modern superbomb mechanic, but what else is there to its story? Can you give us some more info about its history?
I'll have to re-read the Shooting Gameside article on Toaplan and the Tiger games but from what I remember they were huge hits that neatly coincided with the shooting game boom in Japan. Tiger Heli and its sequel were some some of the most accessible shooting games up until that point. There's the bombs that you mentioned, but more importantly Tiger Heli made it easy to shoot at both ground-based enemies and air-borne enemies with the same shot. Of course we now take this for granted but it was apparently quite the innovation. Compared to something like Xevious, Tiger Heli feels much more modern (if you ignore the short range of the bullets). Slap Fight would latter do the same thing but that had a more complex powerup system that wasn't as accessible.
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by OmegaFlareX »

New stream from M2 highlighting features and gameplay:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x356xYljg6A

Without understanding the language, my best guess is that there's not going to be arrange modes, but a "challenge" thing where you clear individual checkpoints. That's kinda disappointing, was looking forward to seeing some kind of danmaku upgrade arrange.
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BrianC
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by BrianC »

So, basically the same challenge mode thingy that was in some of the previous Shot Triggers games, including the Aleste collection?
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by bigbadboaz »

I couldn't really go through the whole thing, but it appears there will be arranged BGM?
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OmegaFlareX
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by OmegaFlareX »

Newest stream from M2: they play the first level in all of the included console ports, and some extensive gameplay of Get Star/Guardian.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJk6KBmjSKY

Get Star is such an odd choice of game to include in this bundle. It's so thematically inappropriate. But it looks fun.
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Sengoku Strider
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Sengoku Strider »

I haven't got time to watch the whole thing ATM, but I skimmed through - did they mention if there was going to be a 'not run like garbage' setting for the janky Micronics Famicom stuff?
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Rastan78 »

Looks like Kyukyoku Tiger and Tiger Heli have arcade, super easy, and custom modes. What is this custom mode all about?

Also I wonder if Get Star, being that it's an arcade game, will come along with the main games or with the console DLC stuff.
Get Star is such an odd choice of game to include in this bundle. It's so thematically inappropriate. But it looks fun.
Maybe they'll include one or two of their outliers like Get Star, Knuckle Bash etc. with each set. That way than can cover all the bases without cramming them all onto one collection.
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Sengoku Strider
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Re: M2 Toaplan collection

Post by Sengoku Strider »

Rastan78 wrote:What is this custom mode all about?
Most of the ShotTriggers releases have one. For instance Ketsui's lets you change your hitbox size, set your own extend values, start on the Ura loop, make suicide bullets standard, etc.
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