Powerups in shmups / Favourite powerup systems

[Terramax]

So, whenever I play Cave shmups, I feel like the power ups are kinda pointless. Your ship gets stronger, but so do the enemies, and unless the bullet patterns change, it really feels nothing but superficial half of the time and I'd honesty prefer if most of their games just stick to whatever attacks from start to finish.

On the other end of the spectrum, games with too many powerup and/or varients of weapons irritate me personally because I usually can't be bothered experimenting and memorising which weapons for which sections are worth having.

I'm most definitely not a fan of powering down whenever you're hit. Beginner players are penalised further for not being good, and whilst I get that these systems were in place to have people spend more money at the arcades, I feel in this day and age where we're all playing on home consoles, such systems just tempt people such as myself to either restart levels / games all over again, or are just put off playing at all.

Personal favourite system for me goes to Under Defeat - there are 3 types of secondary / heavy weapons in the game, none of which power up, and it gives the game enough variety without really bogging the player down with too many choices, and all 3 of them have their pros and weaknesses.

[davyK]

I don't mind a partial power down when losing a life as it serves as a penalty. As long as you aren't in an impossible position then it's OK. Darius Gaiden has a fair system for powering down after a death for example.

I agree that the Cave powerup system is pretty pointless ,though it means a bit more in the earlier games like DDP. In something like Futari they could have had the player on max power from the start and just set the early level intensity to match it and keep the difficulty the same. But it's still pleasurable to pick up a token and getting that extra firepower so they probably kept it just for fun.

The Gradius system remains the best in my book as it facilitates tactical play. The Raiden system is good too but it's unfuriating!

[BulletMagnet]

I've mentioned it before, but I always liked Batsugun's system - you can collect the usual "P" icons which are lost when you die, but also fill an "exp" bar as you destroy targets, and eventually "level up" your shot, which remains permanent. As such, you still have both the "old school" sense of growing in power as you progress and a penalty when you mess up, but there's also a regularly-rising "floor" to prevent an ill-timed death from being near-impossible to recover from.

[Licorice]

I'm most definitely not a fan of powering down whenever you're hit. Beginner players are penalised further for not being good, and whilst I get that these systems were in place to have people spend more money at the arcades, I feel in this day and age where we're all playing on home consoles, such systems just tempt people such as myself to either restart levels / games all over again, or are just put off playing at all.

That's one way to look at it. Another is that powering down forces you to really understand the levels and enemy placement and think more tactically rather than just, well, power through the challenge. Some of the most fun I've had playing a shmup (or any game) is figuring out checkpoint recoveries in Same!^3 (MD, Normal), and doing single level runs from level 1 power using save states.

In fact I had so much fun doing this I wonder if the game would have been better if you could only power up to the 5 way, and for it to only be temporary. Game just seems really well designed around the default 3-way.

Aside from this, recoveries are just very satisfying in general precisely because they're hard to pull off. There's really no feeling like messing up in a run and miraculously getting the 1CC anyway. Much more interesting than just "3 strikes and you're out" systems where otherwise making a mistake has no effect on the play.

Finally, for non-checkpoint games were recovery is challenging e.g. Raiden 2, I just think of them as 1 life games that are nice enough to give you a preview of the next 1 or so minutes of the game for next time lol.

[To Far Away Times]

I've mentioned it before, but I always liked Batsugun's system - you can collect the usual "P" icons which are lost when you die, but also fill an "exp" bar as you destroy targets, and eventually "level up" your shot, which remains permanent. As such, you still have both the "old school" sense of growing in power as you progress and a penalty when you mess up, but there's also a regularly-rising "floor" to prevent an ill-timed death from being near-impossible to recover from.

This is a great one.

I also like Spriggan's power up system. In Spriggan, you have colored orbs for each standard shot type and three slots to store them. Each combination of orbs that you store produces a different shot so it kinda feels like you're making your own shot type by mixing and matching. It's really fun.

[BrianC]

I also like Spriggan's power up system. In Spriggan, you have colored orbs for each standard shot type and three slots to store them. Each combination of orbs that you store produces a different shot so it kinda feels like you're making your own shot type by mixing and matching. It's really fun.

Soldier Blade has a similar system.

[LordHypnos]

I'm not a huge fan of power-ups when it comes down to it. Gradius system is very fun, but makes death so much more punishing, and I just am not a fan of having to 1-life things. I respect people who can do intense checkpoint recoveries, but it's not for me. V.V is a bit more appealing than Gradius itself because the default shot is actually reasonably powerful, but when I was playing it, I found there to be some spots that were significantly harder with the default shot (thinking of the S2 boss, I think? That one is massively easier with Search IIRC).

Would give some props to Mars Matrix for having a system that gives you an incentive beyond score to learn how to chain the first stage, but eschews power-downs on death. In addition to that, the Piercing Cannon is always at full power, so even if you have no power you can still kill the bigger enemies.

As I'm currently digging into Ray Force a bit, that one seems pretty good. Power-ups to the lock on just increase the number of targets that you can lock onto, which can increase your score a lot, but doesn't seem to create situations that are hard to recover from. It seems like the normal shot also has a power level, but I'm not sure (which tells me that it probably doesn't make a huge difference to difficulty). Probably some of the other pickups affect it. Maybe I'll change my mind a little later

[Jeneki]

Cyvern the Dragon Weapons: This game creates a positive feedback loop, where correctly using your special attacks rewards you with more powerup bits, which also lets you use those special attacks more often. Timing when you grab a powerup is also important, to keep the meter running longer.

Gemini Wing: All powerups are 1-use and go into a queue. If you want to be cured of the disease "saving bombs in case I need them later", this is the game to do it.

Armed Police Batrider: Because you shot rebel up.

[Redfox]

My personal fav is Dogyunn. It's kinda silly but I love the team up mechanic and how that can boost your weapons. That feature alone makes it my fav Toaplan game.

[copy-paster]

Seconded BulletMagnet's statement, stage design of Batsugun also designed with certain power level in mind so it never feels too under/overpower upon death. Gauge Edit in Gradius Gaiden also another favorite of mine too, makes recovery easier with your gauge of choice.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

I play a number of games with complex powerups, but generally I do like ones where you pick a shot type and stick with it. What I'd like to see is a game where you can cycle powerups, but you can't accidentally pick up a bad powerup. For instance, make it so picking up a weapon while holding the fire button only powers up your current weapon, it doesn't swap the weapon. No accidental weapon switching if a powerup icon floats in your path, you only change weapons if you let go of shot and then collect it when you're not holding the shot button.

[davyK]

I play a number of games with complex powerups, but generally I do like ones where you pick a shot type and stick with it. What I'd like to see is a game where you can cycle powerups, but you can't accidentally pick up a bad powerup. For instance, make it so picking up a weapon while holding the fire button only powers up your current weapon, it doesn't swap the weapon. No accidental weapon switching if a powerup icon floats in your path, you only change weapons if you let go of shot and then collect it when you're not holding the shot button.

There's nothing quite like picking up the wrong power up in Raiden.

Especially that damn troll green laser in Raiden III

[velo]

To me, checkpoints + power downs generally feels satisfying for the first part of the game but too frustrating towards the end. Especially if you *need* a speedup powerup it gets brutal. If I sneeze at a bad time in the latter half of R-Type 1 it's just over, no coming back for me. So I'd call it a balance issue and/or I suck.

Mixed feelings about having multiple weapon-type pickups, might as well just have different ships/shot types. It's a psychological thing: I'll challenge myself with a crappy ship but I'm not going to deliberately pick up a crappy weapon, so it's like the programmers just wasted their time putting it in the game.