Reasonable autofire/mashing rates?

[SPM]

(No, this is not about "cheating" or anything. I usually play by myself and don't care about that)

I've been playing lots of classic shmups lately and it got me thinking about what a reasonable fire rate would be (one a player could perform on a regular basis playing in the arcades)

Maybe something like regularly tapping at 4-6Hz and eventually mashing at 10Hz? I can mash at 10Hz but I don't think I could keep that rate for the entirety of a boss fight, so maybe a bit less, like 8-9Hz? What do you think? Did players destroy those poor buttons back then? XD

Some situations are kinda "ruined" with a 30Hz rate (such as dealing with a big enemy + zakos at the same time, which turns into a speedkill and then some dull zako management), so I'm trying to experience the intended way in some of these classics using "ideal" autofire rates (just with the easier ones really. I wouldn't use anything below 30Hz for speedkills in something like Same3 1P)

[davyK]

It will largely depend on the game.

The M2 port of Darius Gaiden has a 30Hz option. It has others of course but 30Hz feels very similar to the rapid fire you get in the Saturn version. I have no idea if the Gaiden cabinets which had a rapid fire button were set that high.

Watching the demo sequences certainly hints at a similar rate of fire but I don't know what the official rate would be for that game.

[SPM]

Yeah, If the game already had a built-in autofire I usually use that, like Raiden DX, even if it's not 30Hz. But I get your point about different rates in modern ports.
(I don't think the experience changes that much in those cases though! I may be wrong).

I was talking mainly about games without any autofire, like Hishouzame. I'd like to know realistic manual fire rates to play them the intended way (but using autofires to be more comfortable and protect my wrist)

[pulsemod]

it sounds like you already have a good idea of what you want, but why not measure how fast you tap normally and rapidly and go for those autofire rates? I just tried a web "tap for BPM" site and got about 9 taps per second with my dominant hand. I wouldn't say I'm too fast of a tapper, so 10Hz rapid does sound reasonably realistic!

[BareKnuckleRoo]

I usually use something aroung 8 hz as a reasonable "I could tap at this speed throughout the game without hurting myself too much" speed.

Darius Gaiden's attract speed is extremely fast at 15 hz. I remember it was mentioned in the strategy section for Darius Gaiden.

[Rastan78]

For those who don't know about him there's a famous player and long time Hudson staff called Takahashi Meijin who can consistently mash at 16 hz on pad. It was kind of a meme and his claim to fame sort of besides having some of the best caravan scores in the day. Hudson even made this little yellow pad that just had an A and B button but no D pad with a little digital readout that could be used to practice and test your mashing speed.

The way Takahashi did it was by holding his hand perfectly still, pad on the table and sort of vibrating like a human Hitachi Magic Wand. Must've been quite a hit with the ladies.

[Steven]

Comparing my own manual rate of fire to the autofire options on the M2 ShotTriggers games, it seems I can manually maintain about 12Hz for about 30~40 seconds or so before I start to get tired, which gives me more than enough time to kill bosses quickly without autofire in most cases, but I'm also using those really sensitive Hayabusa buttons and 2 fingers. I usually use 10Hz auto for most things since that's a speed I can maintain comfortably manually anyway, as I find that much more comfortable than going as fast as I can, which gives me about 12Hz. I'll still 30Hz point-blank bosses in some games, though I don't typically like doing it.

For Hishouzame, I don't use autofire at all, but if you do, you only want like 5Hz~6Hz for the stages and pretty much whatever you want for the bosses.

[davyK]

For those who don't know about him there's a famous player and long time Hudson staff called Takahashi Meijin who can consistently mash at 16 hz on pad. It was kind of a meme and his claim to fame sort of besides having some of the best caravan scores in the day. Hudson even made this little yellow pad that just had an A and B button but no D pad with a little digital readout that could be used to practice and test your mashing speed.

The way Takahashi did it was by holding his hand perfectly still, pad on the table and sort of vibrating like a human Hitachi Magic Wand. Must've been quite a hit with the ladies.

I got one of those yellow Hudson shooting game trainers. Was quite a few years ago now. Bought it as a present for my nephew.

I think you need to get a very high rate of fire in some of those old Hudson games like Star Force and Star Soldier in order to get some of the big bonuses.

[copy-paster]

Watching the demo sequences certainly hints at a similar rate of fire but I don't know what the official rate would be for that game.

Attract mode use 15hz for the whole demo. That one is enough to tell that Taito knew about external auto thing and they decide to made default shot slower so that operators can adjust them with ext. auto as they wll.

If you want a manual tap simulation, I'd say set the fire rate to 5-6hz it pretty much simulate what a normal human could tap in one second.

[heli]

Button pushing i wont use.
If i use autofire on neo-geo, i get special guns that are impossible for a human to fire that special attack tru the whole game.
I remember lending my xbox to my brother, he went playing boxing game, the whole x button was loose ( or y button whatever ).