Guwange (PCB)

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Skykid
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Guwange (PCB)

Post by Skykid »

Revised and re-written as of 17/7/12

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GUWANGE
Published By: Cave
Year: 1999
Director: Tsuneki Ikeda


By 1999 Cave were already experiencing success in the shoot-em-up field. After making a strong impression with the likes of Dodonpachi, the company's flair for boldness and creativity bore fruit with Guwange.
Taking place at the end of the Muromachi Era, it’s a game steeped in traditional Japanese myth. Cursed by Shikigami spirits, the lifespan of its three playable protagonists has been shortened to a single year. Only if they can fight their way through the netherworld to Mt. Gokumon and kill its God will the Shikigami be banished.

After working on ESPrade, designer Junya Inoue joined the Guwange team late, suggesting the project had more artistic scope than he saw being included in the planning stages. His contribution is evident right down to the title screen, a multi-parallax forest bathed in an orange sunset; a suitable gateway to a title filled with equally striking touches.

Guwange's title screen
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The three afflicted characters are a novel troupe: The madman Shishin, Kosame, a young spiritual girl; and Gensuke, a travelling pharmacist. Each is introduced with an elegant monochrome story sequence, blood spraying across the screen to the rousing crash of Taiko drums.
Into the game proper and your character marches up-screen in a fashion akin to Capcom's Gun.Smoke. In addition to your main shot - a barrage of arrows and blades - your Shikigami spirit can be wielded as a secondary weapon by holding down the fire button, giving it freedom to roam the screen, destroy enemies and collect out of reach bonuses. During its use, the movement and dodging abilities of the player character are prohibited, so the Shikigami also doubles as shield against incoming bullets, turning them from blue to pink and slowing them to a crawl. If an enemy is destroyed in this process, its shielded bullets will be cancelled into points and absorbed, boosting your score multiplier.

Having a form of shield doesn’t make things massively easier. Although Guwange is certainly one of the more approachable of Cave’s titles, this is still traditional bullet hell, and by the fourth level the screen is bathed in enemy fire. When bullets either pass through the Shikigami or come around it - a regular occurrence in boss battles – switching back to your regular shot instantly returns movement to your primary character, allowing you to evade.

The central scoring dynamic is based around a multiplier that grows exponentially as long as you can hold a chain of destruction throughout the course of the game. You’re required to continuously spread gunfire onto popcorn enemies to raise your chaining meter, and train the Shikigami on the larger. Destroying the right enemies with the right attack generates a flow of coins, which grow from dull sheckles into streams of gold that increase the multiplier total. There are several tricks to keeping your chain active and ensuring your multiplier doesn't reset to zero, such as holding your Shikigami over bullets to bridge gaps between a stage’s last standard enemy and its boss. Additionally, your chain can carry between stages, forcing your multiplier through the roof, and holding down the bomb rather than tapping it allows you to stop the meter from falling too quickly.

Top players also take advantage of boss milking opportunities, reaping coins by attacking regenerating appendages and options, quite literally dicing with death on stage three’s formidable Spider Cat.

Although having to work with both spirit and host initially seems complex, once you have a feel for it, it defines the experience. The richness of the mechanics is what makes Guwange such an inspired work. You do have to engage your peripheral vision more liberally than most shooting games - but it’s also more forgiving than one may expect. At the detriment of not having any score-based extends, life boosting pick-ups are available on several occasions: the secret food hamper on the final stage imperative to a good clear bonus. Your character can also get away with being shaved by bullets, sometimes up to three times per life, without actually being killed. While this aids survival, however, being 'nicked' diminishes your multiplier, forcing number-hungry players to try and go completely unscathed.

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Making best use of all of Guwange’s features is a blast. Rewarding and quickly effortless, utilising your attributes and finding a chaining flow through each stage is an exciting process.

In addition to its ambitious structuring, the game also excels aesthetically. There are few shoot-em-ups that have as much to offer, and in such style, as this. Unlike most shooting games, Guwange innovates by abandoning boundaries to some degree. It’s still forced scrolling, but instead of a single direction your character travels left, right and even backward as you fire at enemies positioned on precipices, steps, hilltops and behind barriers. This grants the landscape a more organic, free flowing course through haunted forests, villages, lakes, streams, snow-laden battlegrounds and mountain valleys.

The enemies are varied, ranging from gun wielding army soldiers and flying wooden contraptions, to traditional Japanese ghosts, phantoms and demons of myth. Boss fights are high-impact, disturbing, and unrelentingly engaging, spitting tight geometric bullet patterns that demand equally tight reflexes. A shot tapping technique that allows quicker movement without losing control of your Shikigami definitely helps to alleviate the pressure, if you can learn to use it effectively.

A spellbinding journey through ancient Japan, Guwange’s undiluted creativity has leaked into every aspect of its concept, with Nasahiro Kusunoki's music being the icing on the proverbial printed circuit board.
Much lauded for its distinct, traditional score, Japanese drums thunder while wind instruments soothe and haunt, all consistently impressive from one track to the next. Modern elements are threaded into the compositions, moving from the slow and haunting theme of stage one into the pacy and driving drum & bass of the second.

With all its attributes and idiosyncrasies, it distances itself from the Cave norm in the best possible way. Its increasing rarity is hardly surprising, either, since Cave weren’t in a position to pour a lot of money into their games in 1999, and the development team was a group of just ten. Cave’s relationship with publisher Atlus was also coming to an end (it would be their last project together) and for the first time since they began their affiliation, Atlus didn't produce an export version, probably because of the game’s significant Japanese content.

Despite troubled times with Atlus, Guwange was Ikeda’s baby, and it shows. It's only when a director produces a commercial work selfishly, eschewing the rules of the mass-market, that we end up with something so fresh and significant. As a game it’s certainly up there with Cave’s best, second only in desirability to the seemingly more available Ketsui.

Destined to remain timeless, neither constricted by its period setting or its two-dimensional gameplay, this is the gaming equivalent of a fine wine - and somehow you have to assume this was the intention from the outset.
In which case, well done Mr. Ikeda, you got it in one.




A very serious nine out of ten.

Skykid 2008 (Revised and re-written 2012)


Sources of information and many thanks to:
GaijinPunch :wink:
Gamengai.com
the world of Arcades.net
Wikipedia.com



How's my reviewing?
Drop me a PM and let me know!

Want to try the game out for yourself?:
Guwange is most easily played and enjoyed on MAME

Want to listen to the music?:
You can sample the FINAL BOSS THEME here:
http://webzoom.freewebs.com/ord1000/Finalboss_theme.mp3


Want to learn more about Guwange?
There is a wealth of information available at Gamengai.com, in the Omake/Translation section. Get over there!

Want to read your Guwange high score?:
http://www.nhk.or.jp/lesson/english/index.html
Always outnumbered, never outgunned - No zuo no die

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