
Arcade, Japan version

Perikles - 1,218,200 - ALL - Yes - ShmupMAME v4.2
VideoWhat a fabulous run, it has it all: stupid deaths, an inflated score thanks to unintended milking and truly epic moments. Part of me longs for a solid 2-ALL without any deaths, but I'm extremely proud of this run not despite, but because of all its rough edges.
Decided to kill myself on the stage 7 boss since I did want to enter stage 8 with the missile launcher, yet got annoyed after a few attempts and finished the stage without one. I will say, however, that the first loop's checkpoints lose all their threat once you delved into the nightmare that is the second loop, it feels downright trivial (even though I did die prematurely once).
Got a good start with the first two stages in the second loop, stage 11/2-3 was a medium-sized fiasco after I lost my laser, though. I fortunately studied an alternate route just for this case, and it all worked out fine. Next stage went smoothly.
I wanted to cry when I not only failed to quickly kill those undescribable mother ship tentacle things in stage 13/2-5, but also picked up the blue pods by accident. Somehow managed to get through with a lot of luck, grandiose dodges and a dose of slowdown once the screen was flooded with all that nonsense. This is also a ludicrous checkpoint, recovery is pretty much impossible.
Died/killed myself a few times on stage 14/2-6 as usual before I got to end it with the desired enhancement, nothing out of the ordinary there. This stage feels oddly relaxing compared to the horror that awaits the player directly before and after it since you can easily recover here – I wish that all the checkpoints were like this in the game. When they are good, they are excellent, the bad ones are simply ridiculous, however.
Couldn't get the magic pixel on my first try in stage 15/2-7 and didn't have the guts to inch towards it. If you sit just right you can hit the huge gunships with all three pods at once which helps tremendously in the long run. So I had to perform some manual ninja dodging; I don't want to indulge myself in self-adulation, but those manoeuvres were truly befitting of a Ninja Ryukenden Task Force member, hopefully making BIRU-sama proud.

Final stage went exactly as planned. What a superb finish!
Overall I'm immensely glad I sticked to the game after finishing the World version. While I don't think that Image Fight is quite as well designed as R-Type II when it comes to merciless onslaughts of myriads of enemies at once, it has without a doubt the most awe-inspiring improvisational situations of all Irem games thanks to the vertical orientation. A 2-ALL of the World version is moreso in line with a 2-ALL of the first R-Type as far as difficulty is concerned, Japan version is congruent to the Japan version of R-Type II, so thanks for splitting the tables, Despatche.
