Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

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it290
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Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by it290 »

Been waiting for this one for a while, another quality M2 release as always. Really nice to play in tate mode and I love the default marquee wallpaper in yoko since it gives you a quick reference to all the characters. I've played the devil out of the Genesis version of this one and have spent a fair bit of time with the PCE CD version as well, but not as much with the arcade, will be pretty glorious to try this out with three players if I get the chance. The timings on the arcade version really put your skills to the test in a way the more deliberate Gen/MD version doesn't. Anyone else dipping into this?
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Marc
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by Marc »

Not a game I've ever played actually, but I'll certainly be giving it a spin. I'll pretty much buy anything on the Ages label in the simple hope that they keep them coming. Can't wait for Space Harrier and Virtua Racing.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by GaijinPunch »

Looks like ports of the MD version. I played a fair amount of that one back in the day as I didn't have enough dough to play the arcade. Good fun. Substantially easier than the arcade version. I had a super play of it (it's probably on Youtube now) that was nuts.
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BrianC
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by BrianC »

GaijinPunch wrote:Looks like ports of the MD version. I played a fair amount of that one back in the day as I didn't have enough dough to play the arcade. Good fun. Substantially easier than the arcade version. I had a super play of it (it's probably on Youtube now) that was nuts.
It's not the MD version. It's the AC version, complete with vertical aspect ratio. I bought it on the JP eShop since I had no idea when the US version would be coming (it already played in English). I like what I played so far, but I only played a little bit.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by TransatlanticFoe »

Absolutely love Gain Ground on the MD and SMS but not played the arcade version before. Woah this is brutal. Not just the speed of everything and so many more projectiles, but the default time limit is very harsh. Haven't made it past the 1st era's stage that features a bunch of dudes in a fort throwing knives at you. Cannot get the timing down to clear them out, zero leeway.

Popped it on the easiest setting and maximum time limit just to get a feel for how everything moves in this version - more enemies, more projectiles, more hitpoints, different behaviours. Even the easiest difficulty is much harder than the MD port (which only took me a few proper attempts to clear, omce I'd got the hang of the mechanics). Save scumming my way through this for now!

What's in this version?

International or Japan version
"All characters" mode - looks similar to the MD (and SMS, via a cheat) extra mode that gives you everyone at the start
Stage 4-8 bugfix toggle, explained in the online manual
Left/right screen rotation options
Scanline and smoothing options
3 player support
Online leaderboards
Variable difficulty and timer options
Save states
Replays

Shame they couldn't bundle the MD/SMS ports in though, given that they both have unique extra content.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by scrilla4rella »

Nice! I've been looking forward to this. Will dust off the Switch tonight.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by GaijinPunch »

BrianC wrote: It's not the MD version. It's the AC version, complete with vertical aspect ratio. I bought it on the JP eShop since I had no idea when the US version would be coming (it already played in English). I like what I played so far, but I only played a little bit.
Indeed... that's pretty cool
My first search showed the Alex Kidd / Gain Ground posts.

How does it look on a big ass TV and the weird resolution?
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by GaijinPunch »

TransatlanticFoe wrote: Stage 4-8 bugfix toggle, explained in the online manual.
One of my first translations was one of Sega's "Meisaku Album" entries. The guy talks quite briefly about the bug.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by BrianC »

GaijinPunch wrote:
BrianC wrote: How does it look on a big ass TV and the weird resolution?
From what I remember, weird, but I'll give it another look. I did buy Alex Kidd off the US eShop and was pleasantly surprised by the added cutscenes and FM sound. I found the Darius games to look especially nice on the big screen. Darius 1 doesn't support scanlines in the Switch handheld mode and the default resolution is too small in that mode. The others look nice in both handheld and docked modes.

edit: Had another look at Gain Ground. It doesn't look bad, but some of the text seemed oddly thin. Turns out that was just the font used. International and Japan have interesting differences. Only the international version is three player.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by GaijinPunch »

BrianC wrote: edit: Had another look at Gain Ground. It doesn't look bad, but some of the text seemed oddly thin. Turns out that was just the font used. International and Japan have interesting differences. Only the international version is three player.
This is due to accuracy (kinda). From the aforementioned translation (which in and of itself is retro now :shock: and the accuracy of which could admittedly be better)
We touched on this a minute ago, but I'd like to come back to it if I could. The 1-2 player cab was popular, but there's also the rumor of a 3-player version...

There is... rather we started development of it for the overseas market. We used the same cabinet that was used in Quartet, which was meant to be re-used. In terms of sales, we thought of Japanese game centers and concluded that the 2P version was best. The 3P version was never released [in Japan], but we did sell an upgrade kit for those that had the Quartet cabinet, so I think you could say that there are people [in Japan] who have played the 3P version.
So I'm curious if the "upgrade kit" is actually the same... or what. Or specifically what's different between the US & JP 3-player boards. My guess is little if anything.
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Domino
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by Domino »

Got it. Been awaiting for it for awihle. Good stuff and it's the arcade version too!

I was reading the staff credits and I thought there were some cool people in the Special Thanks near the end:

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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by TransatlanticFoe »

The online manual suggests the only differences are the 4-8 bug and number of players (I'd hazard that the Japanese version has Japanese text too). The Japan version has the original 4-8 bug where taking out turrets doesn't reduce the enemy count, so you can't win by clearing the enemies. The international version "fixes" this by not including the turrets in the total enemy count. The new bug fix toggle option includes turrets in the enemy count and reduces when you kill them, so lets you clear the stage by "properly" wiping everything out.

The upgrade kit sounds like it's just plugging the international release into an existing Quartet cabinet, given the interview states the 2/3 player versions are on different hardware rather than governed by a DIP switch.

Really interesting interview though, thanks for sharing! The multiplayer comment probably explains why it's so balls hard single player and I can see it'd be fun to get another couple of decent players in on it. The enemy layouts combined with their unique AI is really devious and it's great to hear this isn't just a happy accident - but rather months of work! And hearing the time constaints on the final stage explains why it's quite a bit stripped back in comparison to earlier ones - though combined with the music it creates an ominous atmosphere.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by Marc »

Not overly enamoured with this one, I have to admit. It's just too slow to hold my interest unless I'm really missing something, and I'm not really seeing much difference between the selectable characters.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by GaijinPunch »

Total speculation: Shou most likely leant them the board... and then a beta board or something. :|
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by it290 »

Marc wrote:Not overly enamoured with this one, I have to admit. It's just too slow to hold my interest unless I'm really missing something, and I'm not really seeing much difference between the selectable characters.
The differences between the characters are the name of the game in this one. Some characters have distance attacks that allow them to outrange enemy fire, others have the ability to attack higher elevations, and others have shields, boomerangs or other crowd-clearing abilities that allow them to survive rushdown situations. Tactically selecting the right character to tackle a stage or a portion of a stage and prioritizing the survival of your high-value characters is the way to go. If you've never played it before I can see how it might just seem like a slow-ass single screen Commando, but it's not that at all and has a lot more depth than it might appear. You really have to master the stage layouts and your characters' strengths and weaknesses to survive.
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by FinalBaton »

it290 wrote:The differences between the characters are the name of the game in this one. Some characters have distance attacks that allow them to outrange enemy fire, others have the ability to attack higher elevations, and others have shields, boomerangs or other crowd-clearing abilities that allow them to survive rushdown situations. Tactically selecting the right character to tackle a stage or a portion of a stage and prioritizing the survival of your high-value characters is the way to go. If you've never played it before I can see how it might just seem like a slow-ass single screen Commando, but it's not that at all and has a lot more depth than it might appear. You really have to master the stage layouts and your characters' strengths and weaknesses to survive.
You just perfectly described the spirit of the game. That was written better than I could have done it, awesome post
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Re: Gain Ground is out on US Switch eShop.

Post by GaijinPunch »

it290 wrote: The differences between the characters are the name of the game in this one. Some characters have distance attacks that allow them to outrange enemy fire, others have the ability to attack higher elevations, and others have shields, boomerangs or other crowd-clearing abilities that allow them to survive rushdown situations.
Movement speed is a huge one as well.
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