ST: Battle Garegga (20.7.14 - edits, record replays list)

[CStarFlare]

It may be her way of speeding up the kill slightly while making sure she still finishes the carrier off with shot? The moving options will throw one or two bullets at the cockpit for extra damage but immediately change back so they don't do too much and ruin the setup.

Icarus probably knows for sure, but that's the only thing I can think of. If it were a rank thing, it would probably be simpler to just pick up a couple of the items she leaves on the carrier.

[Shepardus]

I'm guessing it has something to do with timing the kill as CStarFlare said and/or with having a consistent rhythm for the section.

[Icarus]

I'm trying to experiment with the Saturn port's rapid option cycling control feature.

It only has one use: pseudo-Wide.

Kamui mentions in her Special Demonstrations #8 commentary that she cycles all the way through her options every time she destroys a carrier in Cloud, but I can't figure out what use it has for her. Do we know the rationale for it?

Timing and rhythm. That's all.

[microfolk]

Regarding the Shot Frequency part in the OT, does it apply to every version of the game or only the Saturn port? Randorama's quote mention a Special Menu where you can change the shot speed so I'm inclined to think it's talking about the Saturn version...
But in case the arcade works the same way how can I increase the shot rate without risking to have a non continuous stream? Can I tap the shot button a couple of times really fast and then press it in order to change my shot speed?

Also what determines Nose Lavagghin's final spread shot speed? The one it spews out after destroying the Twin Cannon Body. Sometimes it's hard but manageable, other times is completely unreasonable and it destroys me. I should practice its fight a bit more so it could be as well a matter of its position on the screen (high = manageable, low = crazy shit), but I'd love to know.

[CloudyMusic]

Regarding the Shot Frequency part in the OT, does it apply to every version of the game or only the Saturn port? Randorama's quote mention a Special Menu where you can change the shot speed so I'm inclined to think it's talking about the Saturn version...
But in case the arcade works the same way how can I increase the shot rate without risking to have a non continuous stream? Can I tap the shot button a couple of times really fast and then press it in order to change my shot speed?

I believe that part's a bit incorrect. As I understand it, it's as simple as this: if you manually tap faster than the current autofire rate, your autofire rate will be raised to that rate permanently. So if you tap the A button once and then tap it again 5 frames later, your autofire rate will be raised to that rate permanently (1 shot per 5 frames = 12Hz). The Saturn version has a mappable button that will raise the autofire rate one level at a time so you can be extremely precise about it.

The whole thing about "gaps in the stream" based on the rhythm that you tap with is false, as far as I know. The confusion probably stemmed from the fact that if your autofire rate is really high, you can start running into the cap for how many of your bullets can be on-screen at once. (You'll notice that if you move higher up on the screen so that you have fewer bullets on the screen at once, those gaps will disappear.)

[microfolk]

Regarding the Shot Frequency part in the OT, does it apply to every version of the game or only the Saturn port? Randorama's quote mention a Special Menu where you can change the shot speed so I'm inclined to think it's talking about the Saturn version...
But in case the arcade works the same way how can I increase the shot rate without risking to have a non continuous stream? Can I tap the shot button a couple of times really fast and then press it in order to change my shot speed?

I believe that part's a bit incorrect. As I understand it, it's as simple as this: if you manually tap faster than the current autofire rate, your autofire rate will be raised to that rate permanently. So if you tap the A button once and then tap it again 5 frames later, your autofire rate will be raised to that rate permanently (1 shot per 5 frames = 12Hz). The Saturn version has a mappable button that will raise the autofire rate one level at a time so you can be extremely precise about it.

The whole thing about "gaps in the stream" based on the rhythm that you tap with is false, as far as I know. The confusion probably stemmed from the fact that if your autofire rate is really high, you can start running into the cap for how many of your bullets can be on-screen at once. (You'll notice that if you move higher up on the screen so that you have fewer bullets on the screen at once, those gaps will disappear.)

The thing about the bullet limit is something I noticed too, I just finished a run where I accidentally set a fire rate so high I had HUGE gaps in my shooting stream while lazing in the bottom of the screen, but if I put myself a little above the middle I fired at an incredibile pace. I should be more careful though, I pressed the A button two times while waiting for the third boss to show up. -_-

I also think that Nose Lavagghin's spread becomes hellish only when both of the side propellors are destroyed, could anyone confirm this?

[Shepardus]

The more parts you destroy, the faster the spread becomes.

[Eaglet]

For all Gain players:

This will be covered more in-depth whenever we actually get our streaming session together but i wanted to share what I've found out about the timing for bombing the birds.
First of all, make sure that you've got as much score as possible after stage 1. Coming into stage 2 with over 600k will greatly help with getting everything down correctly.

Now, What you want to be doing is clear up the screen just well enough to prior when you're bombing that you'll have some red ships circling you and not much more.
Position yourself so that you can drop 2 bombs ASAP and directly ram yourself into a red ship when the invincibility frames wear off.
The timing for the bombs is: as soon as the treeline (where the birds appear) is just at the insert coin line - bomb twice and make sure that only the first bomb hits the upper part of the castle with its blast radius to trigger the birds spawning. Next bomb should be placed at pretty much exactly the same spot.
When you yourself spawn again you'll have to make sure that you'll be able to pick up the full bomb quickly (a fast subtype helps with this) and bomb thrice at approximately the middle of the screen.
Make sure that all bombs hit the same spot. Sprite overload sometimes disables you from bombing thrice but I've found that bombing as fast as you possibly can helps with this.
Put a high AF rate on the bomb button if you have a AF PCB or use MAME. Othwerise, mash the button as quickly as possible.

The timing for this is very specific and RNG sometimes fucks you over completely (with all birds running off quickly to the sides) but if you get this down correctly you should have at least 2,8 mil after every bird run.

The importance of timing and bomb positioning cannot be stressed enough. Practice this with save states if you can to get down the proper feel for it.
Once you have it internalized it's gonna work like an instinct.

[Eaglet]

Huge discovery!

The correct bomb timing for Gain is to bomb just as/right before the first turret that scrolls down from the top of the screen fires its first shot.

The bomb should be positioned aligned with the castle from the middle with the lower 20% of the blast radius hitting the castle. Deploy the second bomb right away a bit to the right aligned with the wall to the right of the castle and a bit up so that the upper limits of the blast radius just about touch the invisible INSERT COIN line and suicide immediately.

All subsequent bombs after respawning should be placed a slight bit lower than the middle of the screen and aligned with the right wall as the previous bomb. Doing this will pretty much guarantee you a score greater than 2,9 mil if you get into stage 2 with 600k.

The timing is extremely strict and being off by just a couple of 1/100 of a second will greatly reduce score potential.

[Eaglet]

Flubbed up a credit yesterday where I had 3,48 mil after the birds, so I know my method works.

[bkk]

The timing is extremely strict and being off by just a couple of 1/100 of a second will greatly reduce score potential.

Agree with this. I place the first bomb as high as possible though, and try to overlap it with the other bombs. I've gotten 3.7 this way.

[microfolk]

Here I am again with another question about bosses' behaviour: do we know what decides if Junkey Monkey's missiles are in shoot in sync or not? It seems random to me but what do I know.

[Eaglet]

It does seem random to me. Both that and when the twin shot firing turrets get active.
The first form does fire missiles quicker with higher rank though.

[microfolk]

Is it reasonable to expect to consistently get 1.5m from the birds? I'm still trying to learn the timing but I'm struggling to get more than 1.1m every time, but I think that's 100% on my lack of skill instead of being consistently screwed by RNG. I know it's one of the most random scoring places in the entire game but I'd love to have a score target to strive for every time.

[Eaglet]

With which ship? All ships potential vary greatly.
Golden Bat should strive for 2 million point gain.

[microfolk]

With which ship? All ships potential vary greatly.
Golden Bat should strive for 2 million point gain.

Ah yes I was thinking about Golden Bat, my bad. Guess I should train the birds for a little while then!

[Feedbacker]

What are the differences between Garegga an its chinese bootleg "1945二代" ?

[DKA_Darius]

A question about this game. Why I cannot use the third bomb after I use twice? My ship is Gain, and I want to bomb three times quickly for burnning the bird in stage 2, but it often happened the third bomb cannot be used immediately

[CloudyMusic]

A question about this game. Why I cannot use the third bomb after I use twice? My ship is Gain, and I want to bomb three times quickly for burnning the bird in stage 2, but it often happened the third bomb cannot be used immediately

The commonly-accepted explanation is the game's sprite limit; hit the bomb button repeatedly (either manually, or with autofire) and the third bomb will eventually launch.

[Eaglet]

Also, pick up all powerups ASAP to remove sprites from the screen. Protip.

[xy2_]

1) Whether or not the “chain” formation increases per-frame rank or not.

2) Differences, if any, in how rank works in 2-player games.

Checked this with fba-rr, and there are no difference in how rank works in 2P. Unlike what one would think, the per-frame rank increase is not doubled, and otherwhise all rank interactions work as expected.

Also a funny fact: the per-frame rank increases start not at the first stage, but directly at the ship select screen. This means the more time you spend at the ship select, the higher rank will be when the game starts. This actually proves a slight disadvantage if you wait for timeout when selecting an ABC ship rather than pressing A, B and C.

Rank is adress 0010C9D2 in FBA-RR. Note that endianness is inconsistent, so adresses between ram search and ram watch are 'different'.

While the game is switched on but not being played, like most arcade games it will cycle through an “attract mode” which shows the title screen, gameplay demonstrations, and the high score list: every time it does this, the rank counter will rise slightly (around 65,000 points) and thus the next game played will start out at a slightly lower difficulty level. The more times the attract mode sequence is allowed to run, the higher the rank counter goes and the easier the game gets (though, again, it never gets easier than the default starting amount).

Also this is untrue. The rank counter increase for each attract demo still stands (around 65,000). However, there's a critical point about this: while the game is played during the demos, the rank is still affected. This means that even if the rank counter is inrceased drastically, it will reduce a bit. In most replays the 65k offset is enough to not modify rank drastically, but there are some demos that are long enough that the rank will actually be slightly lower (and as such, the game will be slightly harder) as a result: the biggest example of this is the Plateau demo where the rank ends up a whooping 60k units lower than the rank was before that demo, even with the offset. The best demo to get before starting a game is the nose lavagghin demo, where the rank counter increases the most. This is providing we are just starting the game with normal rank and letting attract run; if you just got out of a game, for example, then just letting run the attract demos over and over is still the best to decrease rank, because most demos are still profitable in terms of rank counter increase (and rank decrease). Also because of this oddity it's impossible to go back to normal rank after the first credit unless you hard reset.

There is an advantage to this, however; it's that you can offset the small enemy chain this way, as most people probably know here. THis means there is a risk-reward choice even outside of gameplay..

Now we know why there are so much suicides in the demos

[trap15]

Err, I've been playing this for a long time on PCB with a rank display, and I've never had the rank not get easier after an attract loop. Besides, in the attract loop the rank gets started at minimum, instead of what the actual start rank is.

[ProjectAKo]

I don't think sitting on the select screen matters overall since the rank is going to minimum out when you suicide to nose laughin or sometime before the birds.

[ratikal]

What are good rank levels for each stage or each major milestone? I'm using ShmupMAME 4's rank display and this is what I have so far. For reference, 240 is the lowest.

Stage 4: 230
Stage 5: 210
Nosey Mk2: 190 (I have about 7M at this point)
Stage 6: 176
Gunwall: 163
Junky Monkey: 140

Are these too high? I'm really not sure how I can reduce rank with my current routes. I've been experimenting with autofire and my current rate is 10hz up till pre-stage 4 boss. Then, 12hz until Nosey 2. Finally, 15hz for the rest of the game.

[Shepardus]

What ship/character are you playing? I think in my first clear (which was with Miyamoto) I was around 150 at the end of the game. I wouldn't say there are really "right" or "wrong" rank values - if it works for you, it works, and it depends on what your goals are and what you can handle. Unless you've got some really precise strategies you need to execute, such as pre-placing Gain's bomb over the Slayer ship's shrapnel in stage 5, rank's more about the general feeling it produces than the number-crunching that drives it. That said, your rank from stage 6 onwards seems rather high to me, probably thanks to the autofire rate. With Miyamoto and Wild Snail I don't increase my autofire rate past default until Junkey Monkey, though top Miyamoto players raise it pretty high from the start since tick points are a major source of points for Miyamoto.

[ratikal]

I'm using Bornman ABC right now. I also feel like 10hz is way too slow and annoying to use.

[EXEXEX]

I'm using Bornman ABC right now. I also feel like 10hz is way too slow and annoying to use.

10hz is pretty much same as default rate though it bit faster.

Well interestingly from of my experience, using external autofire (at any rate) will boost the rate to fixed 30hz in certain moments, even if you disabled the autofire it still shoots at 30hz!!

[ProjectAKo]

That's because during a moment of lag you will fire at 30hz, and then the game will just be set to 30hz permanently.

[moozooh]

H,121,140 - unknown player (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jN_BWKQlwSw - SDD-Kaede's channel)

Turns out that's actually SDD-Kaede. Here's the new link, the old one is down.

[EXEXEX]

I just downloaded a MAME cheat file in another site, when I was booting Garegga and want to activate cheats there's an option like "Always Have Easiest Rank" "Watch Game rank" etc. Has anyone ever try this? seems like really cool option.