Which top down shmups have your favorite scenery?

[Xyga]

Rayforce ... glorious

Yes. Oh yes.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Gun Frontier springs to mind first, then some of the Capcom's 19 shmups. Varth could use more Raiden/Assault-like interaction, but the world indeed seems busier than the usual tunnel of love fare. Task Force Harrier - NOT the console version, mind. Air Duel - bugs connoisseurs may know why.

I'm a sucker for scaling and I love games that use scaling and rotation in abundance. It's always such a fun spectacle for me.

Play Guardian Force (alas, I don't think it's very well emulated yet).

[uncletom]

Nobody even mentions Flying Shark / Sky Shark ?? Where've you guys been in 1987?

[ZacharyB]

It has to be Rayforce (aka Galactic Attack, aka Layer Section, aka Gunlock).

The story is told through the backgrounds. The final scene where the player enters into the central inverted sphere city is breathtaking. It really drives home the impression that the journey is ending.

[uncletom]

RayForce looks really fine.

But then I have one game for you - Nebulas Ray.

[Jonst]

For me,

Espgaluda & esp2
Dodonpachi daifukkatsu
Mushi & mushi futari

[Aleksei]

Speaking of gun frontier, Metal Black has some awesome backgrounds.

edit: oh, didn't read the top down part, errr, guess I'd have to go with the Raizing magical and garegga trilogies.

[Magma Dragoon]

I love Truxton II's fourth stage and that amazing night cityscape.

[Some-Mist]

Ketsui.

this was the first thing that came to mind before battle garegga.

edit: aiiii.... "top down shmups". editing out my last bit.

[uncletom]

Yes... There are so many games with awesome looking backgrounds, it would be easier to ask what games have the opposite.

Before any of you can say "off topic" let me just antagonize a moment by asking; Which top down shmups have the ugliest scenery?

Allow me to be the first to reply - Twin Eagle. A game made in the age of good graphics yet still not able to perform visually compared with other games at the time. I could go on but I understand that some people infact like this game so I won't be slashing to bits as I would like.

[Stevens]

My experience is limited, but here are some of my favorites:

Zero Gunner 2 - Stages 5, 6, and 7 do a nice job of following each other.
Mars Matrix - Stage 5. Love the boss battle (I suck at MM by the way)
Under Defeat - Stage 5 (already mentioned). War torn Berlin. You can almost smell the destruction.

[uncletom]

I quite fancy the multicolored stars in Galaga. Really. It's simple and pretty, like christmas.

And Slap Fight, these pixels just never stop to amaze me.

[Kollision]

Under Defeat springs to mind for having extremely gorgeous scenery
And as people already mentioned, Rayforce

also for the awesome feeling of immersion and the welcome addition of obstacles ---> Silpheed on the Sega CD
i haven't played The Lost Planet but if it follows the same pattern then it should be awesome as well

[JWS]

Since Im a kuso player I mainly play for things like this.
Raizing are gods at this in my opinion, the opening stage in Garrega with the ravines and cable cars. Its really just astonishingly well drawn. Then the stage two boss fight over that hamlet/town. Which amusingly, means your actions will kill more than just the enemy.
The broken and destroyed machines in the ravines on stage 1 of DDP are some of the most moving art Ive ever seen. Shmups have this great beauty to them which slowly emerges over countless plays.

I think on the other hand games like Ketsui I find too washed out (thought I love the EVAC MART). Also any stage that looks like a Grey PCB makes me sleepy.

[uncletom]

But aren't we being a tad unfair? All the 1990+ shmups will ofcourse have 'the best scenery' thanks to their more complex hardware. When you have your first photo realistic 3D poly-generated textured shmup, any earlier game will automatically not stand a chance.

Why not just keep the comparison between equal technology, like bitmap scrolling shmups, chip rotation & zoom shmups, and 3D polygon shmups? Allow a slight handicap. Then you'll get categories like the following:

1. Slap Fight, Raiden, Flying Shark, Ikari, GunSmoke, Strikers 19.. and probably most of the CAVE stuff.

2. Rayforce, Nebulas Ray, Twin Cobra II

3. Ray Storm, Ray Crisis, Under Defeat, Zero Gunner II, Castle Shiki, Xevious 3DG

I mean, if you are going to compare stuff, then keep it proper. Or you can immediately include Crysis as no.1 winner when flying the shuttle at the end stage.

[Doctor Butler]

Under Defeat and Guwange

[320x240]

But aren't we being a tad unfair? All the 1990+ shmups will ofcourse have 'the best scenery' thanks to their more complex hardware. When you have your first photo realistic 3D poly-generated textured shmup, any earlier game will automatically not stand a chance.

But this is about favorite scenery, remember, not best or even most complex, and I think what you are describing is mostly true for the two latter types.

And then there is the difference between good design and good looks. For instance, when CAVE ditched pixel art in favor of pre-rendered art, the games looked worse to my eyes, even though I think the actual designs improved a lot. At the same time, some pixel art that looks good isn't always that well designed.

[LordHypnos]

Personally, I think the early to mid 90s was pretty much the peak of shmup backgrounds. Nothing polygon / prerendered will ever touch Batsugun or Battle Garregga or what have you. Not really why I play shmups though. I'll take ugly Mars Matrix over any beautiful game that I don't like as much. In fairness, Mars Matrix has a few nice looking parts, but it's not Do Don Pachi, you know?

[Squire Grooktook]

Played Dogyuun again a few days back, and have to agree with Chempop that it's really great aestheticly, totally feels like an adventure. On that note, V-Five is fantastic in this department too imo. Not quite as colorful as the former example but a bit more variety.

[uncletom]

320x240: I'm not sure I follow. My favourite scenery in games I also call the "best" scenery, because I like it better than any other scenery. Complexity has little to do with it, but generally my fav sceneries are also quite complex, if that is what you mean by greater detail. Ofcourse a good scenery doesn't necessarily need to be complex, simple design can do very well in many cases.

Then you mean that *good design* and *good looks* are two different things? I would say it is one and the same thing. When I look at something that is well designed I usually mean it "looks great". Same as then something "looks good" I would say that it has "good design". I would rarely say "It's well designed but it doesn't look good". That goes for pretty much everything in this world.

[Blinge]

Espgaluda
Mushi

Yeah man I often find myself noticing new things in the espgaluda background that i hadn't seen before. Really pretty stuff.

Also Exceed series LOL
I fired up #2 for the first time, saw that it re-used the same bland background from stage 1 of the first game and nearly turned it off right there.

[rcoltrane]

Tokio, specially the high resolution parts above the clouds. Simple and awesome.

[Squire Grooktook]

Also Exceed series LOL
I fired up #2 for the first time, saw that it re-used the same bland background from stage 1 of the first game and nearly turned it off right there.

Yup, eXceed 2nd is probably one of my top 5 doujin shmups ever, but the backgrounds are pretty sad.

[President_Obama]

Tokio.

edit: damn you to hell Coltrane.

[Atra776]

Raiden DX - Takes you through different environments in each stage, the graphics, art and design look great in each one too.
Ibara - A nice and dark steampunk world.
DoDonPachi SaiDaiOuJou - Colourful and really futuristic, really like the designs of stages 3 and 4 personally.
Ikaruga - Feels like an interesting mix between modernism and traditionalism; a technologically advanced environment that's not too futuristic while holding onto notions of traditionalism and nature. The megastructures in the game just awes me.
Crimzon Clover - A great mix of environments starting in a cyber city then a desert before ending up inside a hollow mountain followed by a sinister jungle, a stormy night sky and finally finishing up in purely mechanical stronghold.

[Despatche]

RayForce looks really fine.

But then I have one game for you - Nebulas Ray.

yesssss

problem is most people won't really know nebulasray because lolmame (i don't!)

hell, anyone who's ever played land maker in mame assumes it has no dialogue because LOLmame

[LordHypnos]

Yeah, definately V.V
I love some of the animation, and the backgrounds have lotsa detail.

[Eaglet]

Garegga
Batrider
Rayforce

[uncletom]

Raiden II

and

Viper Phase 1

.. and ...

SLAP FIGHT

[professor ganson]

Was going to say Zanac Neo, but on reflection "scenery" isn't what's nice about the graphics.

Was going to say Harmful Park, but it's a hori.

Guess I'll go with Xevious/Xevious Arrangement. What I love: the occasional abstract geometrical patterns, the map-like (sort of symbol-like) character of the overhead view, and the lush green of the environs.