Stuart Campbell's GOTY is Raiden III

[Guardians Knight]

fuck me, just read the insertcredit review ^^

damn this guy is such a tit he deserves his head used as a football...nuf said

[Rob]

The DOJ review was trying to be funny? In what way?

[Acid King]

I like his comment about the Hyper not being "as useful as it looks". Class...

[Valgar]

The DOJ review was trying to be funny? In what way?

Sorry, I guess I spent too much time looking at the pictures instead of actually reading anything he said.

[Rob]

Sorry, I guess I spent too much time looking at the pictures instead of actually reading anything he said.

So the "satire" was using no in-game screens? Being the shmups.com forum addict, this kind of comedy flies right over my head. Would that be knocking "most internet gaming sites" or Cave fans? I don't look at internet gaming news/reviews sites unless they're linked.

The review was dry and uninsightful. Was that intentional? Help me out, this site seems pretty lame. I mean, not the worst.

[Specineff]

Why does he keep saying "your correspondent", "your correspondent", "your correspondent"? Couldn't he just say "I" instead?

//Zig

See Dr. Doom, Thanos and such.



(Ok, for those who don't get it, people with big egos tend to talk about themselves in third person.)

[Turrican]

Why does he keep saying "your correspondent", "your correspondent", "your correspondent"? Couldn't he just say "I" instead?

//Zig

See Dr. Doom, Thanos and such.

(Ok, for those who don't get it, people with big egos tend to talk about themselves in third person.)

Eh, classic. It reminds me of that cool quote in Marvel Super Heroes: "Just as there can only be one Caesar or Napoleon, there can only be one Doom!"

[SAM]

His DOJ review isn't funny (and it gets bad when people TRY to be funny but fail), but let us NEVER forget.

http://www.insertcredit.com/reviews/ketsui/

OMG!!!

OUCH!!!

I never read this before since I try my best to avoid insertcredit anyway, but this WAS worth reading. He obviously spent about 2 credits playing Ketsui.

Ketsui is easier than DDP?!?! What the hell he is talking about.

You are right about this guy haven't spent much time on the game.

I guess he cann't even distingush DDP, from DP, DDP, and DDP DOJ without looking at the title screen. I hope that he won't said "Zero Gunner" when he look into the screen of "Under Defeat"...

[MOSQUITO FIGHTER]

the bosses are in fact the easiest part of the levels, and provide the closest thing on offer to a welcome break

Guess Hibachi is really easy huh Stuart. You could've just watched the DVD. There's this thing called Death Label also.

And for wusses who just want to see all the graphics they've paid for, there's always No Bullets mode

If the game allows free credits why would that be important.

It seems like he dosen't have much of an argument for Raiden III being better than DOJ other than the limited credits in Raiden III. Which gives plenty enough to complete that one also. Raiden III is more flawed than DOJ. With it's weak scoring system and slow ships. Why would anyone listen to this guy. Alot of people here know more about videogames.

[Dave_K.]

His DOJ review isn't funny (and it gets bad when people TRY to be funny but fail), but let us NEVER forget.

http://www.insertcredit.com/reviews/ketsui/

OMG!!!

OUCH!!!

I never read this before since I try my best to avoid insertcredit anyway, but this WAS worth reading. He obviously spent about 2 credits playing Ketsui.

Ketsui is easier than DDP?!?! What the hell he is talking about.

You are right about this guy haven't spent much time on the game.

I guess he cann't even distingush DDP, from DP, DDP, and DDP DOJ without looking at the title screen. I hope that he won't said "Zero Gunner" when he look into the screen of "Under Defeat"...

I invited Brandon from InsertCredit to come to the last Bay Area shmupmeet at the end of October, he sounded very interested, but already had plans for LA that weekend. I mentioned the Ketsui article, and that this would be an opportunity for him to re-review it. He said he thinks maybe the machine he played on had its settings changed to make it easier, because he got pretty far on one credit, which is why the article was written that way.

He most likely only played it a couple times, since the article was written just as it was released in japanese arcades (in 2002). Anyway, I'll invite him again to the next meet, and we'll see what he thinks now (not that anyone here cares).

[Valgar]

I invited Brandon from InsertCredit to come to the last Bay Area shmupmeet at the end of October, he sounded very interested, but already had plans for LA that weekend. I mentioned the Ketsui article, and that this would be an opportunity for him to re-review it. He said he thinks maybe the machine he played on had its settings changed to make it easier, because he got pretty far on one credit, which is why the article was written that way.

He most likely only played it a couple times, since the article was written just as it was released in japanese arcades (in 2002). Anyway, I'll invite him again to the next meet, and we'll see what he thinks now (not that anyone here cares).

If his article came across as speculation off of one credit, then that is fine, but it doesn't.

[zakk]

OMG!!!

OUCH!!!

I never read this before since I try my best to avoid insertcredit anyway, but this WAS worth reading. He obviously spent about 2 credits playing Ketsui.

Ketsui is easier than DDP?!?! What the hell he is talking about.

You are right about this guy haven't spent much time on the game.

I guess he cann't even distingush DDP, from DP, DDP, and DDP DOJ without looking at the title screen. I hope that he won't said "Zero Gunner" when he look into the screen of "Under Defeat"...

I invited Brandon from InsertCredit to come to the last Bay Area shmupmeet at the end of October, he sounded very interested, but already had plans for LA that weekend. I mentioned the Ketsui article, and that this would be an opportunity for him to re-review it. He said he thinks maybe the machine he played on had its settings changed to make it easier, because he got pretty far on one credit, which is why the article was written that way.

He most likely only played it a couple times, since the article was written just as it was released in japanese arcades (in 2002). Anyway, I'll invite him again to the next meet, and we'll see what he thinks now (not that anyone here cares).

You actually CAN get pretty far in ketsui on one credit if you ignore scoring entirely. If you just keep lock-shot activated constantly and maaaybe sometimes be a little aggressive to make it lock on faster, you'll do ok. Your score will be really really low. (like, 1/3rd of what it could be, perhaps worse).

[Randorama]

Just to know, after reading these few last posts...How can you take in consideration these people and their "opinions"? I honestly wonder how someone who clearly hasn't a fucking clue of what's going on can be taken seriously by someone posting on this forum. I don't want to sound offensive,but i take for granted that any habitual here has, to say the least, a better grasp (since he's supposed to be a fan of the genre) than any other wanna-be hardcore mainstream reviewer...unless the official title "journalist" magically gives some sort of deeper knowledge.

I hope that i'm not offensive (i apologize in advance if i am), but seriously: how can you read this stuff? It's worse than Tim Rogers' rants

[CIT]

For many people not as deeply into shooters, arcade gaming and importing as the users of this board, the Cave games occupy some arcane and inaccesible realm of videogame lore. It seems to me that for said reviewers covering these games is mainly just a pretentious means to assert their own guruistic internet persona. Even more so, if they are able to just wave away a game like Ketsui with their left hand and tell us that it really isn't all it's cracked up to be.
Tim Rogers is a good case in point. Nothing he writes is about games. Everything he writes is about Tim Rogers.

[benstylus]

To be honest, I think that's why I like Tim Rogers more than any other video game writer out there. He takes every gaming experience and makes it completely personal.

[Dave_K.]

Just to know, after reading these few last posts...How can you take in consideration these people and their "opinions"? I honestly wonder how someone who clearly hasn't a fucking clue of what's going on can be taken seriously by someone posting on this forum. I don't want to sound offensive,but i take for granted that any habitual here has, to say the least, a better grasp (since he's supposed to be a fan of the genre) than any other wanna-be hardcore mainstream reviewer...unless the official title "journalist" magically gives some sort of deeper knowledge.

Insertcredit is nothing more than a blog. Its reviews are exactly as you stated, opinions, just like this WOS stuff. I don't even know why you are dignifying them as "journalists" when this is not printed material sold on newstands. If I wasted $3.95 to read the Ketsui review, then yeah I'd be pissed, but come on, its a multi-authored blog! I'm only interested in reading it because like any good blog, its updated frequently, and occasionally links to other interesting material. Now it may be true that in real life Brandon is an assistant editor for some development magazine, but that doesn't make him authoratative on reviewing shmups, so I read it as such. If others don't see if that way, then thats there own short sightedness.

When I said I would invite Brandon to the next shmup meet, its really because he is a fan of the genera. I would like to see him revise his review, but only to do the game justice, not redeem the reviewer.

[Randorama]

Insertcredit is nothing more than a blog. Its reviews are exactly as you stated, opinions, just like this WOS stuff. I don't even know why you are dignifying them as "journalists" when this is not printed material sold on newstands.

I skipped this part (i.e. i thought they were somewhat professional reviewers) sorry In general, though, i prefer to form my opinions in a rather different way, i admit (shameless spam: that's how i write my reviews in my simple blog, link in the signature ). On the other hand, i also admit that the whole "being fan of a magazine/reviewer" part is hit and miss for me. It is also true that i grew up without consoles and thus my gaming experience was more or less like "These are the new games in the arcade, play them or shut up!".

At any case, i'm beginning to think that this site could benefit from a articles section...

[Dave_K.]

At any case, i'm beginning to think that this site could benefit from a articles section...

I'll second that. Now your opinion on shmups I would respect, and hold you to a much higher standard.

[Rev. Stuart Campbell]

Hello viewers! It's Rev. Stuart here, posting under a pseudonym because you were too chickenshit to let me register under my own name to defend myself against your cowardly attacks. I can't tell you all how thrilling it is to find the internet hosting yet ANOTHER forum full of bitter, whiny Kick Off fans!

It's faintly saddening that when a professional journalist with 150,000+ readers a month chooses to write such a glowingly pro-shmup feature, attempting (and not for the first time) to bring the joys of the form and one of its finer games to a much wider audience, he should find himself the surprised recipient of such an outpouring of poisonous, vitriolic abuse from the very people you might expect to be pleased. What's the matter, boys? Scared some icky normal people are going to enjoy some shmup action, come along and spoil your exclusive little clique? (Evidently, given that this place displays that sure sign of complete wankery, a forum that you have to be "approved" to post on. Get the fuck over yourselves, eh?)

I'm not going to hang around and argue the toss, but because I'm a nice chap, I'll take a few moments out to helpfully correct some of the sillier clangers in this thread, then there'll be a little bit of constructive chat and a cheery farewell. Here we go!

------------------------------

Why? I hate this weapon.

(I've helped you out a bit with your punctuation there, dude.)

Oh man! I look an idiot now! My review has failed to take account of the fact that some random guy on the internet named "Rob" doesn't like the Toothpaste Laser! How could I have failed in such basic fact-checking? For the sake of humanity, kill me before it's too late and give my job to a squirrel!

best in the world? Anyone who's read a Tim Rogers article might want to disagree.

x 1,000,000,000,000

Cheers, Ben - you've made my whole year. The day anyone says my work resembles that abysmal cunt Tim Rogers in any way whatsoever is the day I leave Earth and set up a tent on fucking Neptune.

Once he was complaining in a way like "Why the hell Winuae doesn't emulate game X? THat's why I think the Amiga was a stupid computer, games always crash on it" or something stupid like that.

That is awesome, man. That's EXACTLY what I said. Good work! (I made maybe 40 posts on EAB in my whole life, by the way.)

The problem I have with WOS is that's extremely hard to navigate

Yeah, that "type something into the Search box at the top of the front page then hit Return" interface is a real bitch to figure out.

The anti-GTA rant at the bottom makes me think that he just chose the first shmup he had on the shelf to badmouth licensed soundtracks and famous voice actors...

Um, here's what I actually think of GTA:

GTA3 is so good it's unplayable. I didn't even like the first two very much, but the third has joined a select list of games (including Mario 64, Goldeneye, 3D Lemmings, Banjo-Kazooie and Tempest 2000) that I simply can't load up unless I know that I absolutely don't have to be doing anything else for the next 12 hours, because I'll be so captivated I won't be able to switch the bastard thing off even as the house burns down around my ears. (And this despite the fact that it's excellently constructed to be playable either for long involved stretches or - so rare these days - for a single 5-minute one-mission blast.) There's always something new to do.

It also has the best example of an internally coherent and cohesive game world I can ever remember seeing. Life goes on without you, and if you can think of something that you would logically be able to do in the game universe, even if it isn't the way the game suggests doing something, it'll work. And it's so many games rolled into one it's almost a joke - Crazy Taxi, Chase HQ, Turbo Esprit, Shenmue, Spy Hunter, Driver, Emergency Call Ambulance, Smuggler's Run and Dance Dance Revolution.

I was lying about the last one. But not about this: GTA3 is a faith-in-games restorer. Astounding.

I've never got round to making a list of my top 10 games of all time or whatever (I have, y'know, a life to be getting on with), but if I ever do, I'd be quite surprised if anything other than GTA3 was at the top of it. It's an utterly magnificent game in every regard, which is probably why the release schedules are so packed with piss-awful half-baked ripoffs of it, which is what my comments were actually aimed at.

Yeah, having to actually aim at the things you are shooting at sucks.

Hell yeah! How's your internet petition to get spread fire and homing missiles taken out of all shooting games coming along, by the way? "One bullet shooting straight up was good enough for Space Invaders! It should be good enough for anything!"

Who the hell puts ANY Turrican installment in a list of so-so games?

Anybody who's played more than eight videogames in their life. Christ, I'm bored just thinking about it, never mind playing through ten thousand screens that all look exactly the same.

I wonder... if the "toothpaste" laser was included, would he have marked it down for being too easy?

Damn right I would. After all, it made Raiden DX such a pushover.

Or the Rick Dangerous games. Those are bloody brilliant.

You don't even deserve a reply. If you just want to remember a big list of stuff, try a phone book. Those are free! (Also, girls will actually be more impressed by someone who can recite a whole page of the phonebook than by someone who can finish Rick fucking Dangerous.)

Is he referring to the Green Plasma laser that covers the whole screen like a snake once fully powered up?

No, of course I'm not, you idiot. Can't you read? Tooth. Paste. Laser. Jeez, you boys really ain't the brightest, are you?

As far as magazines go, Edge and Hardcore Gamer Monthly some of the only ones on the magazine racks right now that I'd say are woth a regular purchase

That'd be the Edge that thinks Raiden DX is just a slightly tweaked re-release of Raiden 2 and gave it 6/10, yes?

http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.com/raidendx.htm

Stuart sounds like he likes bad, obscure games just for the sake of being hardcore.

And that, my friends, is being a tool.

Too right, man. It's like you've read ALL my reviews! Outrun 2, Gradius V, R-Type Final, Metal Slug Advance… I bet you've never even heard of those!

http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.c ... utrun2.htm
http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.c ... adius5.htm
http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.c ... -rtype.htm
http://worldofstuart.excellentcontent.c ... lugadv.htm

(See also the other ultra-R@RE, super-l33t titles quoted above as favourites - Mario 64, Goldeneye, Tempest 2000… I just LOVE all that obscure, bad shit!)

it just pisses me off that he somehow thinks enemies that can shoot in your direction are somehow "smart."

Compared to enemies that just spew out 3,000 bullets in a geometric pattern regardless of where the hell you are they're smart, yes. Raiden 3's enemies react persistently to what the player does, whereas most shmups' enemies don't. Therefore, relatively speaking they're Einstein. You'd prefer I compared Raiden 3 to a chess game rather than other shmups, I suppose.

Sometimes he does his homework, sometimes not (Giga Wing the first "bullet hell"? No)

You'd have an excellent point if I'd ever said any such thing, of course. What I actually said was "…pioneered by the likes of Giga Wing". I'm not writing for the obsessive trainspotting nerds found on this site, I'm writing for a fairly normal gaming audience, and if I'd used, fuck knows, ESP.Ra.De (released, whoop-de-doo, a whole few months before GW, in arcades only), or whatever YOU'D consider the first BH game, as a comparison, none of them would have the first fucking idea what I was going on about. Unlike most of the early bullet-hellers, Giga Wing was released on a home format, in Europe (where most of my readers live), within the last few years, and therefore has a pretty good chance of being recognised by ordinary people, which is the point of using a comparative reference in the first place. The piece didn't claim to be a definitive history of shmups, it was just an illustration of a point.

Interesting if you throw in that he's clearly a scrub of the genre, perhaps.

I don't even know what that's supposed to mean in English. Lucky I'm the journalist, eh?

His DOJ review isn't funny

Um, well spotted, Sherlock. When did anyone say it was supposed to be?

people with big egos tend to talk about themselves in third person.)

So we can add grammar to the list of stuff you know nothing about, then. The third person would be if I wrote "Stuart Campbell thinks this sort of game is great", as if I was someone else. Constructions like "your correspondent" - which gets used ONCE in the piece, by the way - are actually the opposite of ego. They're a literary device used to portray the author as the servant of the reader, rather than some high-and-mighty figure handing down words of wisdom.

Guess Hibachi is really easy huh Stuart.

Oh man. I'm, like, so woefully un-hardcore that I don't even know what you're talking about.

It seems like he dosen't have much of an argument for Raiden III being better than DOJ other than the limited credits in Raiden III. Which gives plenty enough to complete that one also.

Whereas YOU're clearly the hardcorest! Raiden 3 on three credits! The girls must LOVE you!

Why would anyone listen to this guy. Alot of people here know more about videogames

In your fucking dreams, sonny.

------------------------------

Goodness, that was tiring. I heard about this thread from people on another forum. One of them commented that "For shmup news and info, the shmups forum is a great place; on the other hand, they have there some of the most miserable and humorless bitches on the internet". Man, they sure nailed you guys.

I shan't stay, because hey, this is your place and if you want to be all "specialist" and "hardcore" - with all the ridiculous, tedious, joyless anal hair-splitting that that usually entails - who am I to spoil your fun? I don't like cowards lying about me in public, though.

I just wanted to share with others my enjoyment of a game I really love playing, and maybe do a little tiny bit to bring shmups (ones which PAL gamers will actually be able to buy) to a wider audience. I'm terribly sorry that's upset so many of you so much. (And, indeed, that some of you are still bearing 15-year-old grudges about shit Amiga games which you don't seem to be able to get over even when reading reviews of spectacularly unrelated PS2 shooters in 2005.)

I like Raiden 3 because it's an exciting and addictive game of skill for reasonably normal people. Yeah, if you're one of the autistic savants memorably described by someone else here as "Japanese ninjas", Raiden 3 probably will be a little sedate and ponderous for you. For everyone else it's a lot more accessible, yet still brutally challenging - not least because of the Gradius V-style incrementing credits system, rather than the infinite continues of Cave games and others. (Which get them lazily dismissed in reviews because it means you can "finish" them in 20 minutes, forcing shmups even further into the niche ghetto and reducing even more the likelihood of most of them ever being released in Western territories.)

Me, I prefer a game where the thing that LOOKS like my ship actually IS my ship. I prefer a game where - unlike Dodonpachi Daioujou, which I've been playing for a few days now - it's ALL about skill, ie there isn't a 40% chance of survival if you just cross your fingers and charge blindly into a pack of 500 enemy bullets, because only one pixel of your "ship" is actually vulnerable. (I rather like DDP-DOJ, but it's shallow eyecandy for drooling halfwits compared to R3, and it's not paining me at all to be away from it while I talk to you muppets. Giga Wing 2 does "bullet hell" ten times better in terms of applying skill.)

But anyway - I'll be off, so you can all get back to slagging me off because I criticised your favourite Amiga basketball game in 1992 or something. Have fun! Enjoy videogames!

Love and kisses,
RSC.

[Rob]

What's the matter, boys? Scared some icky normal people are going to enjoy some shmup action, come along and spoil your exclusive little clique?

Good heavens, yes. I don't know about others, but a positive article won't necessarily yield a positive response. I'd like to see reviews written from the perspective of a more serious player. The same points could be given a negative tone here and it wouldn't have made much of a difference. A review from someone who thinks any shooter today requires luck can't be taken very seriously. The point of credit unlocking is a minor one, and you made that a key point. Your obsession with the "toothpaste laser" makes it look like you prefer novelty.

Yeah, having to actually aim at the things you are shooting at sucks.

Hell yeah! How's your internet petition to get spread fire and homing missiles taken out of all shooting games coming along, by the way?

You know, if you want a wide shot there's the regular "wide" shot. Complaining about the green laser not having the exact capabilities of the wide shot (or even the forward blue laser) is stupid. The green laser has its own advantages, like piercing through objects. It's called "balance."

Protip: give the laser a quick whip back and forth to clear small enemies!

it just pisses me off that he somehow thinks enemies that can shoot in your direction are somehow "smart."

Compared to enemies that just spew out 3,000 bullets in a geometric pattern regardless of where the hell you are they're smart, yes. Raiden 3's enemies react persistently to what the player does, whereas most shmups' enemies don't. Therefore, relatively speaking they're Einstein. You'd prefer I compared Raiden 3 to a chess game rather than other shmups, I suppose.

This is why your shooter reviews aren't that great: you don't know what you're talking about. Name one commercial shooter within the last five years that has nothing but static patterns. They are aimed or have aimed shots mixed, in addition to static patterns. It's smarter to mix up attacks, while Raiden 3 has its aimed shots to move away from 80% of the time.

I just wanted to share with others my enjoyment of a game I really love playing, and maybe do a little tiny bit to bring shmups (ones which PAL gamers will actually be able to buy) to a wider audience. I'm terribly sorry that's upset so many of you so much.

You post articles on the internet, I think you should be able to take criticism a little better than this.

(I rather like DDP-DOJ, but it's shallow eyecandy for drooling halfwits compared to R3, and it's not paining me at all to be away from it while I talk to you muppets. Giga Wing 2 does "bullet hell" ten times better in terms of applying skill.)

I love GW2 more than anyone, but no. DOJ is far more difficult and requires more skill for even moderate success. Give the game another day.

[Shatterhand]

Oooooh great, I was afraid this was going to happen. For some reason I was nearly SURE this was going to happen.

[SAM]

Welcome, Welcome to our forum. Stuart.

Being a shmups forum member doesn't means we don't play other kind of video games, it just we mostly tale about shmups here.

I think most people (including me) are actually apperciate your works and especially those reviews on shmups. We understands the intended audiance of your articles is for causal gamers and times you have to make sure they could understands what you are trying to tell them and to how much details they would like to know about a shmups.


Anyways, I think you misunderstands us at some points...

For everyone else it's a lot more accessible, yet still brutally challenging - not least because of the Gradius V-style incrementing credits system, rather than the infinite continues of Cave games and others.

Well, I think we got a big misunderstanding here. Members here generally don't Continue their game when they got game over in a shmups. We tried to complete a shmups in a single credit only. That is we call 1cc, meaning Single Credit Clear, and the norm is under acrade version default difficulty settings.

Just a look at the rules of the high scores section in the forum, and take a look at the results, you would know how hardcore these people are.

(Which get them lazily dismissed in reviews because it means you can "finish" them in 20 minutes, forcing shmups even further into the niche ghetto and reducing even more the likelihood of most of them ever being released in Western territories.)

No one here is able to finished dodonpachi dai-ou-jou, I am pretty save to say no one outside Japan have been able to finish that evil game.

You see dodonpachi dai-ou-jou takes 2 loops to finish (the game end after the 2nd loop), to go into the 2nd loop, one of the requirements is you are still on your first credit when you finished the first loop.

In the 2nd loop the games goes insane, you got face a hidden boss at the end of the 2nd loop. You cann't continue in the 2nd loop, once you lost your last ship its game over.

Our forum record reaches as far as stage 3 in 2nd loop. You could take a look at the replay vedio comes with the PS2 version, and you would see what I mean.

I like Raiden 3 because it's an exciting and addictive game of skill for reasonably normal people. Yeah, if you're one of the autistic savants memorably described by someone else here as "Japanese ninjas", Raiden 3 probably will be a little sedate and ponderous for you.

People here said Raiden 3 is "not very good" because its scorceing system is not interesting enough. Once we could able to finish it in a single credit, there is not much room left to improve our scores. That's just the theory, I have to ammit that not many of us could actually finish Raiden 3 on a single credit.

Some of us complain about its simple bullet pattern, but given the relatively high speed of the bullets in this game. You simply cannot also got a complex bullet pattern at the same time IMO.

It just that members here seem to like playing shmups that are tricky to scores high more than those just trying to survive as long as you can. I myself do enjoy shmups without tricky scoring system like Flying Shark, Kiki Kaikai as much as DDP DOJ, Esp galuda.

Me, I prefer a game where the thing that LOOKS like my ship actually IS my ship. I prefer a game where - unlike Dodonpachi Daioujou, which I finally got round to playing today - it's ALL about skill, ie there isn't a 40% chance of survival if you just cross your fingers and charge blindly into a pack of 500 enemy bullets, because only one pixel of your "ship" is actually vulnerable. (I rather like DDP-DOJ, but it's shallow eyecandy for drooling halfwits compared to R3, and it's not paining me at all to be away from it while I talk to you muppets. Giga Wing 2 does "bullet hell" ten times better in terms of applying skill.)

Well the main idea of Dodonpachi Daioujou is to score high, while Raiden 3 is to survive... Their developers got different forcus in their mind when they create the games.

I kind of agree with you that Cave should shown clearly where the hit box (or should it be hit dot) is within the player ship. This would definately help in doging bullets, and let you know your cause of death.

BTW, if you like Raiden 3 you should try your hand on G.Rev new game Under Defeat, you will like it.

But anyway - I'll be off, so you can all get back to slagging me off because I criticised your favourite Amiga basketball game in 1992 or something. Have fun! Enjoy videogames!

I don't play sport game, so never mind.

[Turrican]

The problem I have with WOS is that's extremely hard to navigate

Yeah, that "type something into the Search box at the top of the front page then hit Return" interface is a real bitch to figure out.

It's not that, but an index would help people who aren't looking for a game in particular, but just want to browse and read your articles for the sake of a good reading. For example, once redirected to them I enjoyed your pieces about Burnout and Virtua Racing, but I wouldn't have typed "burnout" 'cause I'm usually not interested in racing games...

[GTA]

It's an utterly magnificent game in every regard, which is probably why the release schedules are so packed with piss-awful half-baked ripoffs of it, which is what my comments were actually aimed at.

Good to hear. I actually knew you liked GTA, so the whole conclusion seemed a bit weird to me.

P.S. by the way, I hope you stay. Give us some credit, we are generally better than it looks.

[SAM]

it just pisses me off that he somehow thinks enemies that can shoot in your direction are somehow "smart."

Compared to enemies that just spew out 3,000 bullets in a geometric pattern regardless of where the hell you are they're smart, yes. Raiden 3's enemies react persistently to what the player does, whereas most shmups' enemies don't. Therefore, relatively speaking they're Einstein. You'd prefer I compared Raiden 3 to a chess game rather than other shmups, I suppose.

This is why your shooter reviews aren't that great: you don't know what you're talking about. Name one commercial shooter within the last five years that has nothing but static patterns. They are aimed or have aimed shots mixed, in addition to static patterns. It's smarter to mix up attacks, while Raiden 3 has its aimed shots to move away from 80% of the time.

According to the logic of this arguments. If its really smart, the bullet should be homing.

As I said before, since Raiden 3's bullet is relative fast, too fast to have a complexcated bullet pattern.

I think just Stuart seems doesn't like the idea of bullet hell with dot size hit box (i.e. Cave style) very much, but could not find appropriate way to express to causal gamers.

Stuart if you have time, could you tell us how you think about Cave style bullet hell comparing to the traditional style shmups up?

[Rob]

People here said Raiden 3 is "not very good" because its scorceing system is not interesting enough.

It's not that great of a survival game either.

[ccovell]

Stuart, nice too see you drop in; too bad it wasn't as civil as it could be. Words of wisdom from above that I have always taken to heart are: "Never argue with a fool." Especially true on the internet.

Anyway, your site DOES need an index of all your articles. I loved browsing through all the articles from the archive of UK mags. An index of your other writing would benefit a lot of people.

As far as covering all us shmup-lovers with a wide brush stroke, remember that we're not all the same. Perhaps it's my relative newness to the forums (see my number of posts on the left), but I don't care much for score; I find chaining and other score systems distracting. I play for fun. I'll continue a game if I'm having fun, to prolong the fun. Games with infinite continues can be abused, but other shmups that limit continues are great for me.

So, I'd like to say to Stuart AND those easily offended on the Shmups forums: don't take it all so seriously. Talking about shmups should be about prolonging the fun of the games.

[Rob]

I play for fun.

arf

[Icarus]

I would have expected a self-confessed "professional" journalist to be able to take criticism and offer up constructive discussion and debate better than that bunch of vitriolic rambling a few posts up. And Stuart, I like the articles. But as a multimedia designer in training, I have to comment on your navigation for your site. Or rather, the lack of it. If you visitors can't find a quick-access list of all the stuff you have available to read, they're less likely to stay and look around.

My 2p.

[MOSQUITO FIGHTER]

Oh man. I'm, like, so woefully un-hardcore that I don't even know what you're talking about.

Good listening skills. Sorry I'll go slower this time. DOJ has 2 loops. One of the most difficult bosses ever is at the end of that second loop. The folks at Cave call it Hibachi. The bosses generally give me a more difficult time simply because they throw around more bullets. I'd say the stages are more difficult taking the chaning aspect into consideration. Otherwise no for when doing survival play. With the exception of level 5.

Whereas YOU're clearly the hardcorest! Raiden 3 on three credits!

Raiden III gives up credits pretty quick. I haven't spent alot of time on the game but I've already got free play unlocked. I don't know what the prerequisites are for credit unlocking but It dosen't seem to take very much time at all.

Graduis V is better in this aspect because it is a lengthy game and will require more credits for new players. What does it matter anyway. In my experience playing shooters with new players they generally prefer to credit feed through the entire game as opposed to getting angry when the limited credits run out and quitting. Not much is learned about the game either way.

If you're attempting to make shmups more popular well that is commendable I suppose.Doubt It will work. Shumps have rarely done huge numbers in sales. You seem to be a bit full of yourself if you think that you can add popularity to the genre. Think of all those people who acquire Raiden III because of you and take it home and dislike it. You're not making new shmups fans you're driving them away. There are other shmups that will cater better to new players. MUSHA, Thunder Force III, and the eye candy graphics of Treasure shmups would be better choices. Raiden III isn't even the best shmup released this year much less best game overall. If I was going to write a review for 150,000+ readers I would make sure I knew what I was talking about first. I'll leave being hardcorest! up to you Stewie.

[uwfan]

that is so obviously a troll, its not the real Stuart Campbell.

just ignore the troll, is my advice. its probably japhei or 'MasterBaiter'.