Shmup Related Questions That Don't Deserve a Thread

[Perikles]

What's the difference between Darius and Darius Extra?

From what I know/observed myself:

- Excess lives are converted into handsome rewards at the end of the game, nudging players into completing it on one life instead of doing checkpoint milking against the final boss (mainly Octopus and Great Thing).

- The laser is more useful against bosses, particularly against Fatty Glutton.

- Stages are a tad bit harder on Darius Extra as far as I can tell, some zones have additional enemies and those blue turrets that fire a constant diagonal stream of bullets are quite a bit more resilient.

- I'm not entirely sure, but I think there might be additional orbs hidden in the terrain and/or the location of some of them changed.

[trap15]

Hitboxes are also very different, they're much better in Extra. You should only play Extra, original is completely superceded.

[Sir Ilpalazzo]

Cho Ren Sha 68K - Playing with a PS3 controller (using xinput drivers) and Xpadder. Is there any way to remap or otherwise circumvent the game's wonky default controller control scheme? It automatically sets square to pause, X to shoot, and O to bomb - I'd rather have bomb on square, but it seems like the game doesn't support remappable controls.

[Shepardus]

Thanks for the answers regarding Darius Extra.

I'm sure this has been discussed before, but does anyone know how the autofire detection works in Gun Frontier, if that indeed is a thing? Sometimes it won't let me enter my initials at the end (instead just saying CNT as if I had used a continue), and sometimes it will even if I've used autofire sparingly. I have no idea where the threshold is.

[copy-paster]

Does anyone know the official chronology/timeline of R-Type? I can only assume this :

1. Leo
2. R-Type
3. II
4. III
5. Delta
6. Armed Police Unit Gallop (Gallop happens during the events of Delta)
7. Final

does anyone know how the autofire detection works in Gun Frontier?

Anything beyond 10hz rate increase the rank though.

[trap15]

Gun Frontier's rank is per-shot, not tied to fire rate. And the per-shot rank is relatively small compared to other factors.

I'd assume you're just blowing through the count-down since it comes up pretty quick.

[Shepardus]

I'd assume you're just blowing through the count-down since it comes up pretty quick.

It's not that, I've got two buttons bound to shot, one with autofire and one without. Even if I use the non-autofire button to advance the continue countdown I still sometimes get "CNT" instead of entering the name (and note that it's "CNT" rather than "AAA"). It's possible that it's unrelated to autofire, though, as even when I use autofire it doesn't always happen.

Edit: I've spent about two hours trying to reproduce this while recording an input file, all unsuccessfully. Strange because it was happening all the time before, and I'm pretty sure I wasn't using any continues. I guess it wasn't autofire doing that but I have no idea what was.

[M.Knight]

I faced the same issue and asked the same question beforehand, but we didn't find the actual source of the problem.
At least, it has nothing whatsoever to do with keeping the button pressed during the countdown. As you said, it inputs "AAA" when you do that. And, well, it does not make sense at all to have "CNT" as a replacement for "AAA" instead of the company name like in some CAVE games.
I would agree that is has nothing to do with autofire as well, though I am not 100% sure on this one.

If this issue happens again, check whether there is a difference between your actual score at the bottom of the screen and the score in the ranking next to the CNT initials. My memory might be a bit fuzzy since it has been a while since I last played Gun Frontier ( a shame, I know ) but I seem to recall something like that. I'll dig up my screenshots when I have some time to confirm that.

EDIT: Here's the screenshot I took : (JP version)

[Shepardus]

I'm also running Windows 7 and it still works fine for me. Have you tried redownloading the game?

[Shepardus]

As far as Windows updates goes I'm up-to-date, at least for important/recommended updates. My graphics drivers (Intel HD 4000) aren't the newest version though, they date back to last September.

[The Armchair General]

What Shmups have scores that go up to the most digits? For example top Futari god scores go into the billions while top Crimson Clover scores go up into the trillions. Is there any shmups that have top scores that go into the quadrillions or beyond?

[EmperorIng]

Ha ha ha, that is part of the GigaWing series' whole shtick (the other being the awesome reflecting mechanics).

Go for the Giga Score!

[BulletMagnet]

Yeah, Giga Wing and Mars Matrix come most immediately to mind for that one.

[Shepardus]

The Giga Wing series (especially the later two games) and Phantasmagoria Trues are good examples of this, but I think Alternative Sphere takes the cake. If you use RestartSyndrome your total score there is basically your Alternative Sphere score + a negligible amount.

[LordHypnos]

^My total score on restartsyndrome is basically my 1.3 Trillion Mars Matrix score plus a negligeable amount. lol. Maybe some contribution from my shitty Giga Wing score. I was considering getting Alternative Sphere specifically for that reason as well Though I haven't yet. Giga Wing is definitely noticeably more silly than even Mars Matrix in that department, as well. I think that normal scores are in the hundreds of trillions, and it only got more ridiculous with future entries in the series.

[cave hermit]

On the cloud stage in Battle Garegga, is there practical value in using your special weapon to damage the giant green bomber (Slayer) that follows Mad ball MK-2?

I'm assuming you get score bonuses for doing so, but the ST doesn't explicitly confirm this.

[CloudyMusic]

On the cloud stage in Battle Garegga, is there practical value in using your special weapon to damage the giant green bomber (Slayer) that follows Mad ball MK-2?

I'm assuming you get score bonuses for doing so, but the ST doesn't explicitly confirm this.

Destroying the various pieces of the body plating, propellers, hatches, etc. all give points. If you do the whole thing, it adds up to quite a lot.

[BulletMagnet]

Yeah, pretty much any background element that only a bomb can destroy throughout the game means extra points and/or medals.

[microfolk]

Also bombing the debris it shoots out when you destroy the last turret and Black Heart + cohort fly in the background give you A LOT of points (100k? 200k? 300k? Can't remember right now)

[Shepardus]

160k if you get all of them (260k if you include the 100k for getting the kill in the first place). Similarly, the debris when Glow Squid bursts out of King Crimson is also worth a lot, though I don't remember how much. If you're planning on bomb-milking BH2's grenades, though, it's better to save your bomb for that.

[EXEXEX]

When I was reading Gradius Wiki, I saw the Timeline Chronology about the game.

Is that page are reliable and accurate? That was surprising for a game that has questionable storyline.

[microfolk]

160k if you get all of them (260k if you include the 100k for getting the kill in the first place). Similarly, the debris when Glow Squid bursts out of King Crimson is also worth a lot, though I don't remember how much. If you're planning on bomb-milking BH2's grenades, though, it's better to save your bomb for that.

Wait is the vehicle carrying Glow Squid called King Crimson????? I love Battle Garegga so much.

[BIL]

Slayer is such a beastly slab of multi-screen pixel artistry - right up to and including Black Heart and its squadron ripping their way out from within its exploding wreck.

Spoiler

[GGA_HAN]

for anyone that's played it how would you rate Pulstar in difficulty? I've cleared 1 loop of R-type and looking to get into another similar game...

[Perikles]

Pulstar is pretty easy due to the massive slowdowns that occur when using the homing laser, it also takes a while before the difficulty picks up. Definitely simpler than the first loop of most Irem arcade games including R-Type I & II, although a tad bit tougher than the first loop of X-Multiply in my opinion.

[wasurechan]

What's with the trick in superplays where they go behind the boss? Every time I try to imitate it, I die a thousand deaths.

Is it timing? Pixel-perfect positioning?

For example, Gallop in Radiant Silvergun. Everyone seems to go to the top left of the screen and mirror his vertical movement but it was nothing but a deathtrap for me.

[Shepardus]

I've never done the Gallop trick myself so I'm not sure exactly how it's done but from what I understand you need to destroy the top-left section quickly enough so it doesn't crush you as Gallop rocks back and forth.

Edit: Okay, so I tried it out a bit and managed to pull it off. You want to move to the top-left as Gallop is doing his big blue laser attack for the first time (so make sure Gallop isn't too close to the left edge so there's enough room to move there). It doesn't need to be pixel-perfect or anything, but make sure you press yourself all the way against the top and get reasonably close to the left wall so the glowing jet at the center of Gallop's back doesn't hit you. When Gallop follows you to the left you need to destroy the top-left section as quickly as possible before it crushes you with some other attack, and after you do that you should be good.

[CStarFlare]

Anyone played Artesneit's games (NSFW)? They look decent but the art style is... well:

Maebari girls, BLAST AWAY!

* What is "maebari"?
Outfits with a kind of, um, design focused on the crotch front.

I could overlook if they're good, but I don't want to spend $10 on a pervy game that sucks.

[Shepardus]

Pazzy has a video of Kyomu no Otome along with a description of how it works, he says it's actually pretty fun but you can see for yourself. There's also a demo which I've downloaded but have yet to play.

[CStarFlare]

Interesting, thanks. I think I've seen videos of Kikai Shushi which also looked decent which I didn't immediately connect to the cover because there's no sign of taped genitals in the gameplay.