Thunder Force 3 & Thunder Force AC

[pegboy]

I will upload a video eventually, I've not only saved all of my MAME replays but also done a live recording with OBS for each run. I still might do a few more runs though, we will see.

[Gemant]

The highest scoring replay I've found online was a autofire score of 2.391M.

yes, 2.391 is the top score video never appeared on the web in these last 15 years. About 中井鯉絵（こ）（ん）（で）（ら) there aren't informations. I never see this name in other hi-score.

[pegboy]

Yup, I'm still doing this:
TF AC - Have a pic and will put it up later.
PEG - 2,409,460 - ALL - MAME (Japan)

[Limbrooke]

Yup, I'm still doing this:
TF AC - Have a pic and will put it up later.
PEG - 2,409,460 - ALL - MAME (Japan)

Good work. Table updated.

[pegboy]

Thanks, the only other thing would be separating out the Saturn scores for Thunder Force AC. The Saturn version scoring is broken, it's much easier to post high scores with that version because they changed a bunch of the point values (I pointed some of the examples out in an earlier post) for some stupid reason. I'm also pretty sure you can just farm the stage 4 boss forever and counterstop the game, but I haven't actually tested that (maybe he times out?).

[The Armchair General]

Massive congrats Pegboy! It's really nice that recently some farm members have been getting world record or near world record scores. Keep up the good work guys!

[pegboy]

Well I fucking did it, and god damn it was close.
Thunder Force AC:
PEG - 2,412,170 - ALL - MAME (Japan)

This is probably my proudest achievement ever in gaming, an actual world record score. Now I'm sure it can be broken, in fact I know I could probably beat this if I grind the game more, but at least I know that at one point in history I owned a world record score for a Japanese shmup.

[ProjectAKo]

So what was the deal? Was it all RNG?

[pegboy]

Yes and no. In the last run I posted, I didn't get a favorable amount of ships in stage 6, so there is actually another 2K missing right there if I could trigger it. Still haven't figured out how to do it, I need to study some of my replays to see I guess? I did pretty much pitch a near perfect game other that that.

My only glaring mistake was missing 500 points from one of the pillars at the end of stage 7, and also nearly killing myself in the process. I dropped from full shield to nothing...god damn I almost pissed it all away right there, and had to clear the stage 7 boss and stage 8 naked. It's not like the final stage is hard (it's actually piss easy) to do, but when I'm shaking like a maniac and my heart rate goes up that high it's hard to not fuck it up.

In theory (and I've done so with save states) you can get another 3-4K or so on top of what I did if you literally are perfect on everything and also trigger the stage 6 ships.

For the record, I still think that non-autofire score is bullshit.

[GGA_HAN]

Congrats, Pegboy!

Are you going to be releasing the video? I've not played the Japan version of this game, only the "world" version which is at the arcade I work at; I'm curious to see the differences.

[pegboy]

Yes, I will be posting the video at some point, but I might try to raise the score a bit more if I can.

I played through the world version once, and I think the only difference is that there are less bullets being fired. I Might try it again just to see, since I have the Japanese version memorized down to every single enemy lol. The world version is definitely easier from what I remember.

[GGA_HAN]

might as well post my Thunder Force AC world version score, before I forget!



HAN - 2,314,590 - ALL - PCB (World)

No autofire used in this run, if that matters.

[pegboy]

I played the world version a little bit. There are a bunch of differences...

Right off the bat there are enemies missing in level one (hornets when you get the first L powerup) compared to the Japan version. There is also an extra powerup in level 1 in the world version. The bosses and other enemies (like the missiles in stage 1) die much quicker. The bosses die almost instantaneously in the world version if you use autofire. I mean they die quick in the Japanese version too, but not that quick.

Level 2 missing a bunch of enemies as well, also powerups in new spots, missing powerups in other spots, etc.

As far as scoring, it's really hard to say if you can score more or less than the Japan version, but I know you end stage 1 up about 10K points from the Japanese version because of that extra powerup. But I also noticed a powerup missing in level 2, and there are overall much fewer enemies, so maybe the score potential is actually lower? It would be hard to say without studying it further, but there are definitely enough differences where the score tables should not be combined. Extra/missing powerups make a massive difference in this game for scoring since they are 10K each, so you'd really have to figure all of them out to find the max score potential for the world version, and I'm not going to be doing that lol.

If you are playing on MAME, I'd def stick with the Japan ROM as that to me is the definitive version of the game. World version has too many missing enemies and needless changes IMO.

[CIT]

Thunder Force III (normal):

CIT - 1206520 - ALL - MD (jp)



Thunder Force AC (normal):

CIT - 1208550 - ALL - Saturn (jp)

[pegboy]

After about 10 hours of failed runs I broke my previous score by a pretty decent amount:
Thunder Force AC:
PEG - 2,414,620 - ALL - MAME (Japan)

[Gemant]

2,414,000... a result that until 1 month ago seemed impossible to achieve

Please release a 1280 x 720 video!

[ProjectAKo]

you must be finding all sorts of tiny optimizations

[pegboy]

Yeah, but I'm still missing out on thousands of points even with my last run. I think the theoretical maximum score would be in the realm of ~2.42M with my current knowledge of the game. Hard as hell to pull off though, at least for me.

[pegboy]

Here's the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTqKvA092pA

[ProjectAKo]

I love the perfect milking of everything

[seraph]

Congrats on the world record! Amazing run.

[GGA_HAN]

I had no idea the pillars at the end of the second to last stage were destructible! Have to test that in the MD version, too...

Incredible replay, congrats again.

[GGA_HAN]

Here's a Mania difficulty run for Genesis / MD, did this on a US Genesis with an Everdrive cart:



Thunder Force 3 (Mania):
HAN - 6,701,900 - Haides - Genesis / MD

replay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVBdsEaQgSU

[pegboy]

Is this thread still being maintained? If not I would like to take it over, there are several issues that I've commented on that have yet to be addressed.

[Limbrooke]

Is this thread still being maintained? If not I would like to take it over, there are several issues that I've commented on that have yet to be addressed.

Yes, it is. I updated it as of the last score submitted this July 2016. I can think of two points raised:
- inclusion of Thunder Spirits: I am not doing this yet
- rules to only accept Japan ROM for Thunder Force AC: I am fine accepting both regions so long as the region is illustrated

Anything else? Otherwise, I will continue to maintain this thread until I relinquish updating duties.

[pegboy]

Is this thread still being maintained? If not I would like to take it over, there are several issues that I've commented on that have yet to be addressed.

Yes, it is. I updated it as of the last score submitted this July 2016. I can think of two points raised:
- inclusion of Thunder Spirits: I am not doing this yet
- rules to only accept Japan ROM for Thunder Force AC: I am fine accepting both regions so long as the region is illustrated

Anything else? Otherwise, I will continue to maintain this thread until I relinquish updating duties.

My last TF AC score wasn't updated. I think there are other scores posted that are missing as well.

Other issues:
Thunder Force AC Saturn port should be put in a separate category as the scoring is totally different (way easier to score higher in that version, and possible counterstop with stage 4 boss milking)
Thunder Force AC Japan/World versions should also be split as they have different scoring as well and should not be compared with one another.

I went over both of these issues in previous posts and presented the reasons why they should be separated. If you don't care about TF AC I could just take over that portion (and Thunder Spirits) and you can keep TF III? Otherwise you should make some of the changes I mentioned so the scoreboards are comparable.

[Limbrooke]

My last TF AC score wasn't updated. I think there are other scores posted that are missing as well.

Other issues:
Thunder Force AC Saturn port should be put in a separate category as the scoring is totally different (way easier to score higher in that version, and possible counterstop with stage 4 boss milking)
Thunder Force AC Japan/World versions should also be split as they have different scoring as well and should not be compared with one another.

I went over both of these issues in previous posts and presented the reasons why they should be separated. If you don't care about TF AC I could just take over that portion (and Thunder Spirits) and you can keep TF III? Otherwise you should make some of the changes I mentioned so the scoreboards are comparable.

Sorry about missing that score, updated now. I must have glossed over it when you were submitting so many scores. Nothing else should be missing now.

Regarding the Saturn TFAC portion, one submission at this point does not necessitate a separate table and even then the Saturn score was a recent submission (within 2 years ago) so unless a whole host of scores come in, the current state is fine.

Looking over the table, the more recent submissions have been Japan and while I don't agree on making another table that tells the same story that is currently told, I can concede there are enough entries to warrant the work. I'll get on it shortly.

[pegboy]

All I'm saying is that the one Saturn score is very misleading, as you get a lot more points for killing basic enemies in that version. Not to mention that you can farm points forever against the stage 4 boss if you wanted to, that alone should put those scores in a separate category. I don't feel like that warrants one of the top spots on the board when nearly all of the scores below it would be higher up if played under the same scoring. Also, I believe there was another Saturn score or two someone in the thread.

[Limbrooke]

All I'm saying is that the one Saturn score is very misleading, as you get a lot more points for killing basic enemies in that version. I don't feel like that warrants one of the top spots on the board when nearly all of the scores below it would be higher up if played under the same scoring. Also, I believe there was another Saturn score or two someone in the thread.

Actually, you're right - I don't know why I missed both CIT and your posts. I also played before on the Saturn release but changed to MAME later on however pardon CIT and Kollision nobody else has submitted for Saturn.

[takki]

Name Takki
Support MD Jap
Score 1 264 000