Shmup Ticker: What are you playing RIGHT NOW?

[BIL]

^ Been considering that one myself, good to hear your thoughts! The speed and onscreen sprite count certainly looked good... it's hard to tell with Nichibutsu, I find. Their stuff is always solid, and colourful, but I've seen some howler decisions like Cosmo Police Gallivan's apparent binding of jump to [up]... which is fine, but it seems that's also how you aim up. I hope I'm just misinterpreting MAME there.

I quite like Soldier Girl Amazon / Holy Warrior Amaterasu, but it's got a touch of Arcade Contra Aim Lag™ that subtly hampers an otherwise impressively rampant Commando-esque. The vehicle jacking is great, keeping the swift bike nets you a tank, which ruins everything's shit. Won't stop a pining for Out Zone, but it's worth a look. I hope Ninja Emaki shows up at some point.

[Stevens]

Zero Ranger. Made it to 2-3. I might be able to clear this after all. Its been ages since I got a new 1 CC.

[Stevens]

Since my last post I've had two runs to Despair.

Like I said above I haven't played any shooters, let alone seriously, in over a year.

That said I think I'm pretty close at this point.

[Stevens]

I cleared Green Orange mode earlier this week and have been playing both modes since. Haven't gotten another clear, but am close to over a million in White Vanilla. What a great update.

[BIL]

NMK's P-47: The Freedom Fighter, on PS4 via its recent Arcade Archives release. Simple, balls-hard hori shooting that'll be instantly familiar to anyone who's enjoyed their later USAAF Mustang (Fire Mustang on MD).

Unlike that game, which is strictly foot/floor open-screen blasting, there's lots of terrain here, often steep. With the conservative main shot, classic ground bombing and risky low-altitude stunts, it has an almost Scramble early-hori purity. Same for the cute yet mortally dangerous ground troops, who're a lot more characterful here than in Mustang. Choo choo muhfucka! Kinda Koutetsu Teikoku with the ominously tracking elephant gun at the end tbh.





You bitch-ass motherf... I knew this little asshole was up to no good!

Enemy formations quickly ramp up to post-Gradius intensity, though. Bullet visibility in st2 ~Teh Sunset Sky~ is mildly boneheaded but more than tolerable. Grab the rad [E] buckshot subweapon and ram it up they butt.



Later stages are uniformly way the hell nicer so I hope it's just a blip. One helluva Huge Battleship a few stages in, recalls Area 88 from a few years down the road. Good no-nonsense spartan hori with an appropriately brisk difficulty curve.



Mahaaa! The French. North Africa. Algeria. Whatever the fuck. I skipped the stage intro, fml. EZ on me old eyes.

[EmperorIng]

I played a bit of the PCE remake but always thought it was a little unremarkable. I am sure the arcade version fares better! I have my hopes of them getting P47-Aces, the fanciful sequel, out on ACA as well. I'm quite fond of the game despite not being very good at it.

Recently I've been casually playing some Kiki KaiKai on ACA, getting new personal bests with some decent regularity. The stage 5 boss, the oni with the whip, has thus far proven to be a sizable roadblock. Like most other kiki bosses I think the real thing is learning how to cheese the fight and quick kill with a good position + autofire, but since I am not there yet I get creamed.

The game's rank becomes so ridiculous by stage 4/5. The moment you move backwards it seems like the game's spawning algorithms malfunction and flood you with loads of enemies, especially on high rank. Add this to the new spawn coming in as you push forward and you can be in a truly hellish situation! Devilish by design, for sure. Thanks to GSK I did learn that you can gain some easy extra lives if you uncover gold pearls -which normally provide you with a screen-clearing bomb- when your score counter's thousands and hundreds digits are both 0: e.g. uncovering a yellow gem at 10,000 points will yield a bonus life, whereas uncovering it at 10,050 will give you the yellow pearl.

Since item spawns outside of certain locations are random, this means you can get lucky and get one or two extends by pure chance! Overall it's pretty critical knowledge when the game only gives out two extends at 70,000 and 150,000.

[BIL]

P-47 Aces is one of my big hopefuls for that mythical mid-90s stretch I hope we hit someday (only "someday" rather than "soon" because they've got a whole lotta 80s stuff to cover! Rainbow Islands PLS) Bring Uncle Beard and that one boss helicopter hoisting an AA cannon - a ballsy feat of heli ingenuity, matched only by that Geostorm dude, who Izuna Drops his last bombshell out of his burning chopper onto your train - home!

I'm hoping for the middle game Mustang, too (which was apparently gonna be called P51 - ta for lore, trap!). The MD cart is a really good approximation of its militantly stripped-down shooting, right down to the astonishingly mean rank (that later stage full of weather balloons will make you go "ZZZ" with misses in tow, but dare to one-life it and you will say MEIN GOTT IN HIMMEL as the mother of all revenge bullet bukkake erupts!). However it doesn't capture the AC's punky buzzsawing OST!

USAAF vs LUFTWAFFE mit DAS GUT ROCKEN

[Marc]

Glad it wasn't just me, first thing I though when playing P-45 was that if felt like an updated Scramble! Enjoying this one, simple, uncomplicated fun.

[trap15]

Uncle Beard

Alas, the uncle you're thinking of is Captain Uncle:


Uncle Beard is from Operation Ragnarok (already on ACA, go go go!):


Knowing your NMK uncles could save your life some day

[BIL]

I'll brush up, I promise Ragnarok is a gem indeed, reminds me of eternal scruffy puppy Metal Black with its multi-angled "aura" shooting. Except ship is fast and has BOMBA ofc

[Jonpachi]

Working on Slap Fight MD, which I kinda hated at first but is now really growing on me. Such a weird game.

[BIL]

What the shit, I think P47 mixes up its North Africa and Ardennes intro screens, I was too drunk/sleepy to notice Stage 3's austere overcast mountain range doesn't gel with the DESERT WAR intro pic. So cute, like a little kid mixing up his class project slides...

O RLY?

Dunno how deliberate it was, but the way you can move your stricken, burning plane around before it explodes reminds me of Same Same's "FUUUCK" sendoff - though it doesn't quite hit that zenith of anger, since P47 doesn't have bombs to die in stock with. Wish I could find the interview where they talked about that offhand.

Playing it at a sensible hour with the speakers up, the SFX are surprisingly strong. Nice bitterly resounding *crack* when tanks fire Fast Aimed Shots™, a legitimately useful cue.

Oh neat, hold against the left edge to drop bombs straight down. Not always the safest place to be, but useful if something right underneath urgently needs squashing. Do it at the very start of a credit and the game is all "excuse me WTF r u doin," haha.



This has to be the same dude (Hide-kaz?) who did Saint Dragon's st2 music, the Ardennes BGM is a hilariously chipper accompaniment to the nonstop carnage.

[trap15]

What the shit, I think P47 mixes up its North Africa and Ardennes intro screens, I was too drunk/sleepy to notice Stage 3's austere overcast mountain range doesn't gel with the DESERT WAR intro pic. So cute, like a little kid mixing up his class project slides...

All the intro screens seem rather detached from what stages they're actually in, for the most part

Playing it at a sensible hour with the speakers up, the SFX are surprisingly strong. Nice bitterly resounding *crack* when tanks fire Fast Aimed Shots™, a legitimately useful cue.

I recently picked up the ACA version as well, I was surprised at the... hmm, how to put it... detail? in the sound effects. They're very complex, much more than you'd hear in most other shooters. The sound effect for dunking a bomb into the water is pretty significant, and the saturating fshpshfsphfspfhspfh sound effect from autofiring into a high HP enemy is really satisfying. It's more than I expected for sure.

Oh neat, hold against the left edge to drop bombs straight down.

As far as I can tell, the bombs actually behave like Darius, where holding back drops them down, and right drops them further forward. Since you need to pick up so many speed ups, and the screen is only so wide, the only effective way to drop them down is by holding into the edge though... It's super satisfying to crush the hell out of that turret battalion for sure though.

This has to be the same dude (Hide-kaz?) who did Saint Dragon's st2 music, the Ardennes BGM is a hilariously chipper accompaniment to the nonstop carnage.

Good ear, indeed P-47 and Saint Dragon are both composed by Sizlla Okamura, also well-known for some of his hot jams in Viewpoint (notably Stage 2). HIDE-KAZ only started to compose with Task Force Harrier (for which Okamura provided support and sampling, after which he left the company).

[BIL]

"Mahaaa, the French... Nazca Lines... have always been celebrated for their excellence. There is a Japanese shooting game..."



Ahh, Sizzla Okamura... that explains everything. Guy has a real gift for matching feelgood/feelweird vibes to balls-hard shooting.

[Stevens]

Scored another Green Orange clear with a score 115,000 points better than my first clear. Amazing how simply not getting hit is a viable way to better your score even if you're not actively chaining. I have started turning into mech form more often for certain areas, but I'll never be someone changing back and forth on the fly.

I still haven't hit a million in White Vanilla but I'm getting closer. 900, then 920 and so on. My PB is 975...so I'm getting there.

The tlb in White Vanilla is aces.

[Stevens]

Hey I broke a million in White Vanilla, I'm getting OK at this.

PB is now 1,075,sumthin'

[WelshMegalodon]

Pop'n TwinBee

I've tried this game many times in the past five years but have rarely made it past Stage 3.

Is it just me or does Stage 2 have way too many enemies on the screen at once? I daresay it feels a bit sloppy. PCE Detana!! at least let you bomb multiple targets at once...

[dmk1198]

Just picked up shooting love 200x on 360 and hoping dodonpachi resurrection arrives in post, gonna be playing either of them

[Marc]

Pop'n TwinBee

I've tried this game many times in the past five years but have rarely made it past Stage 3.

Is it just me or does Stage 2 have way too many enemies on the screen at once? I daresay it feels a bit sloppy. PCE Detana!! at least let you bomb multiple targets at once...

Can't get into this at all because of the power-up selection method. I hate games that make you shoot weapons to get the one you want.

Also, screw Image Fight

[Jeneki]

BIL if you're doing P-47 gifs, you really need one of the motorcycle.

[Stevens]

More Zero Ranger. Some more 1 CC's in Green Orange.

God damn this game is fun, especially just running through it once you know the layout. PB is nothing to write home about, but it is slowly getting there. Getting hit less which is why my scores are getting better. Not sure if I'll ever try to score it though.

[BIL]

BIL if you're doing P-47 gifs, you really need one of the motorcycle.

Roger that

***DEFENDED THE STEVE McQUEEN***



Some crazy-ass micropixel art goin' on, especially with the little dudes manning the AA guns! I also especially love the lighthouse, just before HOLY FUCKIN HUGE BATTLESHIP comes steaming in.

Reminds me of Sqoon... actually, so does the title screen attract sequence. Hmm!

NSFWA (NOT SAFE FOR WORKER ANTS

[versionfiv]

Raiden DX
oh yeah, finally played Batrider and really enjoyed it.

[CaptainAhab]

I am trying to 1CC Crimzon Clover.

[monstercloset]

Taking a break from working on my CCWI Arcade Original 1CC to try and get through ZeroRanger. I might be okay with just clearing 1 loop on it, lmao.

[EmperorIng]

I hope you take the time to get through the second loop, even if you credit feed. ZeroRanger stores some of its nicest surprises for the second loop.

[Stevens]

Taking a break from working on my CCWI Arcade Original 1CC to try and get through ZeroRanger. I might be okay with just clearing 1 loop on it, lmao.

I will echo EmperorIng here - No matter how you have to do it make sure you see the entire game. You'll be missing out on a lot of greatness if you only play the first loop.

I am far from a great player and managed a 1 CC of Green Orange. White Vanilla (and some time away from shooters) helped a lot.

My first 1 CC was Black Belt on the SMS back in 1987. It took me a few months, but I finally got it to the point where I could 1 life it and take minimal (possibly none at all) damage. I knew the game that well.

Zero Ranger is the first shooter that feels like that to me. Stick with it, you won't regret it.

[Rudio Radio Waves]

I've been trying out DoDonPachi and Gradius V, and I feel like I'm getting better at both of them (going from dying to the first boss to clearing the first stage without continuing and in normal rank). Pretty happy about that!
I might go back and mess around in Ikaruga, too.

[null1024]

Mars Matrix!

I haven't played this in way too long. I forgot how much I enjoyed this game.
also, I keep screwing up and going "okay, I'll just do the reflect here and-oh, it never came out and I just crashed into a big wave of bullets"
Gotta get back in the swing of things.

[Shawnzzy]

I've been switching between Crimson Clover, ZeroRanger, and Blue Revolver. I guess I'm just stuck on indie shmups right now.