The Self-Introduction Thread

[Himbeertoni]

Greetings, my name is Paolo, i am from Hamburg and working as a pilot for Turkish Airlines.
I am new to this arcade hobby, though i am familiar with lots of consoles.

Looking for a nice cab, too. Got a supergun already.

Cheers

[oocilote]

Hi, I'm new here and new to Shmup's too. But recently I got interested in this kind of genre, I've only played R-Type, Gradius and Sonic Wings on Snes (pretty much a newbie on the surface).

So, I'm looking for where I could start my "jorney" into this properly, cause there are countless games to play! (also, sorry if my english is bad, I'm not a native speaker!).

[strawpoll-legend]

Hey there!!

Before I started playing shmups, I had a weird relationship with video games. Most of my friends played them, and even my parents played them, so I was raised in a game-positive environment, but I never connected with the medium. I played some games, mostly Flash games online and cheap plug-n-play arcade consoles, but nothing really clicked with me. However, when I played Deep Space Waifu, (yes, I know, don't laugh ) I instantly connected with the medium. After learning that game was a bullet hell shoot em up, I searched out Touhou, remembering it too was a bullet hell, and I instantly became attached to the series. While originally I only really played Touhou, I started to broaden my horizons. Harmful Park was the first horizontal shmup I played, and I enjoyed it immensely.

As far as my favorite shoot em up game, it's hard to narrow it down to just one. As I'm a big PC Engine fan, I absolutely love Magical Chase. The visuals are outstanding, but not distracting, the controls are fun and easy to use, and the shop system spices up gameplay, reminding me of a similar feature in Fantasy Zone. Considering I'm still quite new to the genre, I'm not very good at Radiant Silvergun or Ikaruga, but I adore both games, of course. I'll always respect every game in the Touhou series for really pushing me towards the shoot em up genre, and my favorite game throughout the series is probably Phantasmagoria of Flower View, since I'm obsessed with competitive split screen shoot em ups. Speaking of, Twinkle Star Sprites is also a favorite of mine.

Hopefully this post wasn't overly wordy.

[Mattkuo]

Hello everyone,

I am currently trying to 1 CC rtype on PC engine and love to talk shooters.

[miwa]

Hi fellow shmuppers

Thanks to Ikaruga I've gotten into shmups at the end of last year and have been hooked ever since.
I find it kind of fascinating to have found a new hobby I like so much at the ripe age of 35.
So far I've been able to get a 1-all on Dragon Blaze and 1CCs on Esprade (arcade mode), Aka to Blue (on mobile) and Mushihimesama (Maniac Mode).
Kind of jumping in between Espgaluda 2, Futari and DFK right now to decide what to tackle next. Any suggestions?

Cheers (or Prost) from Germany,
miwa

[metalnarf]

Hi,

also someone from germany here. My name is Frank and I am 35 years old and play games since I'm little.
Always liked the more "retro" games with sometimes just "simpler" gameplay. Like Pinball, Fighters and Shmups.
Enjoying playing these games on various platforms, at the moment: PC, PS4, Xbox One, Switch, RG300, Mobile.

Best Regards
Frank/metalnarf

[buggle]

Hello. I've recently rekindled my love of shmups so I'll be around looking for more interesting stuff to try out. Thanks.

[dns]

Hi, I'm a game developer, working in the industry since 93, on the technical side. I'm now developing a kind of Shmup, not really a regular one, with some twists I've played to the very first Shmups when I was young, like Space Invaders, Galaga, later 1942, Xenon 2 and Alpha Mission 2 on Neo Geo.

[rthorntn]

Hi,

I'm living in Sydney.

Gyruss has been my favourite game since I was a lad.

Have seen shmups.system11.org popping up a lot in my searches and wondered what it was about, Shoot 'em up's, now I get it!

Cheers
Richard

[DeathAdderSFT]

Yo, 'sup y'all?

I think I'll mostly be here to do some reading (and learning!), but an account may come in handy so why the heck not?

[AZA]

Hello everyone. I’m living in Kentucky. I used to live in louisville near downtown, but i moved back with my family out in the country due to COVID-19. I’m a shmup enthusiast returning to this forum after a long absence... my favorite items are my TG16, turbobooster, with Turbo Everdrive, MVS board with Sonic Wings 2&3, Psikyo Sengoku Blade PCB, and Chipped Sega Saturn with a stack of CDRs. I’m relatively young for this scene, only 24 years old, and have been previously been put off from other communities for certain crazy people bashing me and calling me a hipster incessantly for liking “old” stuff. This forum on the other hand seems really chill, and i think i’ll fit in better here than the ridiculous facebook groups.

[Larsen B]

Hey folks. Mainly here for hardware chat as a PVM owner but I did import a Saturn just to play Salamander Deluxe Pack Plus (more specifically Salamander 2) so I guess shmups are pretty good too.

[slime]

Hi, my name is Marina. I think my first shooter had to be Galaga on those plug-n-play TV systems. I got into Gradius and Touhou in high school, and after an 8 year hiatus I'm back on the STG train.

Currently learning Gunbird 2 and Crimzon Clover World Ignition. I start biting it around stage 3 in each of these games. I'm pretty new to danmaku style games compared to stuff like Lifeforce (which probably used to be my favorite), and Touhou's super-slow bullets never properly prepared me for this kind of dodging.

[Gurpegui]

Hello, newbie here!, i registered because i am very interested in OSSC and the gscartsw and this is a great place to get info and discuss about these great piece of hardware, see you in the forum!.

[dcat]

hello, nice meeting you all. i joined partly because i'm working on an weird stg but mostly because i feel a bit of nostalgia for internet forums, for some reason.

[nxs]

hello

I got in to shmups via DariusBurst Chronicles on the Vita, in particular the DLC - the majority of which i had never heard of (pretty much everything except the sega franchises were unknown to me). Since i started to get in to the genre i got an X360 and am trying to improve my skills.

I have a single 1cc on Mushihimesama Futari novice mode (first attempt!) which i know is a joke but now trying to 1cc the real thing. I am practising each level/boss until i can no miss/no bomb with confidence. I have Ketsui on order which was my favourite ship from the DBCS DLC.

I also play other classics on the Vita via retroarch in tate mode (Battle Garegga, Batsugun, EspRaDe etc.) but this is more casual than the 360 activity due to the small screen.

Thanks

[dryja123]

Hi everyone, happy to finally make an account and participate after being a lurker. Recently I’ve gone down the rabbit hole on restoring and modifying retro gaming consoles. There have been numerous times where I’ve done research on a particular device that has brought me to a thread here on the forums. Looking forward to chatting!

[jten11]

Greetings! Good to know there are still forums out there in this age of social media. I'm a shump fan and a hobbyist game developer. I'm a fan of the Touhou series and Danmaku Unlimited games. I used to play games like R-type and Lifeforce back in the days. Currently working on a shump which I plan to sharing in the near future. Nice to meet you all!

[Cold-blooded Geese]

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[kazuku]

Hi, I'm Nik and I've just joined because I enjoy reading and talking about shmups. I'm 42 years old and have been playing computer and video games my whole life. I've always had a soft spot for shmups, but recently this love has grown massively. I can't say exactly why this happened but I guess it has to do with being burnt out from other genres and having gained greater appreciation for the lean, straight-to-the-Point game play loops. I don't mind dying over and over as long as I make some progess or beat my own shitty score. I always try to get as close to 1CC as possible and have this mental thing where I can't get myself to press continue, even if that means I will be stuck in a level for ages or even forever.....I've been following forum discussions and watching endless videos about shmups in recent last months, and thanks to all the good info and recommendations, I've been able to learn and catch up on a lot of great games I wasn't even aware of. Now I try to get my hands on every good shmup I can, and have built a collection with enough variety as to never get bored. I like both old school and bullet hell styles, vertical or horizontal....
The first shmups I remember playing were on C64 - 1942, R-Type, Airwolf..stuff like that. Nowadays I´m a console peasant and mainly play on Ps4 and Switch, but want to expand to other formats ....time for a new PC and hopefully a Polymega, when it comes out and has been shown to work well enough.
Some of my favourite games at the moment are Dariusburst CS, Darius Gaiden, ESPrade, Ketsui, Psyvariar Delta, Devil Engine and Battle Garegga Rev.16. Fixed up my old PS Vita today just to play Dariusburst CS on the go - sooo nice. So thanks for all the tips and advice....I´ll be around.

[manoftheleaf]

Hello, I'm new. I have browsed this forum many times over the years looking at the arcade stuff. I'm not into vertical/horizontal shooters (shmups) but I have fond memories of Galaga in my youth and Einhander in my teens. I joined mostly to for the tech stuff people are making and enjoying. The shumps forum being one of the last bastions of the old age information sharing. My favorite video games are fighting games and beat'em ups. Final Fantasy Tactics is my favorite game and the N64 is my least favorite console. Hopefully I'll contribute something meaningful despite not using forums all that much.

Hopefully everyone is doing ok despite these crazy times, the year 2020 is a blowup, and have a great day.

[sevengraff]

Hi friends! I'm a fan of shmups and came here to find info on what's good to play. I was a fan of this style back in the Dreamcast era but haven't kept up with it. I recently got a good emulation setup on my main TV with a simple arcade stick so now I'm hunting for some good shmups to get back into it.

[Rudio Radio Waves]

Hello everyone! I'm Rudie Radio Waves. I'm friendly, I'm from Italy and I enjoy occasionally torturing myself through very hard shmups! I'm not very good at them, but I'm getting better.
I also enjoy art and media of any kind.

[eilene420]

hello i'm eilene i think these games are neat
i mostly just lurk but thought it was weird that i never had an account so i have an account

[VisionShips]

Hello everyone,

My name is Wes and I have recently found the deep rabbit hole that is retro gaming using RGB. I started by wondering how to hook up all my old consoles to a flat-screen tv, now many hours of reading, watching, and a lot of money later I have finally made an account on this forum which guided me along the way.

[K470r]

Hello, I am Edwin from Bogotá Colombia. I am a lover of my old video games. I found the forum by searching google for CRT information and all paths came here. I really appreciate the existence of this great space to learn and share.

[tokarz1]

Hi all, thanks for having me! Looking forward to all the knowledgeable people here. I have so many projects and it is time to start on them.
David

[Eloim]

Hello I am Eloim. Rezo in other arcade forum. I am from Spain and i collect mostly MVS.

Swaping to jamma now.

Is very nice to be here to learn more about our common passion.

[FootofGod]

Hello! Some of you may know me and see me around Twitch, usually posting something dumb in chat

Anyway, shmups were pretty much some of my formative memories. The first three games I remember, when I was very young, were Super Mario World, UN Squadron, and Gradius III. I definitely played those to dust.

As of recent, Galaga has been my main focus (boomer shooter, I know). I'm trying to assist the community with some goals and get some fun stuff off the ground. After that, I'll set my sights on other games. I'd love to start being decent at Dodonpachi and branch out into some other shooters. I'd love to revisit UN Squadron and see if I can git gud at it again.

[o.pwuaioc]

Hello! Some of you may know me and see me around Twitch, usually posting something dumb in chat

Anyway, shmups were pretty much some of my formative memories. The first three games I remember, when I was very young, were Super Mario World, UN Squadron, and Gradius III. I definitely played those to dust.

As of recent, Galaga has been my main focus (boomer shooter, I know). I'm trying to assist the community with some goals and get some fun stuff off the ground. After that, I'll set my sights on other games. I'd love to start being decent at Dodonpachi and branch out into some other shooters. I'd love to revisit UN Squadron and see if I can git gud at it again.

Welcome! I was in a very similar place to you when I first got into the shooter scene. I played the heck out of Gradius III and a few other shooters (Raiden, Darius, R-Type) loved Galaga to death and would always place a quarter in wherever I saw a cab, and was overly enthusiastically recommended games like Dodonpachi. I don't know how much exploring you've done, but there are a ton of excellent shooters that someone who loves Gradius and UN Squadron might be more comfortable in than DDP. YMMV, but for me it was backwards with Abadox and Dragon Spirit and then stuff like Metal Black, Thunder Force III, Strikers 1945, and the load of PCE shooters, a console that I hadn't ever played before 2011.

Maybe you're really into bullet hell games and ships with tiny hit boxes, but at least in my experience I found it more rewarding not to dive into bullet hell so soon, mostly because I discovered very few of them were really my thing. In fact, I think the only one I own is in fact DoDonPachi, a game I haven't touched in years.

Galaga is, by the way, a god-level shooter. Don't let anyone say otherwise.