Licorice wrote:So, was Under Defeat influenced by Toaplan's Kyukyoku Tiger?
Everyone seems to think so, because they're both helicopter military shmups with a vaguely historical sci-fi aesthetic.
But have the developers ever actually said as much?
As far as 1980s heli STGs go, I associate UD more with Taito's Gyrodine, both incorporating a bit of IRL helicoptering via tilting shots. (I guess the more conventional locked forward shot is pretty heli-esque too, tbf)
UD also shares GD's take on the classic
Xevious air/ground attack, albeit automated (UD's main shot auto-targets ground enemies in its path, while your secondary guns fire straight ahead at all times).
There's the floating, colour-cycling pickups, but that's really a Toaplan thing in general. And while both KT and UD have a Bomb Button, the latter's works like Tatsujin's - instant screen-wiping salvation, as opposed to the nervous delay and limited blast radius of KT (an ethos copied by the absolute undeniable Tiger clone,
Raiden).
Going down the rabbithole a bit, UD developers G-Rev feature ex-Taito personnel... but while Gyrodine was published by Taito, it was developed by
Crux, a developer key to what would become Toaplan (see also
Orca).
This is the kind of tight, no-flab genre where resemblances are bound to show up in the wake of supremely popular, influential games, even if the STGs in question don't actually play much alike. I'm personally convinced Compile's signature "body ram" burst invincibility prefigured Psyvariar's charmingly-monikered, singularly unstoppable "Invisible Time" (aka
RUBBIN TIME ), even if the triggers are utterly dissimilar (pickup VS buzz).
(I loved your observation, Mortificator, that noted Ikeda favourite Salamander
also features monster slowdown AKA
focus movement when you depress the [fire] button while fully-armed
)