Shmup pet peeves?

[xxx1993]

Checkpoints. I know Gradius and R-Type have a trial and error system, but having to be sent back at the same part again and again and again is just too frustrating to get through. It's especially bad in Einhander, since dying at certain points and especially against the final boss can totally kill the epic mood and also cut you off from listening to the rest of the awesome music.

Randomizing power ups. Sometimes you might accidentally grab the power up you didn't want. What if you wanted to keep grabbing the same weapon just to keep it, only to grab it just when it changes and you end up with a crappy weapon instead?

Using power ups as bait to lure you into the enemy or bullets. I tend to suffer with this all the time, especially in vertical shmups. In the words of Leo Getz from Lethal Weapon: "They FUCK you with the power ups!"

Suicide/revenge bullets. This alone is why I sometimes can't get through the first stage of GG Aleste 3 without losing a single life. Because shooting an enemy or missile will cause a bullet to fly out. Sometimes, it can even catch you off guard. I personally like to call them “fuck you bullets”.

True final boss/ending conditions. Why must you go through so much effort just to reach the real final boss? Can't there be a casual or novice mode to let you get through those with no effort, like Rolling Gunner or Crimzon Clover? CAVE does it all the time, and it's especially bad with Psyvariar 1 and 2 (one of my least favorite shmups to get to) and its rip-off Risk System, and even Raiden Fighters Jet, where you have to be extremely good at the simulation to do the Real Battle missions, but even then you're not out of the woods yet because you can't lose a single life in the first part and you can't use a continue in the second part either otherwise the Real Battle will end prematurely after defeating the first boss of the second half.

No more continues in the final stage and boss. This is something Taito, Konami, and Sega were guilty of back then. Fail, and you can’t try again. Even SNK had something like this with NAM-1975, where failing against the final boss resulted in an automatic bad ending similar to the much later Chrono Trigger. R-Type Final also did something like this, where you must complete Stage F-C in one shot. Die once and it’s an instant Game Over.

[Sturmvogel Prime]

TURRIDAMAGE: Taking non-stop damage without being able to recover from the first hit like in the first Turrican. Many of the trash shooters I've reviewed are plagued with that issue.

POINT OF SHAME: Adding 1 point to your score after continuing as if it was a mark of shame. Many Capcom shmups do that thing.

USING ROGUELIKE AS AN EXCUSE FOR STARTBACK: Randomizing levels and procedural generation doesn't mean to deprive the player from having extra lives, continues and deleting save files. Fission Superstar X, Straimium Immortaly and Enter the Gungeon are good examples.

[sunnshine]

Stage hazards in some vertical shmups. Fuck right off ZeroRanger and fuck off a bit more when you get there. Strania's ok although I have no idea why

Grinding for credits/weapons to get to the point when the game's actually fun to play (looking at you Ginja Force, Jamestown (I mostly like this game but hate the unlocking aspect of it) and Caladrius (kind of)). Putting the good stuff behind hours of grind isn't 'adding content' it's just shitty design. Lords Of Thunder, Forgotten Worlds and Trouble Witches Neo got the credits/shop/weapon upgrade thing right though.

Popcorn that takes more than one shot to die (Ginja Force, again, and it has health bars for them. You know what else has health bars, Ginja Force? Fucking Sine Mora, that's what.)

edit- oh, and lolis, obvs. WTaF?

[Rastan78]

POINT OF SHAME: Adding 1 point to your score after continuing as if it was a mark of shame. Many Capcom shmups do that thing.

This is a very good thing IMO. It serves the function of defining a score that was done legit on 1 credit vs one that one done via credit feeding.

Think about the traditional system of scorekeeping from Japanese arcades where the operator would verify the PCB settings and player score. The vast majority of arcade games will add the extra digit or wipe scores on continue. Otherwise it would get extremely difficult to verify scores. Especially multilooping games could simply be credit fed until counterstop with no way to tell the difference other than witnesses watching the entire run. Video proof wasn't viable in an arcade setting at the time most shmups were created.

[ATTRACTS]

POINT OF SHAME: Adding 1 point to your score after continuing as if it was a mark of shame. Many Capcom shmups do that thing.

This is a very good thing IMO. It serves the function of defining a score that was done legit on 1 credit vs one that one done via credit feeding.

Think about the traditional system of scorekeeping from Japanese arcades where the operator would verify the PCB settings and player score. The vast majority of arcade games will add the extra digit or wipe scores on continue. Otherwise it would get extremely difficult to verify scores. Especially multilooping games could simply be credit fed until counterstop with no way to tell the difference other than witnesses watching the entire run. Video proof wasn't viable in an arcade setting at the time most shmups were created.

Agreed 100%. If there were no way to show someone continued, the high scores would all be bullshit.

[emphatic]

Ship inertia of any form and for any reason
Weapon shops - it's a shmup, not an RPG game.
Too many ship type/config options - ain't nobody got time for that
Instant kill attack from bosses without any visual cue to tip you off before hand something bad's coming at you
Badly planned popcorn enemy numbers - if you can't kill every single one fully powered up after knowing what's coming, there are simply too many

[MJR]

Bullet sponge enemies, bosses are fine but when you have smaller popcorn enemies behaving like bullet sponges that is what I always HATED. This is extremely prevalent feature in euroshmups, though japanese have done that as well (I'm looking at you, Truxton II).

When I play a shmup, I am essentially playing a power fantasy that I am flying ultra-high-tech attack craft with massive firepower, not kite with a pea shooter. Western devs had this aggravating tendency to develop their shmups like RPG's, meaning that you had to collect endless amount of powerups before you had any serious firepower.

In best shmups, imho, you always had considerable firepower, and the challenge came from figuring out the tactics and memorizing level layout / attack patterns.

I do forgive Radiant Silvergun though, even that's it's powering up system is a RPG, you still get fair amount of weak popcorn enemies.

[SPM]

Games rewarding an aggressive playstyle that makes you skip a cool pattern or set-up you loved when learning the game (once you are good enough at the game you don't see it anymore). Not a deal-breaker, but it bothers me. Give me more game by playing well, not less (or at least less bullshit, not less interesting patterns).

That's one of the reasons why I usually enjoy playing an underpowered ship/mode in some games I've already "mastered".

[Sumez]

Checkpoints is something I've bounced back and forth on. Of course, the true answer is that it depends on the game, and some are better with them, others are better without them. And I think hating on a game just for having them is undeserved.
There are definitely games, including a few popular ones, which have more than a few really obnoxious checkpoints. Meanwhile, nearly all Toaplan games do them exceptionally well, and the feeling of getting sent back in order to get your bearings back, with the risk of multiple chain deaths until you finally recover, is usually the most fun part of those games. But when it gets to the point where a 1CC pretty much needs to be a 1LC, it's no fun. Give me some bombs to strategically work my way back to sufficient firepower, and claw my way out of the abyss.

Using power ups as bait to lure you into the enemy or bullets

This is like the bread and butter of fun challenge systems in shooters, especially when used as a scoring mechanic. You gotta put yourself in the line of fire and take risks in order to get rewarded. It's good when games do this.
But there are definitely also examples where it's just stressful. I think a curious example is how annoying the bell system is in the Twinbee games (IMO), but when Parodius put the exact same items in a horizontal game with a different philosophy to stage design that allows you to cease fire more tactically, they suddenly become a much more fun risk/reward mechanic.

Suicide/revenge bullets

Enemies designed around releasing projectiles of any sort upon defeat can create a fun dynamic to a stage where you need to think more about when and where you are focusing the fire. I like it.
But just adding suicide bullets to enemies that normally don't have them as a way to increase the rank/loop difficulty? I think it often kinda clashes with the game's original design which is probably why a lot of people don't like them. Like everything else though, they have their time and place.

True final boss/ending conditions. Why must you go through so much effort just to reach the real final boss?

Because it's the final boss.

[DMC]

Multiple loops. Increases the scoring/skill ceiling but makes the game too long and repetitive. Also, once you're good enough for the second loop, first loop becomes boringly easy.

I liked though that Kingdom Grandprix let you choose stages for first loop and then forces you to play the other ones for the second loop. I think the loop condition of winning the grandprix made more sense than most loop conditions too (e.g., do not use bombs).

[xxx1993]

Multiple loops. Increases the scoring/skill ceiling but makes the game too long and repetitive. Also, once you're good enough for the second loop, first loop becomes boringly easy.

I liked though that Kingdom Grandprix let you choose stages for first loop and then forces you to play the other ones for the second loop. I think the loop condition of winning the grandprix made more sense than most loop conditions too (e.g., do not use bombs).

Oh yes, that too... Fire Barrel is especially guilty of this since it has THREE loops for you to conquer. They don't feel much either, just being the same game but with some additional perks and raised difficulty. I know the DonPachi and Ghosts 'n Goblins franchise is known for this, where the true ending is only available on the second loop.

[BulletMagnet]

- Invisi-bullets: If I can't easily and immediately distinguish enemies' attacks and thus lack the ability to react accordingly you've failed the most basic and essential requirement of designing a shmup as far as I'm concerned. Hard-to-see bullets are no more "legitimate" a challenge to overcome than movement inertia.

- Stealth Backstab: Making enemies appear from the sides or behind to keep players on their toes is fine, but letting them do so with zero warning and essentially guaranteeing that the player will regularly and jarringly die by playing your shmup like every other shmup on the planet is "reach for the power button" fodder.

- Important, Invisible and Inscrutable: Hackers discover, thirty years after a game's initial arcade release, that rank increases more slowly when using the 2P ship on a Thursday while standing on one leg and whistling the jingle to an obscure deodorant TV commercial; embarrassed gamers wonder how they could have possibly missed something so obvious for so long.

- Extended Boss Breaks: Nothing makes me hate a boss fight more than long, repeated stretches where it's impossible to do any damage; the occasional "shields up" or "attack from the background" or "flood the screen with minions" is not a problem, but as a boss's main "gimmick" it's nothing short of excruciating.

- Inadequate Fire Rate: Few things are as infuriating or disempowering as firing straight into an oncoming line of zako from what should be a safe distance only to get suddenly sucker-punched by one that manages to randomly slip through a gap in your bullets.

[Creamy Goodness]

Tiny hit boxes on bosses that are only vulnerable for a few seconds. A lot of 16-bit console games do this and it is a really annoying way to add challenge.

And I think anytime powerups are used as a way to increase challenge. Whether it be placing them in the line of fire or making so you have to dodge them so you will not lose a good weapon.

[Steven]

Being punished for using bombs. You make a game about blowing shit up, but then you punish the player for using a thing to blow shit up. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

No bomb = more skill required. I understand that. But I definitely don't like it when the game's like "oh, you used a bomb to blow shit up in this game about blowing shit up? Fuck you, more rank/no last boss/no second loop/etc. for you".

[davyK]

When a game doesn't have a fast restart.

Power ups with no power down on death. e.g. Futari. A big fat powerup that's easy to pick up and you must pick up. I know some sort of power up has to occur but why not just have it automated with an on-screen prompt to say so?

Manual rapid fire. OK for a short time in a level section or boss fight maybe - but not through the whole game.

Bad colour schemes that make some bullets hard to see, especially after an explosion (Raiden III and V)

[Rastan78]

Being punished for using bombs. You make a game about blowing shit up, but then you punish the player for using a thing to blow shit up. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

No bomb = more skill required. I understand that. But I definitely don't like it when the game's like "oh, you used a bomb to blow shit up in this game about blowing shit up? Fuck you, more rank/no last boss/no second loop/etc. for you".

I'm OK with the punishment for using bombs being score based. Especially if the bomb is a total get out of jail free card with instant invulnerability and full screen clearing damage. Makes perfect sense to reward players who learned to survive every section a higher score. It's like the game is saying here's a tool that will help you get a 1cc by opting out of a few tough sections of your choice. But now that you've done that keep pushing yourself to survive with less and less bombs. If all you care about is 1CC effectively there is no punishment.

One pet peeve I used to have was difficulty spikes in games. Now I'm coming to appreciate that a game with peaks and valleys in challenge can be just as good or better than one with a completely smooth ramp from easy to hard.

Having a particularly tough boss at stage 3 or 4 might mean that boss becomes very iconic and memorable even if it gatekeeps the later stages a bit. Sometimes the section that kicks your ass at first is the one you love the most later when you figure out how to handle it.

Or having a final stage that is a bit easier then what came just before to let the player's nerves have a bit of rest before the final boss is ok IMO.

Of course there's a fine line there. You definitely don't want to see a super easy game where out of the blue there's a total brick wall that is 10x harder than anything before it. That said I think a certain ebb and flow to the difficulty can be a good thing.

[pja]

Being punished for using bombs. You make a game about blowing shit up, but then you punish the player for using a thing to blow shit up. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

No bomb = more skill required. I understand that. But I definitely don't like it when the game's like "oh, you used a bomb to blow shit up in this game about blowing shit up? Fuck you, more rank/no last boss/no second loop/etc. for you".

I would say something similar except I just don't like bombs in games period It literally never feels satisfying when you get through a difficult section with a bomb, and it often just feels like an excuse so the developers can throw something nigh-impossible at you.

[XoPachi]

Waifus

[To Far Away Times]

Being punished for using bombs. You make a game about blowing shit up, but then you punish the player for using a thing to blow shit up. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

No bomb = more skill required. I understand that. But I definitely don't like it when the game's like "oh, you used a bomb to blow shit up in this game about blowing shit up? Fuck you, more rank/no last boss/no second loop/etc. for you".

One pet peeve I used to have was difficulty spikes in games. Now I'm coming to appreciate that a game with peaks and valleys in challenge can be just as good or better than one with a completely smooth ramp from easy to hard.

Having a particularly tough boss at stage 3 or 4 might mean that boss becomes very iconic and memorable even if it gatekeeps the later stages a bit. Sometimes the section that kicks your ass at first is the one you love the most later when you figure out how to handle it.

Mushi Futari is one of my favorite games ever, but it throws a brick wall up right at stage 3. I'd go as far as saying the second half of stage 3 is probably the hardest section in the game. Its a weird difficulty curve, but it's one of the charms, I suppose.

[Steven]

I'm OK with the punishment for using bombs being score based. Especially if the bomb is a total get out of jail free card with instant invulnerability and full screen clearing damage. Makes perfect sense to reward players who learned to survive every section a higher score. It's like the game is saying here's a tool that will help you get a 1cc by opting out of a few tough sections of your choice. But now that you've done that keep pushing yourself to survive with less and less bombs. If all you care about is 1CC effectively there is no punishment.

Yeah, points is definitely fair. No problems with bomb kills reducing points if the developer wants to use that as a punishment.

I would say something similar except I just don't like bombs in games period It literally never feels satisfying when you get through a difficult section with a bomb, and it often just feels like an excuse so the developers can throw something nigh-impossible at you.

Yeah, it does feel cheap as hell sometimes. Clearing the screen instantly with no effort beyond bomb stock management and pressing the bomb button is like... yeah. Game balance is always critical, and balancing bombs to be effective but without making the game trivial is likely extremely difficult.

I'd like to see more games that actively encourage the player to use bombs in some way. The only thing I can think of like this right now is the special weapon in Garrega, but I'm sure there are more of them that I either haven't played yet or am forgetting about. There is also the Same! Same! Same! revenge bomb, as you can fire a bomb after you get hit and catch fire before you actually explode, hopefully killing whatever killed you. "You want to shoot me down? Screw you! We're dying together!" Good shit. I love Toaplan.

[Rastan78]

Yeah Garegga and the other Yagawa games like Batrider, Bakraid and Ibara all use frequent bombing for score.

The Raiden Fighters series comes to mind also. Sometimes you'll need bombs to get secret bonuses like "destroyed at a time!" or "defended the house!" You can even gain an advantage for scoring at times by suiciding for additional bombs.

Darius Gaiden has sections where you can get a boost to score by bombing, but there's also a big end game bonus for a full bomb stock. It's only on routes where there are one or two extra bombs that you can bomb for score and still get the max bonus.

[Steven]

I actually have played Batrider a single time. Game overed on stage 1 though lol. That's one more game that I wish was on Arcade Archives or got an M2 ShotTriggers release, just like pretty much everything else that isn't on there already.

I do need to play Darius Gaiden some more, though. Played it at the arcade for the first time, game overed on stage D, went home, bought it on Steam, game overed on stage D again, and played Eschatos and Ginga Force a ton instead since I was already playing those. Need to get back to Darius Gaiden again... great music, though, as expected of Darius.

[sunnshine]

I'd like to see more games that actively encourage the player to use bombs in some way.

I think Shikigami No Shiro III kind of plays like that insofar as it's easy/quick-ish to build bomb/tension/whatever (and life) stock back up, it kind of encourages slightly more risky play than II does, at least the way I play them anyway (survival/panic)

edit- Trizeal too, there are hidden bonus bits that can really only be got to (again, the way I play, ie a bit shit) by bombing.

[xxx1993]

Being punished for using bombs. You make a game about blowing shit up, but then you punish the player for using a thing to blow shit up. Whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

No bomb = more skill required. I understand that. But I definitely don't like it when the game's like "oh, you used a bomb to blow shit up in this game about blowing shit up? Fuck you, more rank/no last boss/no second loop/etc. for you".

This. I don't understand why CAVE doesn't allow players to use bombs when desperate times call for desperate measures.

[Sumez]

Eh, when your bomb is mostly just a panic button giving you a slightly bigger leeway for mistakes, I think it would be weird to not reward players who get through the game without using them. Though I generally agree it's way more fun when you can bomb with reckless abandon, Cave's approach does make sense.

It doesn't apply to all of them though, DeathSmiles has no consequence for bombing outside of the all clear bonus at the very end, and they can even be used as a tool to make recharges easier. And EspGaluda also lets you abuse the barrier as much as you want with no real setback.
But then there's games like Progear where if you care about scoring at all you can't bomb ever, that's pretty damn harsh.

[Steven]

I remembered another one: speed powerups. Do not want. Either have a single speed or let me cycle through the available speed settings without having to pick up speed powerups.

[DMC]

Raizing were very creative with bombs in general, not just the Yagawa games.

In Kingdom Grandprix, you can use the bombs to slow down the CPU rivals in the race, not just to defeat enemies. You can strategically use the bomb on the specific rival that is currently threatening your chances of winning the grand prix. A nice little balance between using bombs this way vs. storing them for survival.

In Dimahoo, you can use bombs on certain buildings to reveal secret items and level-8 items. For instance, many high scoring players use three bombs on stage 1 to collect many of the level-8 items.

Soukyugurentai is a bit of an exception because of the bomb bonus bug, but there are a few places where a hi scoring player can use a bomb intentionally to get a higher score (e.g., the two big ships in stage 6).

All three Yagawa games, of course, encouraged bomb use for creative scoring. The variety of ways you can use bombs here is pretty impressive. In Battle Garegga, you can bomb buildings to reveal medals, bomb hidden flamingos, bomb the missiles of Black Heart, bomb the inner rings of Madball, in Batrider you can also bomb windows and cars among other things, and in Bakraid, you can use bombs to extend the chain.

Brave Blade replaced the smart bomb with a brief invincibility effect in which speed is heavily increased to allow you to collect lots of medals or destroy enemies. It also allowed for some creative scoring and strategic choices since the invincibility effect is followed by a deactivated shield.

Strange Cave, beyond Yagawa, seemingly did not explore this further.

[xxx1993]

I remembered another one: speed powerups. Do not want. Either have a single speed or let me cycle through the available speed settings without having to pick up speed powerups.

That’s exactly why I don’t grab too much speed in Gradius.

[Steven]

I remembered another one: speed powerups. Do not want. Either have a single speed or let me cycle through the available speed settings without having to pick up speed powerups.

That’s exactly why I don’t grab too much speed in Gradius.

Yeah, you end up crashing into stuff and the only way to become slower is to die and lose all of your speed, which leads to the other problem with speed powerups: they also sometimes make checkpoint recovery range from difficult to impossible when you lose all of your speed just because your ship speed is likely now agonizingly slow.

[heli]

I dont understand the tile of this, i,m not english person.
After reading i understand this topic is about stressfull things in shmups.

What i hate the most is horizontal collision and power ups, better start with 1 life,
if gradius was less stressfull, is it still gradius ?