Blazing Star [Arcade]

[Meriscan]

Previous thread. Maintained by Ghegs.

Rules

• Full defaults, one credit.
• Autofire is allowed.
• MAME and MVS/AES are allowed.
• Photos/replays are encouraged but not required.

Submission format

SHIP
NAME - SCORE - STAGE

Example:

Windina
UsernamePlayer - 12,345,678 - ALL

Code: Select all

    | NAME               |  SCORE       |  STAGE  
----+--------------------+--------------+---------
  1 | AST-DGN            |  61,831,460  |   ALL
  2 | AST-POW            |  23,313,890  |    5 
  3 | jpj                |  20,403,050  |    6
  4 | Zigfried           |  18,689,270  |    6    
  5 | Sturmvogel Prime   |  12,724,060  |    6
  6 | SamIAm             |  12,276,920  |    3 
  7 | Acid King          |  11,761,630  |    4 
  8 | Gion               |  10,283,950  |    4 
  9 | malcolm            |   5,965,890  |    6 

Code: Select all

    | NAME               |  SCORE       |  STAGE  
----+--------------------+--------------+---------
  1 | AST-DGN            |  54,518,320  |   ALL

Code: Select all

    | NAME               |  SCORE       |  STAGE  
----+--------------------+--------------+---------
  1 | Gemant             |  38,126,480  |    7
  2 | CRI                |  28,669,630  |    7 
  3 | _Bnu               |  26,010,120  |    6
  4 | The Coop           |  23,236,200  |   ALL    
  5 | AmidstStorm        |  19,498,860  |    6 
  6 | Herr Schatten      |  15,839,050  |    6 
  7 | coffeejoerx        |  14,926,030  |    6 
  8 | neocps2            |  12,460,680  |    4 
  9 | BareKnuckleRoo     |   8,388,000  |   ALL

Code: Select all

    | NAME               |  SCORE       |  STAGE  
----+--------------------+--------------+---------
  1 | LordHypnos         |  5,521,100  |    4

Code: Select all

    | NAME               |  SCORE       |  STAGE  
----+--------------------+--------------+---------
  1 | AKRATEN            |  12,047,760  |   ALL

Code: Select all

    | NAME               |  SCORE       |  STAGE  
----+--------------------+--------------+---------
  1 | ASE-Meriscan       |  58,711,410  |   ALL
  2 | luy                |  52,005,170  |   ALL 
  3 | BBH                |  48,915,370  |   ALL 
  4 | Fran               |  46,486,830  |    7
  5 | Maucast            |  44,112,470  |   ALL 
  6 | Icarus             |  43,869,530  |   ALL 
  7 | DEL                |  36,660,370  |    7 
  8 | Rob                |  35,851,780  |    6 
  9 | Skyline            |  35,682,230  |    7 
 10 | MrMonkeyMan        |  29,768,750  |    7
 11 | Kollision          |  29,559,450  |   ALL 
 12 | Smraedis           |  29,062,960  |    6 
 13 | freddiebamboo      |  26,963,410  |    7
 14 | TVG                |  26,150,200  |    6
 15 | MJR                |  24,888,520  |    6
 16 | Galdur             |  24,145,140  |    6
 17 | GLS                |  23,048,570  |   ALL
 18 | javel              |  22,687,420  |    6
 19 | Edge               |  22,554,690  |    6
 20 | Kiken              |  22,243,210  |    6
 21 | THE ALLETT         |  20,113,360  |    7
 22 | mulletgeezer       |  19,968,700  |    6
 23 | brokendivide       |  19,197,180  |    7
 24 | xipe               |  19,151,800  |    6
 25 | Tvspelsfreak       |  18,890,740  |    6
 26 | LAshujin           |  18,776,210  |    6
 27 | tviks              |  17,895,080  |    6
 28 | Darkwolf7          |  17,374,940  |    6
 29 | Dennis             |  16,670,960  |    6
 30 | BonusJZ            |  16,638,930  |    5
 31 | Neverland          |  15,9XX,XXX  |    5
 32 | Vincere            |  15,432,120  |    6
 33 | Marcodlb           |  15,396,150  |    6
 34 | PBMax              |  15,247,120  |    6
 35 | Davey              |  15,144,090  |    5
 36 | NRS                |  15,142,320  |    6
 37 | Leeram             |  14,860,510  |    5
 38 | elbarto            |  14,654,680  |    5
 39 | Randorama          |  14,450,230  |    6
 40 | Sparky             |  13,675,910  |    6
 41 | maxoon             |  12,035,740  |    4
 42 | Moteuchi_Yota      |  12,010,320  |    5
 43 | Buffi              |  10,513,780  |   ALL
 44 | ED-057             |   7,697,410  |    5
 45 | SpryteMix          |   7,118,590  |    4
 46 | Super laydock      |   7,064,080  |    4
 47 | Cannibal           |   6,451,780  |    3
 48 | Sword              |   6,347,070  |    4
 49 | TalkingOctopus     |   5,837,860  |    5
 50 | DC906270           |   5,703,920  |    4
 51 | raiden             |   5,586,300  |    3

[MauCast]

Windina
Maucast - 44,112,470 - ALL vid

old Calice score

[EmperorIng]

I am trying to see which character I want to play as, and dipping my feet into scoring. This is a kind of kooky and interesting system but man, those flickering bullets are killer.

Hellhound
EmperorIng - 12,612850 - 4



https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2806992876
^ a video of me flailing through the first four stages

This is just a start! I have also been playing as the Pulstar ship, Dino 246, and while the force+bits make the game far easier, her slow speed really can make getting through the stage and collecting medals a chore - especially when her homing missiles tend to kill enemies towards the back of the screen, which will then drop a medal and make them all go down in value

Hellhound is a fairly standard ship I suppose, but its speed makes it easier to use and it has decent enough firepower. Its charge shot and "bomb" have some utility, but the Pulstar ships' charge bomb seems to be almost entirely worthless unless it's some massive damage-dealer that I am unaware of.

Here's hoping for some more updates! I'm getting my medal values up to max by stage 3 and then milking the boss for all he's worth - this is super easy with the Dino btw thanks to her shield blocking the destructible bullets. I am still too chicken to milk the final phase - I haven't even 1cc'd yet! The big hump will be figuring out a good route for the stage 6 boss and dealing with those invisible attacks.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

the Pulstar ships' charge bomb seems to be almost entirely worthless unless it's some massive damage-dealer that I am unaware of.

It's basically there for the multiplier bonus, and to have a pierce shot for popcorn enemies when the need arises. Both Dino ships want to be shooting 99% of the time, and this is actually true of the rest of the ships as the charge shots in this game don't generally outdamage rapid fire. The only exception is the Aryustailm whose sword charge attack is very very powerful (Aryustailm is also the only ship whose slower tap shot is stronger than the rapid fire piercing beams you get from tapping quickly, they're very weak).

Some damage info when I was learning the game for the 1CC and messing with each shot type:

Peplos: Exceptionally weak unless you have a rapid fire button setup, in which case very high rapid fire is literally game breaking and allows for final boss milking that apparently makes Peplos banned for score competition.

Windina: Very powerful rapid shot, and doesn't require super fast tap speeds to achieve if you're playing on an original cab without a rapid fire setup. Popular ship that's easy to use, but is rather slow, so scoring is a struggle.

Aryustailm: The sword charge shot deals massive damage, second only to 30 hz Peplos rapidfire? Long range damage is quite decent too, but seems to be under Windina. The shield charge shot will block some shots if you're struggling to dodge them, so that's handy to have as an option for the clear, though it's no Dino 246.

Hellhound: Modest damage, meh charge shot, decent move speed. The homing missiles aren't bad, but there's better ships out there.

Dino 135: Damage is very similar to the Hellhound, same movement speed too, but you can aim the option in different directions which can be handy at times, and you get a bit wider spread + blocked shots above and below you. I prefer this to Hellhound slightly, though you need a fairly fast tap rate to keep the option shots locked in front, so if you're playing without rapid fire it doesn't work nearly as well.

Dino 246: Easiest ship to clear with I think, assuming you're using a rapid fire button. The shield in front is massive, the damage is comparable to Hellhound (the homing missiles you fire are slower but significantly stronger when they connect), and the spread is quite good. Speed is low like Windina. Like the other Dino ship you need a fairly fast tap rate to keep the option shots locked in front, so if you're playing without rapid fire it doesn't work nearly as well. It blocks a lot of dangerous attacks, including a fairly nasty, dense spread the final boss fires.

The first time I 1cc'd the game was a no miss with this ship thanks to being able to block a lot of otherwise scary bullets. Not a popular ship because it feels more Pulstar than Blazing Star.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

the Pulstar ships' charge bomb seems to be almost entirely worthless unless it's some massive damage-dealer that I am unaware of.

It's basically there for the multiplier bonus, and to have a pierce shot for popcorn enemies when the need arises. Both Dino ships want to be shooting 99% of the time, and this is actually true of the rest of the ships as the charge shots in this game don't generally outdamage rapid fire. The only exception is the Aryustailm whose sword charge attack is very very powerful (Aryustailm is also the only ship whose slower tap shot is stronger than the rapid fire piercing beams you get from tapping quickly, they're very weak).

Some damage info when I was learning the game for the 1CC and messing with each shot type:

Peplos: Exceptionally weak unless you have a rapid fire button setup, in which case very high rapid fire is literally game breaking and allows for final boss milking that apparently makes Peplos banned for score competition.

Windina: Very powerful rapid shot, and doesn't require super fast tap speeds to achieve if you're playing on an original cab without a rapid fire setup. Popular ship that's easy to use, but is rather slow, so scoring is a struggle.

Aryustailm: The sword charge shot deals massive damage, second only to 30 hz Peplos rapidfire? Long range damage is quite decent too, but seems to be under Windina. The shield charge shot will block some shots if you're struggling to dodge them, so that's handy to have as an option for the clear, though it's no Dino 246.

Hellhound: Modest damage, meh charge shot, decent move speed. The homing missiles aren't bad, but there's better ships out there.

Dino 135: Damage is very similar to the Hellhound, same movement speed too, but you can aim the option in different directions which can be handy at times, and you get a bit wider spread + blocked shots above and below you. I prefer this to Hellhound slightly, though you need a fairly fast tap rate to keep the option shots locked in front, so if you're playing without rapid fire it doesn't work nearly as well.

Dino 246: Easiest ship to clear with I think, assuming you're using a rapid fire button. The shield in front is massive, the damage is comparable to Hellhound (the homing missiles you fire are slower but significantly stronger when they connect), and the spread is quite good. Speed is low like Windina. Like the other Dino ship you need a fairly fast tap rate to keep the option shots locked in front, so if you're playing without rapid fire it doesn't work nearly as well. It blocks a lot of dangerous attacks, including a fairly nasty, dense spread the final boss fires.

The first time I 1cc'd the game was a no miss with this ship thanks to being able to block a lot of otherwise scary bullets. Not a popular ship because it feels more Pulstar than Blazing Star.

It's been said with the Aryustailm fightercraft that the Blazing Star game can be "counter-stopped," scoring-wise -- something that the Yumekobo developer team had not foreseen nor anticipated when making it (unless they had some alpha/beta highly-skilled play-testers retained on hand to tell them of that "particular issue" beforehand -- but it was eventually discovered "after the fact" after it was released in both Japan and the USA with it's initial "grand debut" back in February of 1998 "with warts & all" baggage issues).

Of course if had Yumekobo known about the above listed issue, they would've gone back and rectified/fixed that issue before it's "final version" release. So be it.

----------
Another famous arcade stg title from the joint-collaborative effort of Capcom & Takumi is the CPS2-based Mars Matrix stg that can be counter-stopped as well.

To remedy that particularly impressing issue of being counter-stoppable with the arcade version of Mars Matrix, for the Sega Dreamcast console release, Capcom simply added a couple of extra zeroes to the Player 1's and Player 2's overall scores -- "a simple but elegant" solution/workable remedy in retrospect nowadays.

Yumekobo could've simply added an extra set of two more zeros to the Blazing Star's Player 1 and Player 2 scores and "called it a day."
----------

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[EmperorIng]

Practicing more with the Dino 246! And have a very pleasant PB to document on my journey to sub-mastery

Dino-246
EmperorIng - 23,169,800 - 6



I haven't practiced stage 6 much so the boss was a bit of a mess. I died right before I could kill this guy with the rainbow orb, a x128 that's worth almost 4 million! Maybe next time
This is my first time getting to this boss anyway, so I consider this a good victory.

Milking bosses allowed me to max the blue medal value before the stage 3 boss, which is a really good goal to have to shoot that score up. Though superplays can get the max value by stage 2 and I still have not figured that out, lol. Unfortunately I died twice on stage 4, which is always more chaotic than it seems. This left me hamstrung for the next two stages. Stage 6 is a nightmare! How do you deal with that huge enemy rush section? It seems there just to hard-wall you off the machine!

the Pulstar ships' charge bomb seems to be almost entirely worthless unless it's some massive damage-dealer that I am unaware of.

It's basically there for the multiplier bonus, and to have a pierce shot for popcorn enemies when the need arises. Both Dino ships want to be shooting 99% of the time, and this is actually true of the rest of the ships as the charge shots in this game don't generally outdamage rapid fire. The only exception is the Aryustailm whose sword charge attack is very very powerful (Aryustailm is also the only ship whose slower tap shot is stronger than the rapid fire piercing beams you get from tapping quickly, they're very weak).

Thanks for the write-up, it's very appreciated! I have now since figured that the charge shot is really only situationally useful, and the charge bomb, at least for the Pulstar ship (where you press B after shooting a charge shot) is almost never used. I imagine that if you are scoring at the highest level, getting a lot of enemies at x24 or x48 or something might give you a few extra hundred thousand points for the edge... But far more important is triggering the flying Yumekobo in stage 1*, jacking the rank up high, and building that blue medal value ASAP to get to their max value of 81,560.

I initially was using the Windina solely because I liked the rapid shot plus the character design, lol. The Aryustailm was too slow for my tastes... But lately I have been using the very-sluggish Pulstar ship anyhow so who knows! I would like to try clearing with the other Dino ship as well, even if controlling these bits are a pain.

@PC Engine Fan: If the game can be counterstopped with the Aryustailm, it hasn't happened yet! They did have to ban the Peplos because it theoretically can during the infinite milk of the final boss (the only boss without a timer). I don't know why it can get away with it versus the other ships - I guess there comes a point where the other ships are too slow to dodge the final boss moving around? I'm not sure.

*Since finding information on this game can be a little tricky, to trigger the flying Yumekobo, you have to:
-collect a winged orb
-do not shoot until it leaves (unclear as to whether or not it has to leave the screen, or it just needs to play the jingle that its time is expired)

Then, the next time you'd trigger an "Event Item" it will be the winged Yumekobo, which makes every enemy shot down drop a power-up (or blue medal). This cranks the rank up very quickly, and higher rank = more destructible bullets which means more medals to collect. Rank goes up to 256 and you can see what your rank was by the results screen at Game Over.

This game really needs a wiki page and Video Index!

[Mero]

I think Peplos can counterstop because the final boss throws out some high HP objects that only Peplos has enough firepower to destroy.

[EmperorIng]

I think Peplos can counterstop because the final boss throws out some high HP objects that only Peplos has enough firepower to destroy.

I was actually watching the highest-scoring Dino 135 replay last night per Plasmo's topic, and noticed that after a few cycles, all the Boss Babies that big Boss Baby throws at you suddenly rush you at high speed and don't stop till you die. I suspect then that the Peplos can actually outrun them with her speed and kill them with her rapid-fire, allowing the fight to continue.