What was the first shmup to implement chaining mechanics?

louisg · Post by **louisg** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 3:53 am

Those guys in M.U.S.H.A.'s sky level with the ball & chain maybe?

SFKhoa · Post by **SFKhoa** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 4:52 am

louisg wrote:Those guys in M.U.S.H.A.'s sky level with the ball & chain maybe?

Hahahahaha.

j^aws · Post by **j^aws** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 5:02 am

Defender, circa 1980? ...You can chain multiple Humanoids by catching them after destroying Landers... can't think of anything earlier...

SFKhoa · Post by **SFKhoa** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 5:23 am

[deleted]

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 5:25 am

Mars Matrix

j^aws · Post by **j^aws** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 5:27 am

^^ Well, that's not true... you can chain in Stargate, and Defender is it's prequel...

BrianC · Post by **BrianC** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 7:04 am

What about Vulgus? In that game, your secondary weapon is this thing that hits multiple enemies at once for extra points.

j^aws · Post by **j^aws** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:08 am

^^ I'll have to refresh my memory with Vulgus, but it's circa 1984? ... Even Stargate precedes it, circa 1981 though...

Turrican · Post by **Turrican** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:32 am

Right, as far as bonus items-related (humanoids to rescue) we're back to Defender, until someone will tell us that destroying two aliens with the same bullet (if it's even possible) in Space Invaders does multiply the score.

Now what about enemy-related chaining? I mean the most basic "destroy an entire formation, get bonus points" stuff.

j^aws · Post by **j^aws** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:41 am

Turrican wrote:Right, as far as bonus items-related (humanoids to rescue) we're back to Defender, until someone will tell us that destroying two aliens with the same bullet (if it's even possible) in Space Invaders does multiply the score.

I wish I could remember... haven't played Invaders in years...

Turrican wrote: Now what about enemy-related chaining? I mean the most basic "destroy an entire formation, get bonus points" stuff.

Aforementioned Vulgus sounds applicable.

I haven't finalized my voting yet, but I'll be voting for an Arena shmup called SWAT, also circa 1984 (Sega/ Coreland). It has what you describe with it's 'triggered' bombs...

bVork · Post by **bVork** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 11:55 am

Galaga had formation bonuses.

Fenrir · Post by **Fenrir** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 12:57 pm

bVork wrote:Galaga had formation bonuses.

Well, technically Gyruss too :b but maybe it's one year older.

Turrican · Post by **Turrican** » Tue Mar 20, 2007 3:03 pm

conclusion: chaining score system has been with us since the very beginning.

Case closed.

gameoverDude · Post by **gameoverDude** » Wed Mar 21, 2007 2:25 am

For an older game, Konami's Juno First (1983) has a chaining system that's likely the closest to Dodonpachi. The chain time does not replenish with each kill, however.

When you shoot a certain UFO and capture the Mystery alien that ejects from it, the screen goes red and you get bonus points for every enemy shot during this time. The value goes up by 200 (i.e. 1000, 1200, 1400 and up) with every kill until the chain time runs out. In later stages, the value for the first kill in a chain is higher.

05pro · Post by **05pro** » Wed Mar 21, 2007 3:29 am

Whilst we all know what's meant by chaining in modern STGs, each chaining mechanism is vastly different from its peers. EG chaining in DDP is nothing like in Chaos Field which is nothing like Ikaruga which is nothing like Border Down.

You would need to say that the purpose of chaining in all games though is to increase your maximum available score throuh the tactical use of the games inbuilt chaining / weapons system. Because of this I'd say that Space Invaders should be considered the originator.

On the original PCB of Space Invaders the score that the bonus UFOs gave you was linked to how many shots your ship had fired. By purposely missing aliens with some shots so that when you shot the UFO you would get a max score you could say you were chaining the UFOs!

You still had to shoot enough invaders to hinder their approach downscreen without shooting so many as to have them speed up too much whilst also counting your shots to make sure the UFO would be worth max points when you shot it. Taito however classed this as a bug and removed it from later prints of the PCB.

The other game from that era (pre 1980) that had a form of chaining was Galaxian. By shooting enemies when they were in flight you would score at least double what they enemy was worth if it was in formation. By only shooting enemies as they were in flight you would reach the maximum possible score with much less shots fired than if you only shot enemies that were in the convoy.

I think this is the earliest STG I know of with any form of score based chaining.