Ibara BlackLabel location test in akihabara Feb 3

[thesuperkillerxxx]

@GaijinPunch

Greatly appreciated! Thank you for the quick response!

7 more days woohoo i cant wait to play this game.

[captain ahar]

damn cave, i am seriously thinking about buying the ibara ost (as well as mushi).

[undamned]

The pop they have at Hey! is noticeably larger than standard Cave pops. Plus, it's not folded. It is likely they have access to high res images and printed their own, but who knows.

I thought that all of Caves' loke test setups were super deluxe compared to what comes w/ a "full" kit. Wish I could see a pic of DP, DDP, ESP Ra.De., Guwange, or Dangun loke test scenes!
-ud

[EOJ]

Sorry to dig up such an old thread, but this seemed like the closest thing to an Ibara BL thread I could find.

I just got the game last night, and so far I'm very impressed. It's much harder than I assumed, substantially more difficult than the PS2's arrange mode, which sorta feels like a joke after you play BL a bit.

I really like the bullet-buzz multiplier system (officially termed the "XTC system"). It's somewhat similar to Mushihime-sama or DDP chaining in its feel. You don't actually get the multiplier to raise just by having your options touch bullets, you actually have to fire, and each bullet you hit while your options are "buzzing" increases your multiplier. It's pretty hard to get it up to 9999, I've only done that a few times thus far. You have to have the rank at MAX and slowly move through a mass of bullets. Boss milking is extreme in this game, perhaps more than any other shmup out there, but it's actually more fun than boring, so that's fine with me.

I feel Mushi Futari took some stuff from this game as well, particularly the 'sucking in stuff on screen' while holding the C button (or not pressing any button), but not being able to do this while holding the A shot. Futari has a much larger "sucking-in" range than this game though, you have to be relatively close to suck in stuff in IBL.

Overall this game is really solid. It's arguably even more complex than the original Ibara. Scoring in this game takes a lot of planning and skill.
Pretty impressive that this game was programmed by ONE GUY at Cave (named Mamoru Furukawa)!

Anyway, I just felt like posting some impressions, as there are relatively few on this game.

Oh, and so far I haven't run across any glitches, such as those mentioned by bay. And the serial on my PCB is IB-169, so there's probably a couple hundred of these boards out there.

[sven666]

i can only agree with TWE

ill check my PCBs sereal no this evening, if it is anything like the DOJ BL there wont be much weight behind it tho..

its not impossible that there only were 100pcs.. the PCB is sold out (brand new) since a while back and this is not a common game in japanese arcades, saw it in maybe 2-3 places while i was there.

[EOJ]

its not impossible that there only were 100pcs.. the PCB is sold out (brand new) since a while back and this is not a common game in japanese arcades, saw it in maybe 2-3 places while i was there.

You could still buy new kits in December 2006, but they didn't have the box with the black label sticker on it. I'm pretty sure at least 200 PCBs were made, maybe a bit more. Also, these seem to number from 1 on up. I've never heard of one with a number over 200 though, so who knows.

Let's see, mine is 169, Whitey's was 127, and zlk and (I think) superpang both have serials under 100. Guess we'd have to ask bay and other guys here who own it what their serials are. There are about 10 people on these forums with this game, I highly doubt that this forum owns 10% of ALL the Ibara BL PCBs in the world.

[GaijinPunch]

"XTC system"

I thought it was called the Baradise system.

[zlk]

I think on the dvd they mention XTC stands for "extreme terror counter." I enjoyed playing black label. In fact, I like it much more than regular ibara.

If you are going for the 1cc here is a hint: Hadou bomb the final form of the last boss before it starts attacking. Continue doing so until you run out of hadou bombs. This will prevent the boss from launching its final attack. Once it starts its attack mode and starts kicking out enemies and bullets (destroyable and regular) your hadou will not be able to reach the boss and you will in some trouble.

[bay]

Oh, and so far I haven't run across any glitches, such as those mentioned by bay. And the serial on my PCB is IB-169, so there's probably a couple hundred of these boards out there.

my PCB is IB-109

i've run into the graphics glitch where the background stretches right before the 2nd boss (i believe) again, the night of the last shmupmeet.

[sven666]

mines IB-079

there goes the only 100 theory out the window maybe they made an extra 100 printrun?

[EOJ]

"XTC system"

I thought it was called the Baradise system.

Baradise is the system involving the x300 multiplier and the roses. Bomb some big object/enemy and you get the Baradise multiplier to kick in, with roses released that lower your rank when you suck them in. If your rank is at MAX, for some enemies all you need to do is blow them up with your shot to get this multiplier to kick in.

The XTC system is the "bullet buzz" multiplier system, as I mentioned.

Generally, you score much higher if you maintain the XTC (extreme terror counter) throughout most of a level, rather than using the Baradise multiplier throughout the level. On the bosses you want to get the XTC up to 9999 then kick in the Baradise for the x300 multiplier kill. Once you use the Baradise multiplier, the XTC counter goes back down to zero. There are some tricks to get around this using the Hadou gun, but they only really work on some of the bosses.

[bay]

there goes the only 100 theory out the window maybe they made an extra 100 printrun?

perhaps we can get someone with a good relationship with cave, like fujita, to inquire on the printrun of the pcbs?

TWE, you seem to keep good contact with fujita. care to inquire?

[sven666]

fujita insist there were only 100 made, im guessing cave will say no different.

oh yeah ive never had any glitches with my PCB.. maybe its printrun related?

[bay]

oh yeah ive never had any glitches with my PCB.. maybe its printrun related?

i believe TWE mentioned that he had seen the dissapearing boss glitch on the normal ibara. it would make me think that it doesn't matter the print run, just your luck in mucking up the state of the game.

perhaps the haphazard way i play the game triggers the 'Gaijin' bit in the game and it punishes me with the glitches?

[EOJ]

fujita insist there were only 100 made, im guessing cave will say no different.

That's pretty interesting, but Fujita is not right about everything (they had no idea that some Mushi PCBs could save hi scores, for example). So far mine has the highest serial we have on record (169), but that's not to say they didn't just pick 100 random numbers from 1-200.

It's strange that the final batch of PCBs didn't come with the Ibara BL sticker on the box. Fujita said Cave "ran out of them". If Cave planned to make only 100 in the first place, surely they would have printed 100 stickers as well. Both Fujita and Excellent had batches of these "stickerless" Ibara BLs late last year. So, it is clear at least a small second batch was produced. Due to this I'm almost certain there were more than 100 made, but I still think the overall number is below 200.

Anyway, here's everyone on these forums I know to have an Ibara Black Label kit:

TWE
sven666
bay
zlk
zak
whitey
superpang
ill6
neocps2
neophil

That's 10. Anyone I'm missing? And those who haven't submitted your serial, please add it if you don't mind.

[EOJ]

oh yeah ive never had any glitches with my PCB.. maybe its printrun related?

i believe TWE mentioned that he had seen the dissapearing boss glitch on the normal ibara. it would make me think that it doesn't matter the print run, just your luck in mucking up the state of the game.

perhaps the haphazard way i play the game triggers the 'Gaijin' bit in the game and it punishes me with the glitches?

You know what, I noticed on the bottom of my Ibara BL PCB there's one of those orange Cave "service" stickers (with a service number printed), meaning my board was fixed by Cave (for whatever problem it had). Maybe some of these boards were glitchy, and you had to send them back to Cave to get them fixed? If I were you I might look into getting your board fixed, if the glitches happen often. I've played mine a bunch now, and there are no glitches whatsoever. I'll let you know if I come across something, but it sounds like your glitches are fairly frequent.

Also, can anyone confirm a small glitch-type thing when entering your initials on the high score screen? On my PCB, if you're Player 2, you cannot hold UP to quickly scroll through the letters, but you can hold DOWN to do this. On the 1P side there is no problem.

[bay]

I'll let you know if I come across something, but it sounds like your glitches are fairly frequent.

ever since i mucked with my settings in the menu and enabled score ranking (rather than todays highs) im not getting glitches. we'll see if that holds true.

Also, can anyone confirm a small glitch-type thing when entering your initials on the high score screen? On my PCB, if you're Player 2, you cannot hold UP to quickly scroll through the letters, but you can hold DOWN to do this. On the 1P side there is no problem.

on mine 1P down seems to work, but up doesn't. 2P neither work.

i caught these as the glitch happened right as i died... hasnt happened since, which as i said above.. might be cause i mucked in the settings.



larger pics:
http://www.countercultured.net/~bay/iba ... itch-1.jpg
http://www.countercultured.net/~bay/iba ... itch-2.jpg

[EOJ]

ever since i mucked with my settings in the menu and enabled score ranking (rather than todays highs) im not getting glitches. we'll see if that holds true.

I did this right when I got the board. After I enabled score saving and turned on freeplay, I went to "game mode", but the blue screen stayed and it said "error!". Did you get this? I just restarted the PCB and it has been fine since. I even went back into the test menu, and I could exit via the game mode option without a hitch. Weird! Maybe it's just some glitch when you first enable score saving?

on mine 1P down seems to work, but up doesn't. 2P neither work.

Make sure you hold down the joystick a second or two. Unlike most games, there is a delay before it starts scrolling fast. Pretty weird that neither of these work on the 2P side for you!

i caught these as the glitch happened right as i died... hasnt happened since, which as i said above.. might be cause i mucked in the settings.

So that was AFTER you enabled score saving?

I've played some more, and I still have zero glitches. I checked for the stage 6 demorun graphic glitches, and I don't have them thankfully.

I have to say those pics you posted of the glitch look like bad news. That looks more like a defective board than just a "glitch" to me. Especially considering no one else seems be experiencing stuff like that.

[bay]

I did this right when I got the board. After I enabled score saving and turned on freeplay, I went to "game mode", but the blue screen stayed and it said "error!". Did you get this? I just restarted the PCB and it has been fine since. I even went back into the test menu, and I could exit via the game mode option without a hitch. Weird! Maybe it's just some glitch when you first enable score saving?

i never got an error saving or exiting the settings mode. when i first got the board i went into the settings and enabled freeplay. i didn't even realize there was score saving to enable, i've just been playing accepting todays high scores being wiped.

when i enabled score ranking and then goto game mode, it went to a screen like what you see when the board is booting up (memory check blue screen thinger), stayed there doing nothing for awhile, then the normal game screens started. i've not seen that happen when mucking with settings (on purpose to see if it happens) since. weird pcb man..

Make sure you hold down the joystick a second or two. Unlike most games, there is a delay before it starts scrolling fast. Pretty weird that neither of these work on the 2P side for you!

yah, i've held it down. definately just that one works. also, in the test menu i tried it, and the same holds true for cycling through the sprite test. only 1P down will cycle.

So that was AFTER you enabled score saving?

ever since i enabled save ranking/scores, i've not seen the glitch.

I checked for the stage 6 demorun graphic glitches, and I don't have them thankfully.

i had no glitches on stage 6 demorun either.

[EOJ]

when i enabled score ranking and then goto game mode, it went to a screen like what you see when the board is booting up (memory check blue screen thinger), stayed there doing nothing for awhile, then the normal game screens started. i've not seen that happen when mucking with settings (on purpose to see if it happens) since.

Yeah this is the same thing that happened to me, but after a few seconds up in the upper right corner it said "error!". Maybe if I waited a few more seconds it would have just switched over to the game, like it did for you.

[eretsua]

i unhijacked this thread by making my own thread about whether i should buy Ibara Black Label or Ibara Pink Sweets here, please see / respond there.

i really could use some input from you all regarding where i'm spending my fortune on.

eretsua

[eretsua]

a bit late but here are some first impressions that i wrote down when i just received my pcb. it's mostly written in response to someone asking the difference between ibara arrange and ibara black label.

The original Ibara (or Arcade-mode on the ps2) is very close to actually being a Raizing / 8ing game (gameplay-wise very close to Battle Garega, I think). Arrange is closer to becoming an actual Cave game but still has some Raizing / 8ing influences in there but Black Label, though having some similarities to Arrange like the in game graphics and most of the bullet patterns but it's actually a whole different, full fledged Cave game.

The Baradise system (getting your rank up, bombing a massive amount of bullets and picking up the roses for major points) which is present in Arrange is pretty much ditched for Black Label. Instead BL has the XTC-system which stands for eXtreme Terror Counter which is a extrapolated version of the bullet-grazing that was present in the original Ibara / Arcade mode (though there it only yields very small amount of points).

So not unlike in Psyvariar you're suppose to fly as closely past the bullets as possible in BL and this will up your XTC-counter to a maximum of 9999. the XTC-counter will act as a multiplier for the roses when you bomb a massive amount of bullets. I'm not a 100% sure but I think that when you bomb your XTC-counter will be reset to 0 so that pretty much makes it only usable for score on high rank boss battles. Dying resets your XTC counter (and rank) for sure. When you bomb you will see your multiplier appear on in huge numbers on your screen in Espgaluda-ish style which is very cool looking and makes the game more lively.

Another important difference between Arrange and BL is that in BL there is no formation change anymore, only weapons change. Personally i think it's a huge improvement cause i didn't like that formation system of Arrange at all.

Then there is the attract mode . In BL rank objects, bomb fragments, weapons, etc, etc will be attracted to your craft and fly towards you if you come within a certain distance to an object. This makes picking up the rank objects a whole lot easier and the game in general a lot less rigid. Because(?) picking up rank objects is so much easier your rank fills up a whole lot faster than in Arrange. This makes makes BL also a whole lot more intense. The bullets patterns (even on no rank) are denser / more difficult than in Arrange. Arrange does feel a lot easier after spending time with BL.

Other differences include that Meidi Rose is now wearing a string instead of the some what censoring underwear she's wearing in the ps2 version. BL has the original Ibara soundtrack though the Teresa Rose boss tune is different (i think) and lot more violent. Naturally BL is not affected by the scaling and filtering issue's that plague the ps2 version. So everything is presented in a glorious, pixel sharp low resolution of 240x320, just like it's supposed to be.

A bit of a shit thing is that you still have to be player 2 if you want to play with Dyne / play with those specific craft speed & bomb characteristics. Another major disappointment is that the BL pcb doesn't seem support high score saving. It does however support stereo sound output, which is nice of course.

If you want to see BL in action you may consider picking up Insanity Naked Hunter's The Lunatic - Ibara appreciate dvd. It holds a pretty sweet and impressive superplay of BL in the outtake section.

if i said something that isn't correct feel free to correct it.

eretsua

ps.

Sorry to dig up such an old thread, but this seemed like the closest thing to an Ibara BL thread I could find.

same here, maybe rename this thread to the "official ibara black label thread" for future reference?

[glitch]

BL has the original Ibara soundtrack

i remember stage one having the same tune as in arrange.
is my memory corrupt?

[Pointman]

Interesting. Does BL require a 4 button setup or is it akin to an ESPGaluda 2 setup? (3 buttons with an optional 4th if you need to remap the controls)

[nietzschedancing]

Interesting. Does BL require a 4 button setup or is it akin to an ESPGaluda 2 setup? (3 buttons with an optional 4th if you need to remap the controls)

It requires a four button set up.

[Pointman]

Interesting. Does BL require a 4 button setup or is it akin to an ESPGaluda 2 setup? (3 buttons with an optional 4th if you need to remap the controls)

It requires a four button set up.

Arse. Ah well I'll have to go back to pretending that the original Ibara is really good then

[bay]

BL has the original Ibara soundtrack

i remember stage one having the same tune as in arrange.
is my memory corrupt?

it definately has a different tune than normal ibara, as for the same as arrange, im not sure.

Another major disappointment is that the BL pcb doesn't seem support high score saving.

you just need to enable it in the setup menu.

It does however support stereo sound output, which is nice of course.

i didn't notice this, but my cab is mono anyway.

[hermosaguy]

Thank you for updating this thread! I'll post my serial when mine arrives.

[EOJ]

i didn't notice this, but my cab is mono anyway.

No, it's not stereo. No SH3 boards outputs stereo. They're all mono.

And a lot of the music is different in Ibara BL. Though the only tunes I remember vividly being different were stage 1 and the stage 6 boss fight.

[hermosaguy]

Number 047...and by the way, I LOVE this game so far...only gripe is the bullets can be hard to see with all the debris...also wish you could pick between the two pilots, but that is a minor gripe.