Shmup story lines. Needed or not?

[Asherdude]

Who here cares if a shmup has a story or not?

I never cared if a game had a story. In fact, I hate RPG's because I feel like the story line gets in the way of the gaming experience. So, I'm voting a big fat no!

[shoe-sama]

I'd lol if some character told their whole life story in some shmup.

[sfried]

Warning Forever has no story, and yet it is still awsome.

[Nuke]

Plane ice cream is good, but I like it when it comes with chocolate.

[BulletMagnet]

Depends: in some cases I think a game's backstory adds an interesting bit of definition to its atmosphere, while in other cases it simply distracts. It's not incredibly important to me either way as long as the game's other elements are well done, but it's a nice bonus if it's appropriate to the game in question.

[Twiddle]

despite being only seen on operator cards shmup stories are better than most rpg plots

i wouldn't notice if the story was completely absent though

[iatneH]

Hell with story lines. Need more panty lines!

[CIT]

Of course a good shooter doesn't need a story, but an interesting story/setting/characters can definitely improve the experience a lot.

A unified aesthetic/theme is really important as well though. A lot of (older) shooters have a wild jumble of stages, in one you'll be in space, then in ancient Egypt, then inside a giant intestine, etc. I hate that shit, it makes no sense!

[shinsage]

stories can help make a good game better.

[UnscathedFlyingObject]

I like stories as long as they don't get in the way and are good. The perfect example of story done right in a shmup would be Einhander.

[JusteZero]

Story can be good... but in a shmup I don't have the patience to read any more than "Blast off and strike the evil bydo empire!"

[BIL]

Of course a good shooter doesn't need a story, but an interesting story/setting/characters can definitely improve the experience a lot.

A unified aesthetic/theme is really important as well though. A lot of (older) shooters have a wild jumble of stages, in one you'll be in space, then in ancient Egypt, then inside a giant intestine, etc. I hate that shit, it makes no sense!

That's how I view things, pretty much. I think an interesting premise is always a nice addition, provided (of course) the shooter itself plays well. At the same time, I prefer shooters' actual story progression remain in the background, so to speak.

Rayforce and Metal Black are two good examples of what I mean. Both of them twist the usual "save humanity" theme around considerably (earth is now a monster humans must invade from beyond and destroy / jeopardising what little security already-defeated humanity has left, in order to liberate it), and gain a lot of atmosphere and personality as a result. RS's descent into an increasingly vicious mechanical hive, or MB's lonely trip into an alien wilderness; thematic strength like that really complements the action. And yet, although there's a definite feeling of story progression, there are no cutscenes or dialog boxes to slow things down (or mash through on repeat viewings) as in Gradius V.

I value an interesting backstory, especially when it's used to enhance the atmosphere of a shooter. At the same time, this isn't a genre where I want to stop playing and become a passive viewer; not for more than a few seconds at a time.

[shoe-sama]

Warning Forever has no story, and yet it is still awsome.

Did you just use Warning Forever and awsome in the same sentence?

Why must you turn this place into a house of lies?

[kengou]

In a shmup, I actually prefer no story at all. A story always feels tacked on and useless to me, and I don't want to read stuff when I play the game to shoot baddies and dodge bullets.

In most other games/genres, however, stories are great.

[Bloodreign]

I don't need a deep story, or even one at all, just blow up alien ass and get the job done, finish the game and come home a hero.

[-Bridget-]

I'd prefer these games to have storylines, actually.

Like for Gradius and R-type, I know the backstories and everything for those 2 series.

I think it adds to the immersion.


And for Mushihime, I wish I knew WHY the hell Im riding on a giant beetle of doom, fighting other giant insects of doom.

There is a story there, but I cant read Japanese......



These games dont NEED a story, but it helps, nonetheless.

[SteevTee]

Before recently, I could not care less about the stories. But after playing Radiant Silvergun and R-Type Final, I found it deepens the game and gives the player a cause for fighting. I especially like the time-travel/man-kind errors type stories.

[P_HAT]

stories can help make a good game better.

+1

[Damocles]

In a shmup, I actually prefer no story at all. A story always feels tacked on and useless to me, and I don't want to read stuff when I play the game to shoot baddies and dodge bullets.

In most other games/genres, however, stories are great.

You would hate Mid-Garts, then. A 94-page manual outlining the history of the gameworld and all important parties.

...and all for a mediocre shooter.

[Ed Oscuro]

Plane ice cream is good, but I like it when it comes with chocolate.

fuck ice cream and other things I can't have

I agree with the sentiment though.

In a shmup, I actually prefer no story at all. A story always feels tacked on and useless to me, and I don't want to read stuff when I play the game to shoot baddies and dodge bullets.

In most other games/genres, however, stories are great.

You would hate Mid-Garts, then. A 94-page manual outlining the history of the gameworld and all important parties.

...and all for a mediocre shooter.

Surprisingly, it doesn't weigh that much.

Also, you're not forced to flip through the manual while playing. These aren't Gold Box SSI "LOL TIME FOR COPY PROTECTION" games, after all.

[TKGB_Mental_Gear]

"Blast off and strike the evil bydo empire!"

Shakespere couldn't have made a better line.

You guys already know from my Aleste post that I want my stories in my game. There are some exceptions but for shmups, just like my other fav genres: Fighting and RPG, a story is a must.

My fav shmup happens to be Battle Garegga. Now I didnt knew there was a story to it but it's an excellent game. After reading up on it, I found out what it was about and it made the game even better for me. So I have to say that a story is not neccessary but it makes a nice treat. Why? I guess it makes the game more meaningful. Its just like the movies, some people like watching heros save the day and others like Rambo III.

Also for those who say that it interferes with the game, it doesn't have to be in the game itself but you could put it in the manual or in the case of an arcade game, as a intro sequence before you insert a coin. It don't matter to me just as long as it has a story.

[icepick]

I was just thinking about this recently, when I read the story for "Soldner-X." It might not've added much, but it certainly didn't take anything away and gave me a little something extra to think about why I'm flying around identical asteroids.

It's not like anyone really needs to know why, but just as shinsage mentioned, stories can help make a good game better. It adds another dynamic, a third or fourth dimension if you will, and even the smallest effort in this regard can be appreciated... I think. If it's bad, no harm done, right? I suppose that I'm not really used to thinking about them since all of my games are Japanese imports and I don't know the language yet, although thanks to various individuals I have the general idea of most of them.

Hey Bridget: Mushihime story.

I have to say that I really like games with widely-varying scenery though (space, then Egypt, then intes... well... forests or something), even if there isn't any storyline to glue them together. I just realized that I have no idea of what's happening in Trizeal, which is one of my favorite games. Then, reading the opening sequence of Border Down made me look at the first stage in a new light... I mean, it could've been some generic city for all I knew, and it still would've been cool.

You don't need a lot, but just as a little effort into crafting various unique locales is appreciated, so is the same effort going into describing the world in which a game resides. Sometimes it might not make a difference (I only just remembered that Psyvariar 2 has a big paragraph that scrolls up the screen), but you won't know unless you try... and anything in addition to "Insert Coin(s)/Press Start" is excellent by my account.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

By reading the fast-scrolling storyline to all three Psyvariar games gives the shmupper a better understanding as to why a psyonic-gifted special pilot who flies a cool unique space fightercraft (capable of transforming into other more powerful forms) to fight against a supercomputer type of entity and it's underlings type of senario... ^_~

Sure, the old "Supercomputer faces-off against humanity" tag-line has been done countless times before in the past but with the way how Success/Skonec whips up their own dire and grim futuristic setting with humanity hanging by the merest of threads of a slim chance of survialibility senario vision, it's an interesting read nevertheless.... ^_~

A supercomputer with all the latest & high-tech weaponry (and WMDs, of course) against humanity -- do humans (or genetically altered human subjected to intense psyonic-type experiments) really stand a chance of surviving such super slim & fatalistic odds of bringing it for down for good? Mankind had developed a new technology capable of creating A.I. that's organic-based material. Dare they give an all-knowing A.I. entity rein over their entire lives? Surely, that would be insane (and utter madness) to submit to that idealogy...but that is what is presented to the casual Psyvariar shmupper to learn more about.

"Do humans have future?....." is the ending tagline as shown in Psyvariar Revision shmup game...

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[roker]

9 times out of 10 I could care less

but ESPRade did it the best through the intros of the characters and the artwork in between the stages (what I'm referring to is the minimal effort created a big impact, negating the preconceived notions that cut scenes and the like are the absolute way)

I'd implore you guys to find a shmup that could tell a story like that without being superfluous

[Nuke]

Best story in a shmup? Are you great?

[stuminator]

In a shmup, I actually prefer no story at all. A story always feels tacked on and useless to me, and I don't want to read stuff when I play the game to shoot baddies and dodge bullets.

In most other games/genres, however, stories are great.

Pretty much the way I feel. As long as story segments don't take up more than a few seconds, that's fine, otherwise it slows down the game too much.

[icepick]

By reading the fast-scrolling storyline to all three Psyvariar games gives the shmupper a better understanding as to why a psyonic-gifted special pilot who flies a cool unique space fightercraft (capable of transforming into other more powerful forms) to fight against a supercomputer type of entity and it's underlings type of senario... ^_~

Supercomputer?! ^-^

I have only Psyvariar 2, but I will definitely read up on it! Maybe tonight, even.

As long as story segments don't take up more than a few seconds, that's fine, otherwise it slows down the game too much.

In my case, I was considering only "general" story information, as in the kind that you'd read in the instruction booklet. In-game story elements can be nice if you're having such a good time that the action could stand to be broken up for a short rest, but in most cases I as well don't like in-game story sequences at all.

Even a ~1-second brief illustration panel before a stage starts, with something like "... and now we head deeper into the forest" (I seem to be on about forests lately) might be too much, but that might also be extremely picky of me to say. I'll note that it was really neat when I figured out how to turn the dialogue off in Shikigami no Shiro II, since I don't speak Japanese but had already started to memorize what the characters said up to stage 3-1.

(At the same time, I kind of like the "mission briefing"/border select in Border Down. The path lines add a little something interesting that we wouldn't even know that we were missing, had they been omitted.)

[shinsage]

9 times out of 10 I could care less

but ESPRade did it the best through the intros of the characters and the artwork in between the stages (what I'm referring to is the minimal effort created a big impact, negating the preconceived notions that cut scenes and the like are the absolute way)

I'd implore you guys to find a shmup that could tell a story like that without being superfluous

your example reminds me of Axelay. The intro, anyways.
I'd always look deep into it, like the astronaut guy was a family man, then his family got killed so now he's just a badass man on a path of vengeance.
It was just an intro, but it set a very nice tone for the rest of the game while providing enough story for my satisfaction.

[Asherdude]

Or like Darius 2, where you go off to fight the fish people. But when you finish the game, you realize that it was just a bad dream and therefore a complete waste of time.

[FRO]

I'm in the "I prefer" category. I mean, some shmups are better for it. Take Philosoma, for example. On the surface, it's a bit sloppy, somewhat disjointed, and very mediocre. However, add the story & the cool dialogue, & it feels more immersive, even w/ the clunky control & weapon system. All of a sudden, a shmup that might not have had the time of day is suddenly more interesting. Granted, it doesn't shoot the game into the upper echelon, but it certainly makes it worth playing.

Another example would be TFIV. Great game completely on the merits of gameplay, level design, audio, & graphics. However, the interesting back-story simply adds ambiance - makes some of the game seem more like a sci-fi movie than just a shmup.