Gun Frontier vs Battle Garegga

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 12:35 pm

Can anyone jog my memory on this.. is the similarity between these two due to them sharing designers or where the Raizing crew simply big fans of the Taito game?

Post by **system11** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 12:48 pm

Mike Bevan lives!

sven666 · Post by **sven666** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 12:52 pm

MikeB wrote: or where the Raizing crew simply big fans of the Taito game?

thats the case as far as i can remember.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 1:25 pm

Mike Bevan lives!

Lol.. I certainly do

Been spending my time recently writing for Retro Gamer, you might have seen the CPS-2 feature last month, with the Shmups article you contributed to!

Am currently trying to get a two-page article on Garegga into the mag so that's why I'm asking

zinger · Post by **zinger** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 1:49 pm

Not sharing any designers. There's a long thread about similarities and stuff somewhere around here. Do a bit of searching.

DEL · Post by **DEL** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 1:54 pm

If Rando was around he'd give you a perfect answer.

As for the similarities between the two, they are more than just similarities. They must be the same programmers (mostly).
In the same way that the Darius team partly became the GREV team and Toaplan partly became Cave.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 1:59 pm

Thanks DEL. To be honest I'd assumed it was Raizing were merely fans of Gun Frontier and wanted to develop the ideas therein further, so unless anyone knows specifically otherwise that's what I'll write.

PS Like the Avatar

Limbrooke · Post by **Limbrooke** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 3:40 pm

MikeB wrote:
Mike Bevan lives!
Lol.. I certainly do

Been spending my time recently writing for Retro Gamer, you might have seen the CPS-2 feature last month, with the Shmups article you contributed to!

Am currently trying to get a two-page article on Garegga into the mag so that's why I'm asking

Is it going to be a 2-page like what Radiant Silvergun got. A small margin for notes on one page the rest a photo, or will it be a discussion on the port to Saturn to be placed in the 'Full of Eastern Promises' section? I hope it's the latter.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 4:14 pm

Is it going to be a 2-page like what Radiant Silvergun got.

Don't worry I share your pain on the brevity of the Silvergun two-pager, it'll be an Eastern Promise feature. Obviously I won't be able to go into the amount of detail that an on-line source might but hopefully it'll cover most of the major features.

If anyone wants to suggest anything I should mention feel free.

icycalm · Post by **icycalm** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 5:28 pm

Dude, I have a question, if you don't mind satisfying my curiosity.

Are they paying you?

Because if they are not, why not just post your stuff on your website?

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 5:48 pm

Heh. funnily enough in this instance no I volunteered the piece, but I enjoy seeing them in the mag and let's face it to get a niche game like Garegga into a high-street publication is pretty cool.

There's already a bit about it on my site.

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 6:07 pm

Nah, they don't share the same designers, just that the designers of Battle Garegga thought Gun Frontier was really, really cool (whether Yagawa or Nakashima is the culprit nobody will ever know) and had to adapt some thematic and gameplay elements into their game, which is essentially a bastardized version of Zanac.

They made an oo%* improvement over Gun Frontier.

* - infinity percent

icycalm · Post by **icycalm** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 6:12 pm

MikeB wrote:Heh. funnily enough in this instance no I volunteered the piece, but I enjoy seeing them in the mag and let's face it to get a niche game like Garegga into a high-street publication is pretty cool.

There's already a bit about it on my site.

Fair enough, but as far as I am concerned the "bit about it" should be on the magazine, whereas the more in-depth piece should be on your site.

Putting anything in magazines these days is largely a waste of effort. GamesTM for example did a review of Mario Kart Arcade GP 2 (a horrible horrible review, by the way -- but that's beside the point) but if you do a google search the only one you'll find is mine. In the long run, whatever goes in rags gets read by about 100 times less people than what goes online. So my advice to you would be not to put too much effort into Retro Gamer -- especially since you are not seeing a dime for it.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 6:19 pm

Fair enough, but as far as I am concerned the "bit about it" should be on the magazine, whereas the more in-depth piece should be on your site.

Heh.. I'll take that as a compliment, and I do see your point, however I think more people are likely to see the article in the mag than they would on DAM and subsequently discover the game, which is fine by me. People reading my site are more likely to know the game already.

I'll probably collect together all the RG published pieces I've done and shove them on DAM at some point anyway.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 6:27 pm

They made an oo%* improvement over Gun Frontier.

Eh.. woot? Do you like Garegga or not.. I can't make it out

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 6:55 pm

I choose Gun Frontier.

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:00 pm

MikeB wrote:
They made an oo%* improvement over Gun Frontier.
Eh.. woot? Do you like Garegga or not.. I can't make it out

I love Garegga.

I fucking hate Gun Frontier.

Pretty easy to guess from here

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:00 pm

Rob wrote:I choose Gun Frontier.

Even shittier color scheme and illogical Taito-brand rank system.

Frederik · Post by **Frederik** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:08 pm

icycalm wrote: Putting anything in magazines these days is largely a waste of effort. GamesTM for example did a review of Mario Kart Arcade GP 2 (a horrible horrible review, by the way -- but that's beside the point) but if you do a google search the only one you'll find is mine. In the long run, whatever goes in rags gets read by about 100 times less people than what goes online. So my advice to you would be not to put too much effort into Retro Gamer -- especially since you are not seeing a dime for it.

I don´t really follow the market from a professional viewpoint, but I somehow got the impression that game magazines are dying like flies nowadays. As for myself, a games mag is one of the last things I would spend money on, mostly because I can get thousands of reviews condensed at sites like Metacritic.com, and can filter those I trust from those who are incompetent. (The only one I nearly bought was "The best 100 games" from THE EDGE, mostly because it had beautiful pages full of sprite rips, but it was 20€ in Amsterdam.)

And MikeB, you are not paid to do reviews for a mag? Being an illustration student, we are told to be highly cautious with giving away our work for free, mostly since we are ruining the jobs for others this way. The most common argument is "free exposure" which I think applies to your profession as well. I know that it probably is a great feeling to see your work in a high-street magazine, but I somehow get the feeling they are on the better side of the equotation. Because in the end of the day you need to make a living somehow, if it´s not purely a hobby of yours. Know what you can do and know your price. Because they are making money from others people work they didn´t have to pay for.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:28 pm

I'm actually a fairly recent convert to buying Retro Gamer, I don't really read any other mags and can take or leave something like GamesTM or EDGE these days but I do think RG does stand out as worthwile. Even the ones with Mr Campbell

At least it tries to produce stuff that can't be found on the web, such as the Making Of features that have exclusive content/interviews with developers. I recently did one on Rescue on Fractalus (for the next issue) and I must say it was a real honour to speak to guys like David Fox, and Charlie Kellner (who went on to create The Eidolon, one of my favourite games of all time). The feature will be the first anywhere to converse with the entire Lucasfilm games group since the release in '85. There's nothing like it on the net. And don't worry.. I got paid

I used to think print magazines were an out-dated commodity with the advent of the internet but after picking up a few issues of RG (before I started writing for it) I quickly realised how much I'd missed a quality mag since which reminds me of the like of ZZap64, Mean Machines or Amiga Power..
While the web is a great resource there's nothing to compare with actually holding something solid in your grasp and savouring it page by page.

I'm now frantically searching ebay to try and track down issues I've missed (I made of mistake of being completly disinterested for the first 25 issues for similar reasons to those you stated).

Give it a try.. you might be surprised.

zinger · Post by **zinger** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:33 pm

DEL wrote:As for the similarities between the two, they are more than just similarities. They must be the same programmers (mostly).

That's some wild assumption, man.

Do tell if you find something noteworthy from the credits lists:

***Gun Frontier***

THE AUTHOR & PRODUCE
TAKATSUNA SENBA

GAME DESIGN
TAKATSUNA SENBA
TAKAMASA HORI
TAKAYUKI OGAWA
NAOYA KUROKI
BRODY TADASHI
M&F NAGAI
YACK

ART DIRECTOR
TAKATSUNA SENBA
TAKAYUKI OGAWA

PROGRAMMER
TARABAR
NAOYA KUROKI

HARDWARE ENGINEER
TOSHIYUKI SANADA
BRODY TADASHI
TOMIO TAKEDA

DECORATOR
M&F NAGAI

SOUND DIRECTOR
YACK
OGR

CAST
HO LEE CHAN
OGAWA SHONEN

SPECIAL THANKS
HIDEKI HASHIMOTO
HIDEHIRO FUJIWARA
TOSHI KOUNO
AKR FUJITA
ZAK MUNN
JINSEI YANU
OHNO WEP OKICHI
TSUYOSHI SATO
RYOHCHO YAGI
NAKAMURA TAICHO
MARCHIN KONDOH
YOSHIAKI KOUNO
MASAKI OGATA
HISAO YUKI
HISAO SHIMIZU
ICHIRO FUJISUE
YOSHIDA SHOUIN SAYURI
SHIRO IMAOKA
SEIJI KAWAKAMI
MAN KOHYAMA
EDO MIYAZAWA

DEDICATED TO
KATSUJIRO FUJIMOTO

***Battle Garegga***

Director
Kazuyuki Nakashima
Programming 68000 Side
Shinobu Yagawa
Yasunari Watanabe
Programming Z80 Side
Yuichi Ochiai
Graphics
Shinsuke Yamakawa
Mitsuakira Tatsuta
Sound effects
Manabu Namiki (Santaruru)
Test players
Mr. Daigoro, Marika F.

And what Twiddle hinted at. Gun Frontier seem to have totally randomized game mechanics, while Battle Garegga is very well balanced.

Frederik · Post by **Frederik** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:36 pm

I´ve never seen it here in Germany, though, but that one might be the only one that sparked my interest. I was more talking about mainstream mags. One pretty good german mag is GEE.

http://www.geemag.de/relaunch_stories.php

sven666 · Post by **sven666** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:40 pm

altho a 2 page garegga special is something i will be excited about it is hardly the kind of piece gamesmagazines in general throw themselves over, i think just to get it published is a great feat in itself, looking forward to reading it.

short of a picture of the arcade kit i cant really contribute anything tho.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:48 pm

That's why I admire RG.. they actually let me

Last month I managed to include Eco Fighters, Dimahoo, Progear, 19XX, 1944 and Alien Versus Predator mini-reviews over a four page CPS-2 spread.. yes FOUR pages on a dead 15 year old 2D arcade system! How many mags would publish that?!

Plus there was an 8-page shooter feature that got in mentions of Dodonpachi, Batsugun, Tiger Heli, Darius Gaiden, Radiant Silvergun and more..

And there was even an interview with Mr. bloodflowers

icycalm · Post by **icycalm** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 7:58 pm

MikeB wrote:Last month I managed to include Eco Fighters, Dimahoo, Progear, 19XX, 1944 and Alien Versus Predator mini-reviews over a four page CPS-2 spread.. yes FOUR pages on a dead 15 year old 2D arcade system! How many mags would publish that?!

Ummmm...... you know, they ARE called "Retro" Gamer, after all. It would in fact be strange if they DIDN'T devote most of their pages to talking about old games.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 8:04 pm

Good point

Having said that most of those latter day CPS-2 shooters are only borderline 'retro' but they still said 'OK'

zinger · Post by **zinger** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 8:56 pm

Eco Fighters, a 16 BIT title, released 14 years ago isn't retro?

Mortificator · Post by **Mortificator** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 10:05 pm

Garegga! Fuck yeah!

Suicide again to drop the motherfucking rank!

Garegga! Fuck yeah!

Feb 3 ROM's the only way!

POW-up whore, your credit's through, 'cause now you have to answer to

Garegga! Fuck yeah!

........

I really need to take the Team America theme off my Winamp playlist.

Anyway, there are lots of games that rip-off ideas from earlier titles. Many game developers were game players themselves, after all. Garegga doesn't share developers with Gun Frontier and Zanac any more than Bust-A-Move shares devs with Snood.

Twiddle wrote:essentially a bastardized version of Zanac.

I was playing Garegga yesterday and thinking about Zanac too. Maybe this should be a seperate topic, but are there any other games that make rank control such a huge part of gameplay? Maybe Warning Forever, if that counts as rank.

MikeB · Post by **MikeB** » Mon Oct 15, 2007 10:22 pm

Eco Fighters, a 16 BIT title, released 14 years ago isn't retro?

most of those latter day CPS-2 shooters are only borderline 'retro'

DEL · Post by **DEL** » Tue Oct 16, 2007 8:43 am

Ok zinger I take your point, but I was playing Gun Frontier recently and the similarities were everywhere. So it is surprising to me that there were no shared developers/programmers

.

-----------------------------
With regards to magazines, I still think its better to see your work on a nationally printed glossy mag (and I did buy that issue with the Bloodflowers interview

). So I've gotta agree with MikeB there.

EDIT:- One more thing to mention about Gun Frontier. The PCB is hard to 1CC. We used to 1 credit to the Last Boss on 2 player games in the arcade, but never 1CC'd it on a game of singles.
By the way, I don't think we ever figured out how to get a shot into the Last Boss's rotating shield either

.

shmups.system11.org

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