Shmups aren't dead - Argue thread! \o/

[louisg]

The number of recent good console shmups out does not seem all that far off from the number during the 16-bit era. What the popularity of shmups in the late 80s/early 90s really gave us was a massive flood of mediocre titles such as Arrow Flash or Deep Blue, and I think that even the lowest budget title these days has more gameplay value than those-- and the crap ratio just gets worse when looking at the imports. I'd argue that the biggest shift is not in the quantity of good games (arcade-only titles conviniently excluded), but in the interest and knowledge of the genre by the mainstream.

Let's also take a look at some very common game genres in the 80s that are (mostly) no longer with us:

- Adventure Game (and don't forget Text Adventures!)
- Turn-based Strategy-- or strategy games in general which don't revolve around tech trees and factories.
- Run n Gun (like Mercs/Heavy Barrel/etc)

These are truly dead genres: the only activity for example in new text adventures comes from a small and dedicated community. No commercial company these days would ever touch those. And, while every few years a new adventure game is released, it is nowhere near the amount available when Sierra and LucasArts were at it.

Add to this argument a renewed interest in games with arcade-like gaming values (like Geometry Wars), and shmups are far from toast.

[Nuke]

- Adventure Game

I beg to differ, just check out http://www.adventuregamers.com/ to see a genre thriving, although not as strong as in it's Lucas Arts/Sierra years.

And quality text adventures get released all the time as Indie freeware, some recent efforts even putting some of the classics to shame!
Ba's excellent guide page should get you started: fhttp://www.wurb.com/if/

[jpj]

i look forward to the genre being all but dead. nearly there

[DEL]

I've watched the first 4 episodes of the documentary Rise of the Video Game and if you were to take this doc as Gospel, 2D Shoot'em Ups never existed after 1982.
I'm not joking, the Rise of the Video Game documents Tennis for Two on a 1950s oscilloscope, then interviews Steve Russell for Space War in the 60s, it then shows Nolan Bushnell and Al Uncorn with Pong - fine so far...then we get some nano clips of Defender, Millipede and Donkey Kong.
Then the whole 1984-1992 Golden Era of arcades gets OMITTED completely , the next thing you see is a skip of 10 years to Sonic the Hedgehog and three episodes praising a Western programming industry dedicated to making games as Hollywood movies, claiming how brilliant Doom and Grand Theft Auto are. Saying that their Holy Grail is to promote an emotional response from the gameplayer .
Their quest for realism continues.

[Nuke]

Worst. mocumentary. ever! (I refuse to call it a documentary).

[320x240]

Then the whole 1984-1992 Golden Era of arcades gets OMITTED completely

That is to be expected as those years mark the era, more or less, between video-games first and second venture into mainstream culture. In those in-between years video-games was only something kids did "because they didn't have anything better to do".

Of course now we have high-brow games like GTA etc. No wonder video-games are mainstream once again.

[PROMETHEUS]

- Turn-based Strategy-- or strategy games in general which don't revolve around tech trees and factories.

I don't agree man, communities of players of games such as Heroes of Might and Magic or Civilization seem way way bigger than shmups communities to me. It's kind of niche as well, but at least that niche isn't nearly dead like the shmups niche is outside of japan. I mean, sure we are a bunch of guys but there's so few of us that you could almost count on your fingers how many players there are in each country. Hopefully Treasure will continue to make stuff like Gradius V or Ikaruga to keep the genre known to the mainstream public.

[UnscathedFlyingObject]

Shmups are not dead, they're comatose.

[elfhentaifan]

They're undead

[DEL]

320x240 wrote;

DEL wrote:
Then the whole 1984-1992 Golden Era of arcades gets OMITTED completely

That is to be expected as those years mark the era, more or less, between video-games first and second venture into mainstream culture. In those in-between years video-games was only something kids did "because they didn't have anything better to do".

^You're being totally ironic right!?

The 1984-1992 Golden Era of Arcades was a huge burst of games (from Japan only that is). Literally hundreds of new arcade games being released in those years for players to compete on.

If you're not being ironic, you're on the wrong forum.

[sven666]

tired topic.. might as well proclaim that "world of warcraft is finished!"

[DEL]

tired topic..

True, but most chat thread topics are.
This one piqued my interest though, purely because of the Rise of the Video Game omission.

[Rob]

The number of recent good console shmups out does not seem all that far off from the number during the 16-bit era.

07 was the worst year for shooters since about 95.

[FIL]

Shooters from 1984-1992 didn't have nearly enough boobs and pretty dresses.

[spadgy]

320x240 wrote;

DEL wrote:
Then the whole 1984-1992 Golden Era of arcades gets OMITTED completely

That is to be expected as those years mark the era, more or less, between video-games first and second venture into mainstream culture. In those in-between years video-games was only something kids did "because they didn't have anything better to do".

^You're being totally ironic right!?

The 1984-1992 Golden Era of Arcades was a huge burst of games (from Japan only that is). Literally hundreds of new arcade games being released in those years for players to compete on.

If you're not being ironic, you're on the wrong forum.

I remember arcades being pretty popular then too, and machines in every pub and chip shop and son on in the UK. And not crappy fruit machines and MegaTouch consoles...

Seemed really mainstream to a 12-year Spadgy!

[PC Engine Fan X!]

Yep, the American arcades thrived in the years of 1984 to 1992...it wasn't like how it was in 1980 to 1983 when it was possible to see such new arcade game titles being churned out every week. My local arcades back in the early mid 1980's always made sure that the newest arcade game cabinet was placed dead center upon entering...and seeing all those quarters lined up on the cabinet's marquee + people lined up to try it out for the first time. Those days are long gone -- never again to be repeated... ^_~

Witness the short-lived arcade laserdisc game fad that lasted from 1982 to 1984 for the USA arcade industry with Atari Games' 1984 Firefox laserdisc-based arcade cabinet boasting a Phillps laserdisc player that didn't have that usual momentary lag time searching for the next scene to load up & play, it was instantaneous from the get-go (lasted until 1985 for the Japanese arcade laserdisc game industry)...

Sure, Atari's Freedom Fighter arcade laserdisc game, Leland Corp's 1991 Dragon's Lair II arcade laserdisc game & Sega/RDI's Time Traveller holographic-based arcade laserdisc game came out in the late 1980's & into the early 1990's -- it was already considered "a dead format" as far as arcade laserdisc games were concerned (not to mention Pioneer's damned expensive LaserActive gaming console & it's laserdisc-based software titles)...

Of course, with the advent of laserdisc technology back in the early 1980's, it paved the way for the CD-Rom format which lead to the DVD-Rom format and branched out into the current Blu-Ray DVD & HD-DVD format wars..... ^_~

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[320x240]

DEL wrote:
You're being totally ironic right!?

The 1984-1992 Golden Era of Arcades was a huge burst of games (from Japan only that is). Literally hundreds of new arcade games being released in those years for players to compete on.

If you're not being ironic, you're on the wrong forum.

Arcades have never been mainstream in the way video-games are now. Popular among a certain crowd? Yes. Mainstream? No. It was always a sub-culture. Gaming was a sub-culture.

[Rob]

I wonder how many people could recognize Pac-Man. I'm guessing a whole lot.

[szycag]

Text adventures aren't a dead genre just because companies aren't interested in them, that's actually kinda counterproductive. All you really need to make a text adventure is imagination and time, not so much a budget. I would think that genre is kind of built around small dedicated communities, and always has been in a sense. You could handle the distribution of one of those yourself, and rely on word of mouth if it's good.

Point being some enthusiasts are probably glad these games are no longer in the public eye...

[spadgy]

I wonder how many people could recognize Pac-Man. I'm guessing a whole lot.

Exactly. That yellow face is more well known than Lady Di.

[Dragon1952]

Shooting games are not dead, merely another niche genre that lives on forever next to every other game genre and type.

[shoe-sama]

tbs is dead?

[Syndicate]

I wouldn't say shmups are dead, just not as popular as other genres.

[320x240]

I wonder how many people could recognize Pac-Man. I'm guessing a whole lot.

Pac-Man was born when video games where (arguably) more mainstream than they later became. Are we forgetting the big shakeout of 83-84?

Video games where always a cult/youth phenomenon and like many things that have started out as such, it has now become mainstream.

[-Bridget-]

I dont think the shmup genre is dead at all.

Rather, I think it's simply become something different from what it used to be.


The distribution method seems to be changing..... We see alot of doujin shmups now, and also there's quite alot of these appearing in places like XBLA or PSN.


I think the whole problem was, that FINDING games like this, for, say, the PS2, was nigh-impossible, cause most retail publishers are, well, stupid, when it comes to stuff like that. But distributing them over XBLA/PSN.... alot easier. Alot less risk, less cost than retail. And games like Geometry Wars are bringing this genre to people who might not have tried it before.


Any genre in which I can keep finding new awesome games to love (like Galaxies, which I recently picked up and got absorbed by), is a genre that's far from dead.


But it's definitely not the same as it used to be...... but, really, I dont think that's a bad thing at all.

[shoe-sama]

i hope you're talking about gradius galaxies lol

[Arvandor]

You know he meant Geometry Wars >=]

Outside of doujin (which rarely offers up anything worthwhile), '07 has me convinced that the genre is finally dead, or at the very least in its final hour. Of course Cave will pop one or two out until they stop making money from them, but aside from that, and as far as console ports goes, it looks like we're done for.

[MR_Soren]

<i>Adventure Game (and don't forget Text Adventures!)</i>

Phoenix Wright, Touch Detective, Hotel Dusk


<i>Turn-based Strategy-- or strategy games in general which don't revolve around tech trees and factories.</i>

Fire Emblem, Advance Wars, Panzer Tactics, Dai Senryaku, Disgaea, Civilization, Romance of the three Kingdoms... and Battle for Wesnoth which I wrote about three lines of code for.


</i>Run n Gun (like Mercs/Heavy Barrel/etc) </i>

Heeeeaaaavy Baaaaaarrel! My dream is to own a cab with twisty joysticks and PCBs for Heavy Barrel, Time Soldiers, and Ikari Warriors. Because red grenades explode bigger. I miss those games so much.

Sadly, Run N Gun is pretty dead these days. Except for Contra 4, which is amazing. I hear Metal Slug 7 and Commando are also being developed for DS.


The DS is the place where dead genres get resurrected. That's why I love it so much. The DS also had more first-person dungeon-crawl RPGs in 2007 than all other systems combined. That was with two games, BTW.


However, to be more serious, it is sad that many of my favorite genres are out of mainstream and thus the few releases in those genres are rarely carried by major retail outlets. (I've yet to see Contra 4 in a Target, for example)

I wouldn't even know a lot of these games existed if I didn't spend far too much time reading forums. Dai Senryaku (PS2) and Panzer Tactics DS are flying stealth.

[spadgy]

Doesn't the fact that this website, and this very thread show they aren't dead?

Shakespeare's work isn't dead, and he stopped writing that a way back.

And we all know shmups are absolutely comparable to Shakespeare, thanks to their power, popularity, influence, and ability to convey the overwhelming passion of both love and war, moving audiences and critics to tears and yelps of joy...

I'm joking of course, but something that still evokes passions simply not dead. Except for necrophilia victims of course...

[evil_ash_xero]

They strike me as "dying". You can't get Cave's stuff, and they're about the only dedicated shooter maker. Treasure rule, but only put out one game about every few years(shooters that is). We're genuinley at a point where if something happens to one or two companies, that would be it: The death blow. I mean, there really isn't a whole lot to choose from.

I always thought the mid to late nineties was kind of the pinacle of shooters. High quality games, released once or so a year(Razing, Cave, Treasure, Einhander, R-Type Delta, Gradius Gaiden). Now, it's like...poof. Nothing.

s/m