It's the adrenaline that kills me

Skykid · Post by **Skykid** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:15 pm

You know that feeling when you suddenly become a bit too aware of what's happening in a shmup - like reality suddenly kicking in, and you start analysing bullet patterns a little too closely and then BANG! All over.

I used to think getting in the zone with shmups was the adrenaline taking over, but that's not really how it works. I think with really insanely good players (Futuboshi: Progear 2 ALL) they probably play so calmly its boring.

It's not about getting in the zone any more - it's about zoning out instead. As soon as I start paying attention instead of running on autopilot, is when I make the stupidest mistakes.

Does this run true for anybody else?

sven666 · Post by **sven666** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:19 pm

beeing in the zone has nothing to do with adrenaline pumping, its about staying calm and focused when you should be spazzing out..

but yeah im just like you, if i can taste a new highscore coming on in a game ive been practicing alot i usually crap out completely

jpj · Post by **jpj** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:42 pm

sven666 wrote:if i can taste a new highscore coming on in a game ive been practicing alot i usually crap out completely

for sure

if you watch the guy doing the double-play on the raiden III inh dvd, the guy looks positively bored

Skykid · Post by **Skykid** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:42 pm

sven666 wrote: but yeah im just like you, if i can taste a new highscore coming on in a game ive been practicing alot i usually crap out completely

Yeah, that's exactly it. You suddenly become completely aware of everything, and then you die. Horribly. In places you normally wouldn't.

8 1/2 · Post by **8 1/2** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:49 pm

When I was about 9 I took a kitchen knife and walked out the front door, which faced out to a large pine tree in our front yard. I had been imagining how I could throw a knife and stick it into the tree like I had seen in movies. In one motion, I opened the door, looked at the tree, threw it, and THUBBBB.... it stuck perfectly. I spent the next two hours making another 100 throws that never stuck.

It's really a switch between conscious and unconscious thinking to me. It's like trying to get a date with a girl and you bumble about and make a fool of yourself. Sometimes I'm simply too aware that I'm sitting alone on the floor holding a little plastic object with buttons on it and trying to be entertained by some electronic puzzle.

My best runs in shmups are when I trust what I know and just play. Getting better at a game is always about overcoming mental roadblocks like "Oh no, I'm no good at the Stage 3 boss, I'm probably going to die." I have to instead say, "Ok, I know this, it's hard, but I know this," and I'll get through.

Does anyone else talk themselves through tough patterns? I totally do this all the time. "Ok, blue orbs on the left, then that fucking yellow beam down the middle... ok, then the little ships come out on the left, but I have to push up to avoid the green triangles that come up from down low."

jonny5 · Post by **jonny5** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:50 pm

Skykid wrote:
sven666 wrote: but yeah im just like you, if i can taste a new highscore coming on in a game ive been practicing alot i usually crap out completely
Yeah, that's exactly it. You suddenly become completely aware of everything, and then you die. Horribly. In places you normally wouldn't.

same here...i will maneuver through a massive screen filling pattern with little effort and then be like....'wow.....i cant beleive how well im doin'.....dead from single slow moving bullet

ive also found that my first run of the day tends to be my best....even if i play for hours afterwards....odd, huh?

jpj · Post by **jpj** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 5:57 pm

8 1/2 wrote:Does anyone else talk themselves through tough patterns? I totally do this all the time. "Ok, blue orbs on the left, then that fucking yellow beam down the middle... ok, then the little ships come out on the left, but I have to push up to avoid the green triangles that come up from down low."

i tend to do this too

as i'm explaining it to an observer. but when i am playing in front of people, i play total shit

i think rationalising bullet hell is an interesting concept

Jockel · Post by **Jockel** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 6:02 pm

Funny thing is, usually i can keep a conversation going, even when i am i.e. shredding through DOJ. But yeah, i do have the same problem, the moment i realize what's going on.
But thanks to ADD i don't do that often ^_~
Once i am "in the zone" it all seems so easy and i take the hardest risks.
However, if i die then (which happens most of the time) i am completely discouraged to continue. Especially with stupid deaths.

MX7 · Post by **MX7** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 6:06 pm

It's all about the unconsciousness, playing it until you perform in a state of non thinking, or 'empty headedness' if you will. As any musician in particular will attest, when you are able to play a song without thinking about what you are doing, you know you have mastered it. There's some heavy neuroscience involved with this, but I'm too tired to look it all up

Jockel · Post by **Jockel** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 6:08 pm

sry 4 OT, but quite a cool band you got in your sig.
i suppose that's your band?

MX7 · Post by **MX7** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 6:18 pm

yeah, that's us. We've written about 20 songs but are just too lazy to record any more properly. Good things will start to happen soon, I promise

Skykid · Post by **Skykid** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 6:50 pm

I like the way this thread is going - it's like shmup therapy. Everyone just gets it all out in the open.
It is extremely encouraging to know that, when facing tasks as difficult as mastering rock Japanese shmups, we all face the same battles.
Like gaming soldiers.

I agree with everything that's been said. It's like turning and throwing something into the bin at the office. I've come to find if I just turn an shoot without thinking, I nearly always get it. Only when I stop, judge distance and take aim, does it go horribly wrong.
This is proof if anything that shmups work on instinct - of course practice is required, but instinct it of utmost importance.

I've been playing progear and what partly prompted this thread was that the 3rd stage boss has a certain pattern (not desperation) he spits out. For months and months never a problem with that one. All of a sudden one day I looked at it and thought "this actually looks really hard". BAM! Now I die at it every time because I know it's coming up.

jpj · Post by **jpj** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:25 pm

MX7 wrote:It's all about the unconsciousness, playing it until you perform in a state of non thinking, or 'empty headedness' if you will. As any musician in particular will attest, when you are able to play a song without thinking about what you are doing, you know you have mastered it. There's some heavy neuroscience involved with this, but I'm too tired to look it all up

i find it really difficult to write down tabs or manuscript of stuff even if i've played it a hundred times

on topic: i guess it's a case of learning to trust yourself.

and is this what people mean by muscle memory? ie if you've learnt to chain a level in dodonpachi, and without any great thought, your hands just know

sven666 · Post by **sven666** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:31 pm

sometimes i put a piece of tape over the highscore.. it actually helps my progress in some games as it helps me to focus on the survival part.

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:31 pm

sven666 wrote:beeing in the zone has nothing to do with adrenaline pumping

Which is funny because that's what being "in the zone" is

trivial · Post by **trivial** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:34 pm

I compare this to thinking about what you're doing while descending a certain multiple of stairs at a time. It busts your pattern recognition first, and your coordination second, and your ass third.

thamasha69 · Post by **thamasha69** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:43 pm

My 1st run of the day usually is my best as well. I also find that if I have one or two stupid deaths towards the 1st half of a game, I get discouraged and assume my run is nearly over....however knowing that I only have one or two lives left helps me focus more and make it through difficult sections (Stage 4 boss ESP Ra de). Whereas if I no miss through 3-4 stages I get overly confident/excited and die incredibly stupid, losing my concentration and getting mad.

JHJ · Post by **JHJ** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 7:53 pm

FRANK: (confidential) Estelle's got the (jerks his elbow) jimmy arms.

KRAMER: You can get that in your arms?

FRANK: Like you wouldn't believe.
_________________________________________________________

The jimmy arms/hands...happens to me all the time when I'm about to break a hi-score, achieve a new goal, conquer a difficult chain, etc. Overcoming this is one of the great challenges for me with shmups. But getting yourself into the "zone" and breaking your past personal records is also one of the great feelings while playing; at least for me

KindGrind · Post by **KindGrind** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 9:13 pm

I've always felt trying to hard makes waste when it comes to high scoring. I'm not much of a high scorer myself, though...

It's usually when I play expecting nothing that I break my records. But it is when I play in front of people, talking with them as I play that I do best. When I escape near deaths I don't go: "how the hell did I survive that?" I just act out as if it were normal. I got to 6B on Border Down with one credit recently showing it to a friend, something I never got close of doing before.

indstr · Post by **indstr** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 9:29 pm

8 1/2 wrote:Does anyone else talk themselves through tough patterns? I totally do this all the time.

The last few nights when I've been playing Gigawing, I have been yelling at it when I am waiting for my reflect to charge back up. "MOTHERFUCKER, THERE'S TOO MANY BULLETS AND IT'S ABOUT TO CLOSE ME IN... OTAY ANY TIME NOW"

Skykid · Post by **Skykid** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 10:07 pm

thamasha69 wrote:I get discouraged and assume my run is nearly over....however knowing that I only have one or two lives left helps me focus more and make it through difficult sections (Stage 4 boss ESP Ra de). Whereas if I no miss through 3-4 stages I get overly confident/excited and die incredibly stupid.

I'm exactly the same as this, however I wouldn't say having less lives helps me focus more - on the contrary, it helps me relax because I reckon I've fucked it up so bad, who cares? Inadvertantly, this is when I do the best.
When I 1cc'd Mushi it was hilarious to think back on - I'd lost two live before the end of the second level! Go figure...

Post by **Icarus** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 10:20 pm

Restart syndrome is the worst habit to have as a shooting game player. It is often better to keep playing even if you have made several errors early on, and experiment - you often learn new techniques this way.

As for "the zone"...

Skykid wrote:It's not about getting in the zone any more - it's about zoning out instead. As soon as I start paying attention instead of running on autopilot, is when I make the stupidest mistakes.

The best way to play a game is by getting it down to muscle memory, if you're going to play for score, at least. If you can do whole stretches of the game without thinking "I should be positioned here" or "I should shoot this first" then you'll be making good steps forward. The only way to drill it into muscle memory is by constant practice. Good, considered, near mechanical practice, not "flapping around the screen like a headless chicken" practice. ^_-

Taylor · Post by **Taylor** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 10:46 pm

This is it! This is The Run! ...ah, bollocks.

KindGrind · Post by **KindGrind** » Thu Aug 07, 2008 10:54 pm

[quote="Icarus"]Restart syndrome is the worst habit to have as a shooting game player. It is often better to keep playing even if you have made several errors early on, and experiment - you often learn new techniques this way.

I am totally the restarter type. I must have restarted Ikaruga at least 20,000 times, yet I suck at it big time. Sure I can chain well early on: I did it thousands of times. Lately I've kind of toned it down a bit, and I've been scoring much higher on just about all games I played.

DirtyMonk · Post by **DirtyMonk** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 2:14 am

Just do whatever feels right for you.

Aru-san · Post by **Aru-san** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 2:26 am

Icarus wrote:Restart syndrome is the worst habit to have as a shooting game player. It is often better to keep playing even if you have made several errors early on, and experiment - you often learn new techniques this way.

This is the main reason why I've started to hate playing Star Soldier R, a game where you're forced to play for score, for score.

JoshF · Post by **JoshF** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 2:40 am

Kinesthesia is the best way to learn anything. That's what the zone is. I'm in the zone when I'm able to run down my stairs fast where if I was in someone elses house I would probably break my neck.

Aru-san · Post by **Aru-san** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 2:58 am

JoshF wrote:Kinesthesia is the best way to learn anything. That's what the zone is. I'm in the zone when I'm able to run down my stairs fast where if I was in someone elses house I would probably break my neck.

Yeah, and there's a book that explains a diet that claims will put you in kinesthesia for most of your life. It's called "The Zone" diet.

Maybe if everyone took this diet, everyone who plays shmups will be so freakin' good at it! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAsomeonekillme

JoshF · Post by **JoshF** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 3:07 am

and there's a book that explains a diet that claims will put you in kinesthesia for most of your life

Either you're getting the claim wrong, or it was written by Kevin Trudeau.

Aru-san · Post by **Aru-san** » Fri Aug 08, 2008 3:29 am

JoshF wrote:
and there's a book that explains a diet that claims will put you in kinesthesia for most of your life
Either you're getting the claim wrong, or it was written by Kevin Trudeau.

It was written by Barry Sears. It's pretty much a weight loss diet that reduces fatigue dramatically.

I guess I got the claim wrong because reduced fatigue =/= kinesthesia.