mrtie wrote:Hrap may be common ground but the Hori EX2 most certianly isn't. However it's not rocket science to throw a JFL or a ls32 inside one, just a pain in the ass an a lot of dremel work.
The EX2 (the black HRAP with a Sanwa stick and Hori buttons) is a fake JLF because it's common ground. I can't browse SRK because it's overloaded, but I'm fairly confident in saying that.
Anyway, my copy arrived today and I tinkered with it. I'm quite happy with the result. The menus are irritating and it took me a bit of digging before I found people on my friends list at the leaderboard section, since you need to use the dpad to switch between.. I don't know what.
As for the menus, I'm used to them because X = OK, O = Cancel. It's not usually like that for Japanese games, though. At least in the original DOJ for example, O is OK. Once you select Black Label, a bunch of other options come up, which seem to control differently to the previous ones. The previous ones are simply "X to proceed, O to go back" but the pre-game options use the Start and Select buttons, for some reason.
The loading times aren't that bad. I was expecting something much worse, actually. I'm extremely pleased with the "quick restart" option which is present (when pausing the game) and it resets the game immediately and faster than what it takes you to reset the PS2 version, shoving you back at the ship select screen.
As for in-game, well, I've never played Black Label before but I immediately noticed that chaining is easier and you're less likely to break your chain to the following:
- Picking up a powerup
- Chaining from a large ship with a laser to a small ship with a laser
- Chaining a small ship with your shot seems to have a longer chain time
But as for the port, the only irregularities I've detected have been the additional slowdown on the final pattern of the Stage 2 boss. Pre-game, the options also have a practice menu, but it lacks detailed configuration so you're not allowed to enter, say, Stage 3 with 2 or 3 hypers (like a normal run) or start at the boss. The configuration options are nice, but like someone said earlier, there's no configuration to change the position of the screen. The "horizontal control" option is there, too. I haven't seen that shit since Raiden DX.
My main complaint is that the screen is blurry. It doesn't look right. In comparison to playing it on a CRT, that is. Right now, I'm playing the game on a 1680x1050 monitor (which has black sides) and it feels a bit crammed, as well as unnaturally blurry. It isn't game breaking to play the game in yoko, I'm just not used to it any more.
I also installed the game to my HDD, but I haven't played since. I don't know what the loading times are like with the game installed. Thankfully the game is only 3.4GB to install, unlike a lot of other games which are 5-6+ GB or more. I only have a 20 gb hdd so I'm trying to be as conservative as possible here.
The game also came with a nicely detailed hand book. I like it. It shows the hitbox locations of both ships, which have changed from the original: Type-B's hitbox is further up, to the head of the plane and Type-A's hitbox is slightly lower. It also shows where all bee locations are for all stages.
In short, I think it was worth buying. A patch is coming, and it's not like it's unplayable until that happens. I don't recommend using the 360 dpad (although I was able to make it to Stage 5 on my first try, I ended up bombing on places which I would've normally been able to pass but wasn't capable of doing so thanks to the lack of dexterity in the 360's dpad) so definitely consider getting a SFIV stick, HRAP or SFIV pad if you want to get more out of this game. I wouldn't hold out much hope for a US release but I would most certainly put this down as a game to buy if you're getting or own a JP 360 (yeah, it's obviously region locked).
Edit: I also forgot to mention that the settings were on Very Difficult for BL before I hit the "default" button. Check yours.
Also, the game says it's copyright 2008 5pb, but they published it in 2009. I'm just nitpicking now though.
