Dodonpachi Daifukkatsu [Cave 2008]

[Elixir]

Having fun while scoring
Daioujou

Pick one.

I'm actually glad that dfk is easier. Games don't need pinpoint scoring systems or overly difficult patterns in order to be enjoyable.

[Plasmo]

I would like to hear your reasoning.

Donpachi:
+superb announcer
+excellent music
+a chain system that is actually forgiveable. I absolutely can't stand these pixel perfect movements you need in DDP and DOJ
+nice difficulty curve, I could imagine getting the 2-ALL someday
+stage 3
-broken chain system, your chain drops down after like 0,2secs and you often don't know why
-impossible rank during the loop

DOJ:
+great soundtrack, but has it's lows
+some of the best bullet patterns CAVE has ever made
+constant action on the screen
+creamy hypers
-most anal chain system EVER created, hypers make this even worse
-uncontrollable rank (you're not allowed to die nor bomb)

DDP:
+okish game if you want to have fun for 30mins
+no rank
-horrible chaining system
-max bomb bonus gives you like 60% of your final score?
-same repeating music over and over again
-the later stages kinda look the same to me or at least unimaginative

DFK:
+secret bosses from DDP
+chain system isn't THAT brutal anymore
-autobomb
-autobomb
-lasers aren't so creamy anymore
-bullet canceling that actually is no fun (quite surprising how they did that, usually it is fun)
-there are like 2 good tracks in the OST, the rest is shit
-graphics don't appeal to me
-unimaginative stage and enemy design
-lolis
-boring overall
-takes too long (lol stage 5)
-hypers get weaker the more you use, you don't really know when you can still cancel bullets and when the bullets cancel you

Of course that's just my opinion based on scientific facts, maybe you guys have other facts as a base.

[charlie chong]

i was looking forward to this a lot but when i played it(about 5-10 credits) at insert coin i just found it a big letdown. i just didn't feel any connection to my ship in the least due to the autobomb.
only cave game that i got to the 5th level on my first go. also i watched someone credit feed to the 2nd loop !!? whose bright idea was that
i wanna give it another try but my enthusiasm for this game has gone down a lot.
also the 5th level is some puzzle shooter bullshit

[Taylor]

Power mode doesn't have auto-bomb and makes hypers more consistent, though also more numerous. I also imagine everyone would like DFK’s enemy design and overall visuals if the bosses didn’t turn into giant mech girls, most of them are just ships from the older games with some more colour on them. It certainly better than DOJ in this department.

The laser cancelling other lasers, pushing lasers back based on thickness, and sometimes firing regular bullets as they get cancelled depending on their type seems like a great and overlooked addition. You basically have some weapon switching Ikaruga stylised mechanic that creates some interesting fights but isn't used in every single one. It clearly isn't used enough though, mechanically you could argue it's deeper than the polarity system but on the first loop it's only really used by the stage 3 boss, stage 5 intro, stage 5 mid-bosses and that bullshit psychic circular laser section. Everywhere else you only need to hold laser if there's one on the screen.

I agree that bullet cancelling isn’t fun, outside from the odd laser (whose origin dies in a matter of seconds) you’re basically just tapping shot in the center of the screen or holding it down at the sides. The chaining system isn’t that brutal, though how it works is deceptive and all the high scores do depend on rather tricky, um, tricks. Honestly, it feels more like a Mushihime-sama game than a DoDonPachi one.

[sven666]

dunno if you played the game but there is autobomb in power mode aswell, only difference is you start your life with 0 bombstock and have to pick up the bombs before they can be used, you cannot voluntarily use a bomb either since there is no bomb-button assigned in this mode.

the game is still to easy since in power mode you can go crazy with the hypers in a whole different way than the other modes (where you can use a hyper 3-4times/stage at a maximum before the rank gets too brutal, in power its never a problem even at max rank).

[adversity1]

Donpachi:
+a chain system that is actually forgiveable. I absolutely can't stand these pixel perfect movements you need in DDP and DOJ
-broken chain system, your chain drops down after like 0,2secs and you often don't know why

I've never actually played Donpachi so I can't comment, but damn seems like the two points above are contradictory.

DOJ:
+great soundtrack, but has it's lows
+some of the best bullet patterns CAVE has ever made
+constant action on the screen
+creamy hypers
-most anal chain system EVER created, hypers make this even worse
-uncontrollable rank (you're not allowed to die nor bomb)

Don't disagree here, and yes DOJ chains were hell.

DDP:

Agreed with everything here, although I haven't played this one as much.

DFK:
+secret bosses from DDP
+chain system isn't THAT brutal anymore
-autobomb
-autobomb
-lasers aren't so creamy anymore
-bullet canceling that actually is no fun (quite surprising how they did that, usually it is fun)
-there are like 2 good tracks in the OST, the rest is shit
-graphics don't appeal to me
-unimaginative stage and enemy design
-lolis
-boring overall
-takes too long (lol stage 5)
-hypers get weaker the more you use, you don't really know when you can still cancel bullets and when the bullets cancel you

I'm not sure what you mean by lasers not being creamy. They're creamy to anyone going for score. Stage 2, 3, 4 and 5 all feature laser canceling which jacks up your chain 2-3 thousand at a time, and is key for raising the multiplier to the max.

Bullet canceling being no fun is a non-sequitur since it is really a very minor part of the game. The second halves of levels 1, 2 and 4 for instance all have to be normal chained with no bullet canceling and the bullet canceling points in the first half of the levels aren't more than 2 per level if you know what you're doing. Daifukkatsu is more about jacking up your chain on the big laser installations and straight chaining from there then it is worrying about 500-1000 on the chain from bullet cancels.

I also completely disagree that the stage design is boring. Left/right scrolling, ura boss route, variable chaining routes with rewarding popcorn rushes, I find it very fun. For instance take the end of stage 2 in daioujou with all the buildings and popcorns which is just a blast to run through destroying for big points and if you have a big chain, cash in on the hidden bees. Daifukkatsu has fun sections like these in almost every level, especially 3.

Re: hyper rank increasing and bullet canceling becoming vague, it's a little confusing at first, but when you understand how the logic behind it works it's easy to plan around it and keep your chain intact.

i was looking forward to this a lot but when i played it(about 5-10 credits) at insert coin i just found it a big letdown. i just didn't feel any connection to my ship in the least due to the autobomb.
only cave game that i got to the 5th level on my first go. also i watched someone credit feed to the 2nd loop !!? whose bright idea was that
i wanna give it another try but my enthusiasm for this game has gone down a lot.
also the 5th level is some puzzle shooter bullshit

Ok, well play power mode and don't pick up any bombs.

People are really missing the point of Daifukkatsu. Like any company in the struggling arcade industry, CAVE has lowered the basic difficulty of the game in order to allow beginners to clear it, however they have simultaneously loaded one of the most hype scoring systems they've ever made into it. Didn't you guys play Deathsmiles? Mushi Futari? Hearing people complain about being able to 1CC it is like hearing veteran SF players complaining about beating Seth in their first run on SFIV. Just like SF is meaningless without someone to play it against, DFK is an empty shell without taking the scoring system as far as it can go. To put it bluntly: you're playing it wrong, and the score thread is proof of that.

[charlie chong]

i didn't really enjoy mushi futari as much as i thought i would either. I'm not hating on the game yet as i haven't put enough credits into it to fully understand the game mechanics just stating the fact that I didn't really enjoy what i did play of this game and as a fan of the donpachi series i found it dissapointing.
i hate fiddly scoring systems(see espgaluda 2) so that could be part of the reason but also the game just felt floaty and not right to me.

old cave>new cave for me.ever since galuda the games just seem to be getting weaker with more emphasis on shiny graphics than bullets that are fun to dodge. i do notice that a lot of people love the new cave games so i probbly just have shitty taste

[Taylor]

dunno if you played the game but there is autobomb in power mode aswell, only difference is you start your life with 0 bombstock and have to pick up the bombs before they can be used, you cannot voluntarily use a bomb either since there is no bomb-button assigned in this mode.

The difference is you get 5 total in a loop. I don't know if it's auto-bomb itself that is the problem, but more having 12 bombs by default, 5 in the loop and 5 more each extend. If I mess up the secret boss unlock and let go of the stick I still make it to the stage boss before game over pops up.

the game is still to easy since in power mode you can go crazy with the hypers in a whole different way than the other modes (where you can use a hyper 3-4times/stage at a maximum before the rank gets too brutal, in power its never a problem even at max rank).

The whole point of 99% of the design decisions in Daifukkatsu are to provide wide difficulty bounds, as well as the smoke and mirrors that you are a bullet dodging legend. And I think that's what you've got to do if you're making a shmup in 2008 - they did the same in Deathsmiles and I imagine they will in all future releases. Auto-bombing and hypering your way through the first loop is easy, but that's kind of irrelevant. If you want the game hard try and score.

[sven666]

The whole point of 99% of the design decisions in Daifukkatsu are to provide wide difficulty bounds, as well as the smoke and mirrors that you are a bullet dodging legend. And I think that's what you've got to do if you're making a shmup in 2008 - they did the same in Deathsmiles and I imagine they will in all future releases.

youre proboably right about this, problem is i dont think its that well suited for the arcade-scene, will proboably go down great with the home-console crowd that seem to think the longer a game the better. (not that DFK is a bad game but for me it would have been much more inticing to play with 2nd loop only and no auto-bomb)

i must say i prefer the difficulty curve in DS where the player himself chooses his opposition rather than DFK where its forced upon you, makes for a one-sided gameplay experience imo..

[Herr Schatten]

Donpachi:
+a chain system that is actually forgiveable. I absolutely can't stand these pixel perfect movements you need in DDP and DOJ
-broken chain system, your chain drops down after like 0,2secs and you often don't know why

I've never actually played Donpachi so I can't comment, but damn seems like the two points above are contradictory.

Not really. What makes DP's chain system forgiving is that it relies on building several small chains instead of level-long chains like in DDP (or game-long ones in Guwange). Plasmo is talking about level design here. However, he expresses discontent about the way the chains are handled technically. So while the two statements above do seem contradictory, they aren't, actually.

[Taylor]

youre proboably right about this, problem is i dont think its that well suited for the arcade-scene, will proboably go down great with the home-console crowd that seem to think the longer a game the better. (not that DFK is a bad game but for me it would have been much more inticing to play with 2nd loop only and no auto-bomb)

i must say i prefer the difficulty curve in DS where the player himself chooses his opposition rather than DFK where its forced upon you, makes for a one-sided gameplay experience imo..

It's not exclusive to arcade shmups either, Daemons Bride has a button mashing mode, and the sequel to BlazBlue will too. I guess accessibility isn’t a bad thing but...

I agree they could have handled this differently and Deathsmiles did a better job. I imagine they had to try and put this new mentality into the game in a way that still left it feeling like DoDonPachi. I certainly would have preferred an original, tsuujou or ura difficulty select to having to loop it. Long game is long.

[cody]

adverse > everyone else in this thread

I've seen people at the local arcade that never played shooters there before, playing DFK in bomb or strong mode and being excited about finally making it to the 5th stage. They're having a good time, they're getting more interested in shooters; this is a good thing, especially in the west. So what if it means I have to wait twice as long for my turn, I'll just talk to them about the game in between stages. Although I agree that people who hog the machine are right bastards, if they do it just start up 2p side

Even in easy mode, its a harder game to 1-all than deathsmiles, never mind reaching the second loop, and it has way less loli factor than deathsmiles. Autobomb in power mode is not significantly different from the lifebar in deathsmiles, given the multiple refills available in both cases. I thought deathsmiles was excellently placed to appeal to both new and hardcore fans, and it seems to have been well received around here. Why the hate for DFK?

[Udderdude]

as well as the smoke and mirrors that you are a bullet dodging legend.

This is up there with those games where your character does all sorts of awesome looking stuff after you've just spammed one button over and over. Just plain bad.

Cave had it right with their older games which had selectable difficulty modes. Trying to cram everyone (From novice to pro) into one difficulty ends up satisfying no-one.

[TLB]

+superb announcer

-autobomb
-autobomb
-lasers aren't so creamy anymore

-there are like 2 good tracks in the OST, the rest is shit

-lolis

Of course that's just my opinion based on scientific facts, maybe you guys have other facts as a base.

lols.



That's what I was interested in from the beginning. Interesting to see different opinions. Personally, not having played DFK, I think DOJ is the greatest thing since sliced bread. I agree wholeheartedly on most of your bullets on DOJ, but I consider your negatives to also be positives. I absolutely adore the fact that the game is fucking ridiculous. I'm hard-pressed to think of any games that are as ridiculous and manage to be half as fun. Problem is, my fackin' PS2 is broken. I'm considering trading + cash for a PCB, but then I wouldn't have Ibara anymore >_>


Also Cody, that's exactly what I would hope for westerners to think when they play the game. That's the kind of thing that makes my heart skip a beat a little bit. People being interested in STGs?! Cool thing to think about and wonder into the future...

Trying to cram everyone (From novice to pro) into one difficulty ends up satisfying no-one.

False. Adverse is satisfied, I'd be plenty satisfied. You first play the game, you try looping it or 2-looping it. You have your funs, you start playing for score. It works. Why is it a problem?

[sven666]

I thought deathsmiles was excellently placed to appeal to both new and hardcore fans, and it seems to have been well received around here. Why the hate for DFK?

not really hatin on DFK dawg, just nitpicking

my major gripe with the game is proboably the lolis, while it has nothing to do with the gameplay i just cant get over whenever the bosses change into the huge girls, everytime i just silently think "how fucking ridiculous"

in DS the game was designed so the lolis kinda fitted the theme, in DFK theyve been thrown in for misplaced sexappeal.. the way its executed is just poor direction plain and simple.

still a great game tho and im really happy i can enjoy it from my livingroom and not have to wait in line at an arcade to play, if that was the case id have proboably lost interest a long time ago.
when ported i think this game will proboably do really well, console gamers and arcade gamers are a different breed entierly.

[Plasmo]

First of all: I haven't played DFK a lot, maybe it just hasn't clicked yet and I'd actually like the game better the more I play it. (which to be honest I don't believe in)

I'm not sure what you mean by lasers not being creamy. They're creamy to anyone going for score. Stage 2, 3, 4 and 5 all feature laser canceling which jacks up your chain 2-3 thousand at a time, and is key for raising the multiplier to the max.

I was just talking about the graphics here. DOJ's hyper imo looked much better than DFK's.

Bullet canceling being no fun is a non-sequitur since it is really a very minor part of the game. The second halves of levels 1, 2 and 4 for instance all have to be normal chained with no bullet canceling and the bullet canceling points in the first half of the levels aren't more than 2 per level if you know what you're doing. Daifukkatsu is more about jacking up your chain on the big laser installations and straight chaining from there then it is worrying about 500-1000 on the chain from bullet cancels.

I know that you basically just want to bullet cancel everything during the first half of each stage (until you reach 10k), but that's exactly what I don't like about it. It should be more balanced and regularly, I really dislike the fact that you just can't cancel bullets that easy anymore with a high hyper rank.
DFK's chaining has it good points too! It's not that strict anymore (the counter decreses a bit before stopping) and everything about 10k doesn't matter. The latter is a bit problematic imo. On the one side, it makes the game easier and more accessible, on the other side you're not getting any reward for higher chains. Can't really decide on this one...

I also completely disagree that the stage design is boring. Left/right scrolling, ura boss route, variable chaining routes with rewarding popcorn rushes, I find it very fun. For instance take the end of stage 2 in daioujou with all the buildings and popcorns which is just a blast to run through destroying for big points and if you have a big chain, cash in on the hidden bees. Daifukkatsu has fun sections like these in almost every level, especially 3.

Left/Right scrolling would be cool if the background would actually be interesting.
I already said that the ura bosses are a plus, a big plus. I really love secret bosses and secret paths even more so!
What I don't like are popcorn rushes, they are very boring imo and DFK is just FULL of them! Stage 3 and 5 have many 20secs long popcorn rushes. It's the same enemy over and over again, and all the bullets are always aimed, it's not really fun to dodge or anything. I liked the rush at the end of DOJ's stage 2 though, it's short and you get three types of enemies there (tanks, helis, midsize planes) DOJ also has shorter boring popcorn rushes (after stage 3 midboss, end of stage 4), but they are VERY short and don't represent a stage imo.

When I think of DOJ, each stage has some kind of personality, stage 1 is a town at night, stage 2 is some kind of desert, stage 3 is the sky stage, stage 4 is a dark base with elevators and platforms and stage 5 is just the bee hell!
When I think oif DFK, I just want to play stage 4 because the music's awesome...

[Ruldra]

maybe you guys have other facts as a base.

One thing that I really like in the other Pachis but it's missing in DFK: the laser bomb. In particular, the Type-C laserbomb in DDP is incredible, both in visuals and sound. It was one of the things that set the Pachis apart from other shooters. I see no reason to remove it in DFK.

The lolis and autobomb are really annoying as well.

[Taylor]

as well as the smoke and mirrors that you are a bullet dodging legend.

This is up there with those games where your character does all sorts of awesome looking stuff after you've just spammed one button over and over. Just plain bad.

All danmaku games are about making you look awesome when you're just tapping your ship a few pixels, DFK just has more irrelevant bullets than most and adds pointless lasers to the mix (who uses shot on a boss?). It's probably still a few notches below the Mushihime-sama series in this respect, in fact. It's not a bad thing, it just adds to the spectacle, unlike those button mashing games you've compared it to there is still plenty on screen that is relevant.

Cave had it right with their older games which had selectable difficulty modes. Trying to cram everyone (From novice to pro) into one difficulty ends up satisfying no-one.

I can only think of three games with selectable difficulty and two of them are fairly recent?

I know that you basically just want to bullet cancel everything during the first half of each stage (until you reach 10k), but that's exactly what I don't like about it. It should be more balanced and regularly, I really dislike the fact that you just can't cancel bullets that easy anymore with a high hyper rank.
DFK's chaining has it good points too! It's not that strict anymore (the counter decreses a bit before stopping) and everything about 10k doesn't matter. The latter is a bit problematic imo. On the one side, it makes the game easier and more accessible, on the other side you're not getting any reward for higher chains. Can't really decide on this one...

You still get awarded the hit value for a bullet you tried to cancel, even if it just slowed instead, and you do get rewarded for higher chain. Each enemy has a point value, and this is accumulated and added to every subsequent enemy you kill as in all other DDP games, this never stops happening. The hit count is used for a separate multiplier and that caps at 10k, so there's two score mechanics going on.

Also, this multiplier only applies if you have a full hyper and if you drop your chain with a full hyper it doesn't count down, it just drops immediately.

[jpj]

i've started playing DOJ again, but i miss NOA and HEX ...

[Guardians Knight]

lol i cant believe the dabate i just sparked.

i love DP possibly as much as Raiden. for me its manic without being too manic, like batsugun only a bit more polished. must admit ive not played DFK so cant comment on it, just wondered how it compared to (for me) the best in the series.

[GaijinPunch]

I'll play devil's advocate:

DOJ BL > DFK Loke Test #2 > DFK Loke Test #1 (cock laser version) > DFK 1.0 assuming you don't mind a busted scoring system > DFK 1.5 > DDP

I really hate the auto bomb.

[TLB]

I remember reading about these phallic lasers long ago, when this thread was young. Anyone know of a video that's still up on youtube?

[lgb]

This is up there with those games where your character does all sorts of awesome looking stuff after you've just spammed one button over and over. Just plain bad.

Cave had it right with their older games which had selectable difficulty modes. Trying to cram everyone (From novice to pro) into one difficulty ends up satisfying no-one.

Any video game can be like that when you perceive it in such a way.

I will say that "selectable difficulty modes" are a help, probably more so than one difficulty. That said, the ability to cater to a huge group of people with merely one difficulty level is a feat and shows that CAVE is perfectly willing to keep with the modern industry in a convenient way.

in DS the game was designed so the lolis kinda fitted the theme, in DFK theyve been thrown in for misplaced sexappeal.. the way its executed is just poor direction plain and simple.

Ridiculous. They were merely hopping on the well-established bandwagon; technically such an action constitutes "no harm done". The problem here is that you're sizing up a completely different mindset to your own and calling it something close to inferior.

[EPS21]

Ridiculous. They were merely hopping on the well-established bandwagon; technically such an action constitutes "no harm done". The problem here is that you're sizing up a completely different mindset to your own and calling it something close to inferior.

Well said. Its old hearing the same "hurr durr wtf r these lolis doing in mah shmups," when you have to realize exactly what demographic these games are for, and I'm sure most people here can look past that to play a good shmup, but to those who don't I feel sorry for. Don't worry there's plenty of "shooting" games western developers make whose visual style may cater towards your interests.

[cody]

I'm totally baffled as to why anyone would use lack of a selectable difficulty level as an argument against any recent cave game.

Older cave games only had operator selectable difficulty levels that basically just change the number of bullets etc.

New cave games, DFK included, essentially have USER selectable difficulty levels that completely change the game mechanics to make it easier / harder.

[Udderdude]

I'm totally baffled as to why anyone would use lack of a selectable difficulty level as an argument against any recent cave game.

In their older games, there wasn't any selectable difficulty, but it didn't vary so widely. DOJ was balls-hard no matter what you did, etc.

In DFK there is a huge range of difficulty, and they screwed up some things badly (like not allowing the player to turn off auto-bomb, etc.)

To me it seems they wanted to add different difficulty modes like Mushi, but since it was Dodonpachi, they didn't think it would fit and tried to cram everything into one mode.

[cody]

To me it seems they wanted to add different difficulty modes like Mushi, but since it was Dodonpachi, they didn't think it would fit and tried to cram everything into one mode.

See, this is what I'm talking about. DFK has three modes, not one.

edit - as for the autobomb bitching, the only reasonable complaint I can see is in regards to autobomb on bomb and strong resulting in longer waits. How many of the people complaining about autobomb have 2-ALL'ed the ura loop on power?

double edit - GaijinPunch is one of the few people i'd be inclined to listen to complaints from, but if you hate autobomb so much, why rate 1.5 lower than the earlier versions? At least 1.5 doesn't refill your entire bomb stock from a single bomb pickup.

[Taylor]

There was probably more bomb spam in 1.0 because of the full restock. The first 1cc we all saw had some guy bombing the whole game, even the first mid-boss... Obviously you don't get points that way, but it was not very exciting to watch. I assume in the original location tests the bombs worked like in the other games?

[Skykid]

I love all the Cave stuff, and I totally see the point of DFK. I'm not sure yet which I think is best in the series, they've all got high points.

Donpachi is wonderfully straightforward.
DDP is accessible, incredible, action packed fun.
DOJ is the godfather of all shmups - I love the way it rapes me.
DFK feels fresh, is a ton of fun, and can be played in a variety of ways by a variety of people.

Not worth arguing about really, I'd have a great time with any of them.

[GaijinPunch]

I remember reading about these phallic lasers long ago, when this thread was young. Anyone know of a video that's still up on youtube?

Cave is quick to have them taken down. Since I'm now sporting a beard again (until Halloween is over) I think a re-up of the vid is in order:
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=49CFTPVT
This is the version that someone (I think Twiddle) thankfully cut most of me out.

Ridiculous. They were merely hopping on the well-established bandwagon; technically such an action constitutes "no harm done". The problem here is that you're sizing up a completely different mindset to your own and calling it something close to inferior.

DOJ Boss






















DFK Boss:


Slightly exagerrated, but hey, the shoe fits. DOJ is far more subtle. Sven's "tacked on" comment is valid.