Shmupping through the hard times

[mirkvid]

I think that part of what makes games so endearing to us is the times were we going through when we played them. I bought Batrider to play on my first cabinet as I was building it. I had just moved to a new city and was living in a really rough neighborhood (swat team rough). Playing APB on my half built cab was my only escape at the time. I remember reading sheep's page on the game between classes at college and trying to learn as much as about the game as I could. Over the next few years I slowly finished my cab, 1cc'd my first shmup, and earned my degree. Going back to Batrider now is an entirely different experience. I love the game to death, but when I play now there is a sense of nostalgia attached to it. It reminds me of how far I've come since I was in school and how much better things are these days.

Whenever I think of Batrider (or when the Ski High stage music plays in my head), I think of those days and how It helped me get through some tough times.

Anyway, I've been taking a break from games for a while and most of my posts are just jokes, so I thought I'd post something a little more meaningful for once.

Anyone else have stories about shmupping through hard times? Let's hear
em!

[sven666]

dunno about hard times but yeah shmupping holds alot of nostalgia for me, its been a big part of my life over the last decade. (and it has always been my favourite game genre thruout my life)

i guess most of my fondest memories come from all the kickass people ive met and befriended over the years tho, you guys rock!

[neorichieb1971]

Year 2005 - Place St Louis (O'fallon) and Evansville IN

My wife kicked me out of my house with legal papers in Evansville. I worked in St Louis MO so moved there permanently to Ofallon, a quite middle class area to say the least. So I bought a middle class apartment, totally unfurnished. I put my 21" CRT on top of a plastic storage container with lid, assumed the TATE position and popped in DDP on the PS2 (PS1 DDP game) whilst sitting on the floor. It took me 3 months to buy a couch and I didn't have a visitor for those 3 months. The only friend I had was my PS2 and about 600 other games which I sold 200+ to make ends meet.

I had a lot of sorrow during those times. When I wasn't playing DDP or some other game I was looking out of the balcony doors across the street whom like clockwork everyday, a woman would undress with the light on for my amusement around 19:00 (winter getting dark time). It was sublime. I slept on a air mattress from Walmart positioned in such a way on the floor that I could see between the curtains.

So, miss stripper across the street and my games kept me from my suicidal tendencies. Today I enjoy a wealth of friends and family nearby. I came back to the UK where I started life. I left an era behind. I did love STL and Evansville as places of work and family life, but alone it was all too much. I also won't forget playing DDP on the carpet floor, all alone for 3-6 months drowning my sorrows in the pits of hell.

I am really lucky to be here today.. Thanks Cave and DDP.

[njiska]

I don't have anything that tragic, but lately my work life has been a never ending pool of stress and despair. Working no my Mushi Futari high scores has been one of the only ways I've been able to relax. I think it's the focus required to play shmups that makes it so easy to forget the troubles of the world.

[ROBOTRON]

During all my health issues, shmupping is one of the few things that relaxes me. I put in RSG, Viewpoint, R-Type or Zanac, and for a while I feel relaxed. Being my fav genre, its nice to play new games as well as the old ones....its a never ending source of pleasure. Now with my FC3 I've been playing my Genesis, SNES and NES carts like crazy....it seems that thats where about 60% of all the good (console) shmups are.

[charlie chong]

muchi muchi pork kept me fed!
a tragic series of events led me into a severe manic episode and somehow i spent a months wages in a week and a half i still don't know what i spent it on anyways i sold it within a day and had £550 in my bank account same afternoon so i could eat.

[lmagus]

I remember I was about 8, so it must have been 1991, and I got my Japanese Mega Drive which only had one cart.

It had two games in it, which you could swap by pressing reset. They were Verytex and Battle Squadron!

I only had that cart for over a year before someone bought me Sonic.

During that time my parents got divorced, I moved apartments every 2 months because they couldn't decide who I was going to live with, and the only thing i always carried with me was my Mega Drive and that Verytex/Battle Squadron cart.

I stayed away from shmups for years because they always reminded me of that time when my family broke apart.

I only started playing again in 2008 when someone showed me Mushihimesama for the PS2.

Btw, my Mega Drive lived until 1999. It died while I was playing Phantasy Star 4 for the millionth time. =(

[moozooh]

I found that shmupping during hard times didn't help my problems at all because, instead of solving them, I played games (as well as indulged myself in other forms of cheap consumer-ready pleasure; hello, 300 episodes of One Piece in a month!). For better or for worse, games are, and have always been, a way to escape reality. If that helps you any, that's good. For me, the more I was facing reality instead of running from it, the better it helped.

[Skyline]

I find that after a while of just piddling through the routine of life, my brain feels like it's not necessarily on auto-pilot, more like whoever is behind the wheel is asleep.

Games help in that regard, in addition to books and music discovery. The odd session of insert shmup here or TGM DS keeps my brain from turning into watery grits