The critical discussion of Namco shooters!

[professor ganson]

Xevious and Galaga are a couple of my favorites, but Xevious much more so for many reasons. The art style of Xevious is deeply appealing to me with its abstract/minimalist sensibilities, and its green and blue hues. I love the risk/reward scoring system. The gradual ramping of difficulty is a nice change of pace for arcade games from that time.

It only pisses me off that Namco made the Namco Classics PCB with an upside-down display that cannot be inverted. Flipping my monitor just to play Xevious and Xevious arrange isn't a genuine option, unfortunately. Messing with the dip switches does nothing.

[doctorx0079]

Xevious and Galaga are a couple of my favorites, but Xevious much more so for many reasons. The art style of Xevious is deeply appealing to me with its abstract/minimalist sensibilities, and its green and blue hues. I love the risk/reward scoring system. The gradual ramping of difficulty is a nice change of pace for arcade games from that time.

THIS

[Ed Oscuro]

There also is a game which I thought was kind of a sequel to F/A - hmm, can't find it now. Came out around 1994 I think.

the only game I can think of is uh nebulasray

Ehh, more undue Taito influence on this thread as it turns out. Was thinking of Grid Seeker: Project Storm Hammer. Interestingly enough, it's a 1992 game just like F/A.

[Obiwanshinobi]

I wonder why Galaga was so much better seller than Bosconian that so few Bosconian machines survived. It's the sprites I guess. Bosconian didn't have animated, "living" sprites and was probably perceived as plain and featureless in comparison.

Bosconian


Galaga


Bosconian reminds me of Spectre Supreme which I used to play rather a lot. That game also seemed literally endless. My scores must've been pretty good (I couldn't imagine any human being performing much better than I used to in the latest stages I reached, but that was before I even heard about internet scoreboards).

[esreveR]

nebulasraaaaaaaay

all it needs is a destruction bonus

Nebulas Ray was just a crappy VP1 clone. c_c

[mjclark]

nebulasraaaaaaaay

all it needs is a destruction bonus

Nebulas Ray was just a crappy VP1 clone. c_c

Except Nebulas Ray predates Viper Phase 1 by a year.
The thing they have in common is that they're both fuckin' fantastic though.

[kemical]

Nebulasray is my favorite Namco shooter... considering when it came out (1994), at it's time it was an amazing example of pre-rendered 3d graphics, the sound and visuals were amazing... it was the first shooter PCB I ever bought way back in the day. I used to play it back at a Namco cyberstation arcade in the Chicago area, supposedly there weren't very many US region boards made of that game, at least that's what I was told when I contacted Namco about tracking down and buying the game (their cyberstation arcades would sell off old games and listed stuff available in all their arcades across the US).

If you mame it, be warned that some of the graphical effects may not be working correctly and the music seems off at times too... The speed powerup is crazy, once you get several of them collected your ship moves insanely fast.