Is Border Down a bit rubbish?

[Square King]

Damn kids and their new-fangled scoring systems

[DEL]

Obiwanshinobi wrote;

I did not judge Dorder Down just on its looks. I judged THE looks.

Ok cool, no problem . Its just that someone else had already mentioned the game purely in terms of its graphics and not its gameplay.

[BulletMagnet]

Damn kids and their new-fangled scoring systems

Back in my day we had to tally the points ourselves, with an abacus attached to the arcade cabinet! And we LIKED it!

[Ed Oscuro]

Back my my day seeing how high you could count on your fingers and toes was not just the scoring system but the whole game.

We would have had an abacus but crops were so bad we had to eat the wood chips.

Bashing the mutants was just a fun extra. (Six fingers, that's no fair.)

[KindGrind]

Isn't Gradius V a bit rubbish?

[Herr Schatten]

Damn kids and their new-fangled scoring systems

Back in my day we had to tally the points ourselves, with an abacus attached to the arcade cabinet! And we called it Dangun Feveron!

Fixed.

Isn't Gradius V a bit rubbish?

It most certainly is.

[Square King]

Back my my day seeing how high you could count on your fingers and toes was not just the scoring system but the whole game.

We would have had an abacus but crops were so bad we had to eat the wood chips.

Bashing the mutants was just a fun extra. (Six fingers, that's no fair.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13JK5kChbRw

[BulletMagnet]

Damn kids and their new-fangled scoring systems

Back in my day we had to tally the points ourselves, with an abacus attached to the arcade cabinet! And we called it Dangun Feveron!

Fixed.

...well-spoken, sir.

[Battletoad]

G.Revs other DC game Under Defeat also has Superplays for both loops on the disc.

Where can I find these?

Somewhere in the Replay Options. You can load your own replays or load the superplays that are already on the disc.

Indeed lol. Never bothered looking into "Load Replay" because I thought you could just watch your own and I haven´t recorded any. Thanks!

[gennss]

Never could get into border down. Tough as nails, the backgrounds are pretty, but I found the whole pause between deaths killed the action and made it harder to get used to the patterns. The ships remind me of f-zero snes for some reason. For dreamcast shooters, i'll stick to ikaruga, triggerheart, or psyvariar2.

[Halloween Jack]

Never could get into border down. Tough as nails, the backgrounds are pretty, but I found the whole pause between deaths killed the action and made it harder to get used to the patterns. The ships remind me of f-zero snes for some reason. For dreamcast shooters, i'll stick to ikaruga, triggerheart, or psyvariar2.

I love Border Down, but absolutely suck at playing it I'm gonna free up some time and stick at it over the winter though, masochist that I am!

Cheers

HJ

[jpj]

as one of the better BD players here i gotta say it is a little bit rubbish

graphics and soundtrack are really nice, but the actual level design, lack of colour pallette on some levels, some of the boss designs, etc aren't great. the thing that killed it for me was you'll get to a point where you realise it's actually a 1-life game (forget borders being spare lives), so you make 1 mistake and you gotta restart. and that the single biggest point gain in the whole game involves having a good run starting from Red and bordering up to Yellow, and then Green for stage 3, and then you double-suicide on the boss and perform a trick that involves you killing it with your break laser right down to the very last pixels (have fun doing this one and not dying), and then fighting a ranked up 2nd phase st3 boss with a little pea shooter

it's a nice game though. at the very least it brought delboy out of retirement and caused rando to write a blog

[DEL]

jpj wrote;

the thing that killed it for me was you'll get to a point where you realise it's actually a 1-life game (forget borders being spare lives), so you make 1 mistake and you gotta restart

Well when you think about it, almost every Japanese shoot'em up is centred around 1 life, or at least being on you're last life. In the old days you needed to be on your first life with full firepower to cruise through the game, like on Twin Cobra. In more recent times, Cave games reward you for being on your first life, Raizing rewards you for suiciding down to your last life etc. So Border Down is more of the same.

and that the single biggest point gain in the whole game involves having a good run starting from Red and bordering up to Yellow, and then Green for stage 3, and then you double-suicide on the boss and perform a trick that involves you killing it with your break laser right down to the very last pixels (have fun doing this one and not dying), and then fighting a ranked up 2nd phase st3 boss with a little pea shooter

Yes well if you rely too heavily on Japanese Master replays then you're gonna try for that route & method. "There is a-no-therr" as Yoda would say . I have done the game with that method also (did my 6A-ALL with a 900ish break on ST3G) but soon figured out that it mostly wasn't worth the grief - The ST1R start route that is.

I have to respect that you tried though Mr. jpj, & you did very well. Negotiating the ST3G's final form on full rank with pea shooter firepower is a pressure-cooker, especially after all the hell you've gotta go through to get to that point with a large Break behind you.
When I used to get past that bit I was already knackered and the beginning of Stage 4 hits you with the realization that you're only half-way though the game .

[RHE]

Well when you think about it, almost every Japanese shoot'em up is centred around 1 life, or at least being on you're last life.

But with instant respawn or checkpoints it's easier to learn stages imho.

It's less distracting from gameplay too.

[Mortificator]

Well when you think about it, almost every Japanese shoot'em up is centred around 1 life, or at least being on you're last life. In the old days you needed to be on your first life with full firepower to cruise through the game, like on Twin Cobra. In more recent times, Cave games reward you for being on your first life, Raizing rewards you for suiciding down to your last life etc. So Border Down is more of the same.

The Japanese version of Twin Cobra is recoverable from any checkpoint, at least on the first loop. I don't think the constant deaths and extends in games like Battle Garegga are really comparable either. There aren't too many shooters based around a 1LC, and while that aspect doesn't break Border Down for me, it does make it less fun.

[KindGrind]

I remember that when I gave up the ST1R route I started having much more fun with the game.

Trying to make it through the lvl 3 boss on G still is, for me, of the best shmup-related jokes ever.

[esreveR]

I tried Border down.

I hated it, to be honest. G.Rev usually makes great games but this just felt...ugh...why do people complain about Battle Garegga's rank when this game is still around?

[DEL]

^Classic example of my first post. You won't like a game unless you're fairly good at it.

[esreveR]

^Classic example of my first post. You won't like a game unless you're fairly good at it.

If "being fairly good at a game" constitutes "suiciding every other stage" then the game simply isn't for me.

[DEL]

^If you'll forgive the pun, Border Down is the name of the game. You Border Down/suicide down.
Its kinda the opposite of the old generation 'rack as many lives as you can up across the top of the screen', but in this case it doesn't annoy me.
Suiciding for rank control on Raizing games annoys me more. I would prefer to be able to rack up tons of lives on Garegga, Batrider or Ibara and not suffer unmanageable rank repercussions. I like those games a lot, but the suiciding down to last life or next to last life goes against my oldskool instincts.
So I get where you're coming from