Truxton II/Tatsujin II = ...Woah...

gamingjustin · Post by **gamingjustin** » Sun Jul 17, 2005 11:42 pm

Is it just me, or does Truxton II almost never get mentioned around here? Sure, there are lots of great shooters out there but, in my mind, Truxton II stands out as the prime example of what a 2D vert shmup should be.

First off, I love the graphics... I think the graphical style in Truxton II is superior to that of Batsugun's-- In every way. The music is genius, to say the least. If you heard the music without even playing the game you'd think it was very sci-fi/spacey sounding. Great stuff... and makes the game 100 times better. The gameplay is very basic... but it's the simplicity of the power-up system that gives it a certain charm. All you do is collect red/green/blue power-ups with the occasional bomb and speed-up-- but it's great.

There's no complex points system, or cumbersome combos to be had here... Just plain and simple challenging gameplay. It's really nice to sit back, rela, and shoot at everything you see without being distracted by flashy numbers and whatnot.

My favorite thing about Truxton is how, when you die, you must start back at a certain point! This, I think, forces mastery of the game. You can't plow through the game in 20 minutes, mindlessly punching in credits. Yeah, you can limit yourself to a certain number of credits in games like ESP Ra.De. and Battle Bakraid, but when you die in those games the message you get says, "nice try... uh... keep playing though, you can make some mistakes here and there." In Truxton II's case it's, "you suck... now do it again without getting hit..."

Sorry if I'm ranting, but Truxton II is just too fine to not be ranted about!

Anyway, I think Truxton II should be recognized as one of those "staple shooters," like R-Type and Gradius-- a game this great belongs in the same league.

TGK · Post by **TGK** » Sun Jul 17, 2005 11:57 pm

I know it's personal taste, but I disagree almost completely.

My impression

The music is forgettable. Granted it's nowhere near ear grating, but it's nowhere near the other Toaplan stuff either. Hellfire probably has more ignorable music, but that's about it.

The graphics is better than Batsugun, yes, but not by much.

The gameplay is unbelievably unfair. Stage 1 boss has water splashes that blends into the background. Stage 2 boss has fast beach ball aimshots that leave you with no room to dodge. And so on. However It is still much fairer than Tatsujin and Hellfire, I admit.

The weapon system is very unbalanced. The green droplet (green) weapon is usable but too weak, the fire weapon (red) is utterly useless. If you lose the auto-aim beam weapon (blue), you are screwed.

TGK · Post by **TGK** » Sun Jul 17, 2005 11:59 pm

But still, I would rate Truxton II as Toaplan's second best, but it is lightyears behind the best (Batsugun, imo).

gamingjustin · Post by **gamingjustin** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 12:27 am

Actually, you got a point there about the weapons. I only use the red power-up... which is weird because you only use the blue. The green is wimpy though, we can agree on that... and the blue is uncontrollable and distracting... That's what I think.
But, yeah, I could see how people wouldn't like it... Not everyone likes everything.

And, actually, I'd probably like Batsugun a lot bettter if I had it for the Saturn instead of the soundless version (with messed up graphics) on MAME. Which, speaking of sound... Truxton II is one of the few Toaplan games that have full sound on MAME, maybe that's why I like the music so much... haven't heard the others'.

But I still dig those Truxton tunes...[/i]

CMoon · Post by **CMoon** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 3:11 am

Well I love a lot of Toaplan's music--no surprise, most of it (The Truxton's, Fireshark, Twin Cobras, Batsugun) are all by the same guy (correct me if I'm wrong Rando). It all leads directly into Raiden's magnificient score (which is also a homage to toaplan).

I really feel truxton 2 isn't mentioned very often for two reasons:

1. No good port except on that marty-towns-thingy (I have no clue what it is).

2. All the nasty things that happen to you when you die (check points, total power-down).

I would love to see a hack of this game where you either weren't totally powered down by getting killed OR being powered down wasn't so completely worthless. Imagine a batsugun hack where your ship leveled up and couldn't get knocked down below that level!

I definitely agree with the original poster about the graphics--I absolutely adore them. It makes me wish Toaplan had had a chance to do another couple games after Batsugun.

Dartagnan1083 · Post by **Dartagnan1083** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 8:18 am

Fire weapon Useless??
The only weapon I can beat the first level with IS the fire.

I really like the first level music, but otherwise it just throws too much at me to be a huge favorite.

I do like it, but it doesn't quite rank that high.

D · Post by D » Mon Jul 18, 2005 8:30 am

Agreed, Truxton II should've been mentioned more.
I for one take full responsibility.

llabnip · Post by **llabnip** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 1:28 pm

gamingjustin wrote:Is it just me, or does Truxton II almost never get mentioned around here?

I think it's mostly availability. There were no ports to any of the major consoles at the time. So... for most of us, we can only play under emulation plus a few lucky folks who own the PCB. There was just one port on the FM Towns Marty and most of us don't own that console. So I think it's availability that prevents the game from really being hailed. It's still a great game but nowhere near Batsugun (which did get a great release on the Saturn). Truxton (the original) also got good treatment on the Genny and PCE. Since I find emulation a hollow experience, I prefer my games on consoles - and fortunately Toaplan got a good deal of fine ports over the years... Truxton II was a bit of an oversight - it should have been ported more widely.

DC906270 · Post by **DC906270** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 5:18 pm

I disagree about this being one of Toaplans best, the original Tatsujin beats it by a long way. The crown would have to go to either Hellfire/Tatsujin IMO.

The graphics on Tatsujin II are nice n all, and the music memorable, but the game just doesnt feel original or 'special' enough to rank above the previously mentioned shooters. Also, seems to be a lot easier for the first few levels than the original Tatsujin, and then suddenly becomes very difficult later on and is hence very annoying to me. A few years 'after' its time in terms of shoot em up science, there are better shooters dating from the same era, whereas the original was perhaps 'before' its time and ranked as the best/among the best of its era.

Just my opinion....

TGK · Post by **TGK** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 5:39 pm

DC906270 wrote:I disagree about this being one of Toaplans best, the original Tatsujin beats it by a long way. The crown would have to go to either Hellfire/Tatsujin IMO.

if by "Toaplan's best", you mean "Toaplan's hardest", I agree with you.

DC906270 · Post by **DC906270** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 6:46 pm

well, not sure if being the hardest shmup makes it the best... however, i tend to enjoy challenging shmups a whole lot more than easy ones... more longevity. i have been trying to beat hellfire and tatsujin for years and still havnt managed it!

yojo! · Post by **yojo!** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 7:34 pm

I'm a toaplan junkie myself; own all their PCBs. Other less known of their non-ported to console/coimputer PCBs are better than TruxtionII. Vimana, V-Five (good genny port) and Outzone come to mind. Personnaly my top toaplan games remain Flying Shark and Slapfight.

dave4shmups · Post by **dave4shmups** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 10:15 pm

gamingjustin wrote:Is it just me, or does Truxton II almost never get mentioned around here? Sure, there are lots of great shooters out there but, in my mind, Truxton II stands out as the prime example of what a 2D vert shmup should be.

First off, I love the graphics... I think the graphical style in Truxton II is superior to that of Batsugun's-- In every way. The music is genius, to say the least. If you heard the music without even playing the game you'd think it was very sci-fi/spacey sounding. Great stuff... and makes the game 100 times better. The gameplay is very basic... but it's the simplicity of the power-up system that gives it a certain charm. All you do is collect red/green/blue power-ups with the occasional bomb and speed-up-- but it's great.

There's no complex points system, or cumbersome combos to be had here... Just plain and simple challenging gameplay. It's really nice to sit back, rela, and shoot at everything you see without being distracted by flashy numbers and whatnot.

My favorite thing about Truxton is how, when you die, you must start back at a certain point! This, I think, forces mastery of the game. You can't plow through the game in 20 minutes, mindlessly punching in credits. Yeah, you can limit yourself to a certain number of credits in games like ESP Ra.De. and Battle Bakraid, but when you die in those games the message you get says, "nice try... uh... keep playing though, you can make some mistakes here and there." In Truxton II's case it's, "you suck... now do it again without getting hit..."

Sorry if I'm ranting, but Truxton II is just too fine to not be ranted about!

Anyway, I think Truxton II should be recognized as one of those "staple shooters," like R-Type and Gradius-- a game this great belongs in the same league.

I totally agree; Truxton II is an awesome classic, IMO. To bad the only home console port it got was on the FM Towns Marty!

It is a million times better then the original Truxton, IMO. Sure, it's still tough when you loose your weapons, but you can get powered up a lot easier, and there aren't near as many enemies that come at you from the sides and from behind-and when there are, the game has better weapons to enable you to deal with such enemies.

zaphod · Post by **zaphod** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 1:14 am

I actually find that truxton II is pretty fun.

The music, especially that first tune, is truly wonderful i don't know why others here are dissing it.

I actually find the blue weapon much better than the one in the original. i find that it obscures shots less than in that game. The red weapon is NOT useless, but it does suck badly at low power levels, an di'm not very impressed with green, thogh i must admit i have not tried it at max power. bllue gets you the most bang for your buck at the low power levels.

My big tip for this game is to be brave. even many of the minibosses will not point blank you, and because the game has auto-fire (unusual for an arcade) you can damage MUCH faster at close range. Of course big bosses can and will point blank you but that is to be expected if you are silly enough to get that close to one.

Oddly enough it plays much better than the original does in mame. my athlon 1.1 ghs chugs on truxton and flying shark, but Truxton II runs super smooth.

gigadrive32 · Post by **gigadrive32** » Tue Jul 19, 2005 4:42 am

It's pretty amazing that Saturn didn't get a port of Truxton II / Tatsujin II but the FM-Towns Marty did. unbelievable!

CMoon · Post by **CMoon** » Thu Jul 21, 2005 1:17 am

gigadrive32 wrote:It's pretty amazing that Saturn didn't get a port of Truxton II / Tatsujin II. unbelievable!

*cries*

Randorama · Post by **Randorama** » Thu Jul 21, 2005 2:13 am

CMoon wrote:Well I love a lot of Toaplan's music--no surprise, most of it (The Truxton's, Fireshark, Twin Cobras, Batsugun) are all by the same guy (correct me if I'm wrong Rando). It all leads directly into Raiden's magnificient score (which is also a homage to toaplan).

Ehr, no - there's Tatsuya Uemura who's the guy behind Outzone and Flying Shark, and Masahiro Yuge who's behind the two Truxtons and some other games, then Lee Ohta who did...Wardner and stuff (i don't remember), and Batsugun's OST was by another guy entirely (dunno-the-name Sakai the third). The instruments were the same, some bizarre but uber-cool synthetizers of the '80s, Edgar Varese's style

But yes, Tatsujin (both chapters) are the type of music that i like to listen when i'm alone in the mountains, staring at the stars

I definitely agree with the original poster about the graphics--I absolutely adore them. It makes me wish Toaplan had had a chance to do another couple games after Batsugun.

gameoverDude · Post by **gameoverDude** » Thu Jul 21, 2005 9:52 pm

gigadrive32 wrote:It's pretty amazing that Saturn didn't get a port of Truxton II / Tatsujin II but the FM-Towns Marty did. unbelievable!

It's amazingly unjust. A Saturn version would likely have had Tate and full resolution (no cropping).

In the Marty one, the top part of the playfield is just offscreen. So, some enemies will be firing at you before you see them in the onscreen view window. OTOH you can pick them off right before you actually see them if you know where they're coming from. There's considerable slowdown as well. It's not a perfect port and sadly the only one.

BrianC · Post by **BrianC** » Thu Jul 21, 2005 10:15 pm

gameoverDude wrote:
gigadrive32 wrote:It's pretty amazing that Saturn didn't get a port of Truxton II / Tatsujin II but the FM-Towns Marty did. unbelievable!
It's amazingly unjust. A Saturn version would likely have had Tate and full resolution (no cropping).

In the Marty one, the top part of the playfield is just offscreen. So, some enemies will be firing at you before you see them in the onscreen view window. OTOH you can pick them off right before you actually see them if you know where they're coming from. There's considerable slowdown as well. It's not a perfect port and sadly the only one.

Wierd how they do that. Most arcade ports on SNES, Genesis, and TG-16 make alterations to the enemy patterns to compensate for missing screen space.

tehkao · Post by **tehkao** » Fri Jul 22, 2005 3:53 am

BTW, Truxton 2's stages feel even longer than the ones in Truxton 1....they just go on and on and on......

gamingjustin · Post by **gamingjustin** » Sat Jul 23, 2005 7:00 pm

Yeah, the long levels are one of the reasons it's one my most played games on MAME. I've been enjoying a lot of those tough, lengthy shooters lately. In The Hunt is amazing. I actually chuckled a few times at how friggin' impossible it was. I really liked the pace of the game... dunno why. Oh, I played Outzone, too. REALLY GREAT STUFF! I remeber the first Toaplan game I ever played was Zero Wing on the Genesis, just because it had that "All your base..." thing. I immediately established that Toaplan was a pathetic company who could not make shooters because of the game's poor quality. Boy was I wrong!! I even avoided Toaplan shooters for a while until, eventually, I kept reading good reviews for them on shmups.

TGK · Post by **TGK** » Sat Jul 23, 2005 7:27 pm

Even Zero Wing had its moments. I think it has awesome music. I still hum at least 2 Zero Wing tunes at work when nobody's around. I can only say the same thing for a few other shmups.

CMoon · Post by **CMoon** » Sun Jul 24, 2005 12:50 am

On this whole Toaplan thing, an often missed but well ported game by these guys is Twin Hawk (daisen pu or whatever). It feels as though it was ported for the megadrive at the sametime as Fireshark, and much in its favor, this game doesn't play the whole 'takes forever to power up, die once and loose everything' card. You can only power up 3 times and unlike all the other toaplan games from this period, 1 power up icon actually powers you up one level, versus needing to eat a whole armada of power ups to see your ship increase in power.

This alone makes the game infinitely more playable, though expect classic fireshark/twin cobra difficulty. The thing that makes twin hawk different is the novel use of bombs. You actually have helper planes instead of bombs and you can use them however you want to--for awesome firepower, as shield, make them kamakazi enemies or even trade them off for a single screen clearing bomb. As a late 80's game, this feels pretty creative and I'm surprised I haven't seen this idea copied anywhere else since 'bombs' suddenly become hugely versitile.

I suppose it is semi-rare but pops up now and then on ebay for under $20 or so. I have no clue how this one escaped my attention, but it definitely deserves the recognition that other classic toaplan games have received.

CMoon · Post by **CMoon** » Sun Jul 24, 2005 4:57 pm

In fact, taking a look at shmups.com, there is a lot by Toaplan that still needs proper reviews--Slapfight, the Truxtons, Twin Hawk, V-Five, Vimana, etc. (though Dogyuun, Fireshark, Skyshark, Twin Cobras and of course Batsugun get glowing reviews!)

Time somebody write some new revies for Shmups.com!

Ord · Post by **Ord** » Sun Jul 24, 2005 5:39 pm

Randorama wrote:
Ehr, no - there's Tatsuya Uemura who's the guy behind Outzone and Flying Shark, and Masahiro Yuge who's behind the two Truxtons and some other games, then Lee Ohta who did...Wardner and stuff (i don't remember), and Batsugun's OST was by another guy entirely (dunno-the-name Sakai the third)....

I believe the composer for Batsugun was Yoshitatsu Saki.

Randorama · Post by **Randorama** » Sun Jul 24, 2005 6:11 pm

CMoon wrote:In fact, taking a look at shmups.com, there is a lot by Toaplan that still needs proper reviews--Slapfight, the Truxtons, Twin Hawk, V-Five, Vimana, etc. (though Dogyuun, Fireshark, Skyshark, Twin Cobras and of course Batsugun get glowing reviews!)

Time somebody write some new revies for Shmups.com!

Will do, now that i think of it...and in case you bother, i will upload them in my journal first, as a preview

shmups.system11.org

Truxton II/Tatsujin II = ...Woah...

Truxton II/Tatsujin II = ...Woah...

Re: Truxton II/Tatsujin II = ...Woah...

Re: Truxton II/Tatsujin II = ...Woah...