Most Underrated Shmup?

Post by **Icarus** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 3:25 am

I'm aware of the "Guilty Pleasures" thread a while back, and well all know what The Most Controversial Shmup is, but I'm curious. What game[s] do you think are great, but don't get as much discussion or love as they should?

1941 is one of mine. Although I consider 19XX the best of the series, I love 1941 just as much, its fast-paced, balanced, great set pieces, immensely enjoyable, immersive. And not a squeak about it.

Salamander 2 is another. Very faithful to the series, gorgeous graphics, solid gameplay (Option Attack is great fun to use), and while it's a little easy, it's very replayable.

Got loads more, but gotta get some sleep, work in the morning

So what's your thoughts on the most underrated shmup[s]?

Post by **BulletMagnet** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 3:59 am

Cotton Boomerang: Hands down the best of the Cotton games, and one of my personal favorites; it keeps the unique gameplay and scoring mechanics introduced in Cotton 2, but tweaks several things to make them more accessible. Not to mention it looks great and has several characters to mess around with. Thanks to some of its odd features it's still not for everyone, but for all its accomplishments methinks it does deserve more recognition than it gets.

Vasara 1 and 2: Obsure samurai shmups with similar, though not identical, gameplay; an absolute shame neither got a home port. Might not appeal to those who demand lots of shooting in their shmups all the time, since you'll be using lots of close-range attacks, but for the most part both games are well put together.

Cyvern: Even though it's made by a different company, somehow it reminds me of the Vasaras, perhaps simply because it's also so obscure. It takes a little bit of Cave, Raizing, and Psikyo and tacks on some dragons; it's not perfect, but it's definitely another one I wish got a bit more notice (and a port, of course).

Those are the ones I'd name offhand, anyways.

Cthulhu · Post by **Cthulhu** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 5:03 am

Guardian Force for the Saturn. I love this game. Great levels, awesome bosses, stylish guns, great graphics... yet few people give this game much attention. For shame!

I can understand if the rotating turret mechanic isn't your cup of tea though.

Zenichi - Windows XP (doujin game) - I included this in a little doujin review thread I started a while ago but I don't think anyone else here bought it. Fantastic game. One of the best doujin shmups in a while.

Two is good enough for now. I wanna see what other people post before I blab more.

Accutron · Post by **Accutron** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 8:14 am

Solaris for the 2600. Why does it always get left out of the zillion-in-one Atari compilations? Are they afraid they might actually include a 2600 game worth playing for more than 5 minutes?

Herr Schatten · Post by **Herr Schatten** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 8:35 am

Z-Out.

I know I told this before, but I seem to be the only diehard fan of the game around here. However, the reasons for this game being underappreciated are easy to pick out. It seems not many people know a lot about Amiga games in general and those who do try it out on a real Amiga or in emulation usually quickly write it off as being an uninspired R-Type clone. Which it is not. Despite its slightly amateurish visuals in the first four stages, Z-Out is the best R-Type style game that isn't a part of the series. Personally, I'd rate it higher than both R-Type II and Final. Z-Out has some very good stage designs and outstanding boss fights to discover, provided you put enough time in the game.

Monkey_Man · Post by **Monkey_Man** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 8:45 am

Icarus wrote:well all know what The Most Controversial Shmup is

We do?
[/noob]

black mariah · Post by **black mariah** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 9:19 am

BulletMagnet wrote: Cyvern: Even though it's made by a different company, somehow it reminds me of the Vasaras, perhaps simply because it's also so obscure. It takes a little bit of Cave, Raizing, and Psikyo and tacks on some dragons; it's not perfect, but it's definitely another one I wish got a bit more notice (and a port, of course).

Thread's over. Everyone can go home. Nothing is more underrated than Cyvern. It is what Psikyo games would be like if Psikyo had actually evolved their games over the past DECADE or so. Fast patterned bullets with a simple yet deep scoring mechanism. Plus it's really fucking pretty. Compare Cyvern and Dragon Blaze and you'll understand. Maybe I should try to resurrect the Cyvern high score thread that failed a while back...

black mariah · Post by **black mariah** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 9:19 am

Monkey_Man wrote:
Icarus wrote:well all know what The Most Controversial Shmup is
We do?
[/noob]

Yes. In the thread entitled "Most Controversial Shmup". To save you the trouble, it's Garegga and you probably don't want to know why.

bVork · Post by **bVork** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 9:43 am

I don't think some of the protoshmups get enough respect around here. Moon Cresta has fairly deep gameplay (more complex than Galaga, AND it's older!) and Tempest is just THE perfect shmup, as far as I'm concerned. Yes, it only has 1 dimension of movement, but everything is so perfectly balanced that its age hasn't tarnished it one bit. The abstract vector graphics looked amazing then and still look unique today. The control is perfect (on a real machine) and you have only yourself to blame if you die. And, to top things off, the continue system prevents credit-feeding by restarting you at a previous level.

Still, lots of people have heard of Tempest, so I'd say Moon Cresta is the most underrated. If you haven't played it, give it a shot. You might be surprised.

Zweihander · Post by **Zweihander** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 9:53 am

i'm one of the 8 people who liked Section Z. ^^; i wish more shmups would let you fire in reverse. :/ (full fire in other direction; not just rear shot, like Gradius) i'm glad Thunder Force lets you do that, though you have to switch weapon types :/

freddiebamboo · Post by **freddiebamboo** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 9:56 am

I'll give a second vote for the vasara series, they are beautifully made games. I didn't realised thay never got a home port, what an absolute crime.

Post by **Ghegs** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 9:58 am

Zweihander wrote:i'm one of the 8 people who liked Section Z. ^^; i wish more shmups would let you fire in reverse. :/ (full fire in other direction; not just rear shot, like Gradius) i'm glad Thunder Force lets you do that, though you have to switch weapon types :/

Side Arms and Forgotten Worlds, which are part of the same series as Section Z, so it's not much of a surprise.

Post by **system11** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 10:06 am

It'd have to be Cyvern or Vasara 2 from games in recent memory. Cyvern is just quality all the way through, and Vasara 2 is brilliant. I suspect the latter gets overlooked because IMHO the first game was quite weak in a few areas - notably presentation. Visco came back to the table with HUGELY improved graphics and sound, a tight game system, and a lot of interesting gameplay elements focused around the close up attacks. The main thing hurting both these games is the lack of a Cave logo - people are so obsessed with following brands these days.

ST Dragon · Post by **ST Dragon** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 11:00 am

Insector X on the Mega Drive / Genesis!
This is actually vastly superior to it's arcade cousin & boasts some huge end level Bosses.
The gameplay is quite good too.

Last Guardian · Post by **Last Guardian** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 11:35 am

Herr Schatten wrote:Z-Out.
Despite its slightly amateurish visuals in the first four stages, Z-Out is the best R-Type style game that isn't a part of the series

Better then Pulstar or Last Resort ?
Anyway never heard of it before but will try and dig this up, you got me curious.

Marc · Post by **Marc** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 11:51 am

The Thundercross series gets little attention compared to Konami's other series', and I can't for the life of me understand why. Smoother, faster and more instinctive than the Gradius series IMO.

Gynoug on MD seems to be reasonably well-regarded, but should be much better thought of than it seems to be IMO. Beautiful graphics, amazing soundtracks, solidly designed, and a well-paced difficulty curve. One of the MD's finest shooters.

And another vote for Z-Out, shame the bland visuals sour the experience slightly.

Andi · Post by **Andi** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 12:55 pm

Marc wrote:Gynoug on MD seems to be reasonably well-regarded, but should be much better thought of than it seems to be IMO. Beautiful graphics, amazing soundtracks, solidly designed, and a well-paced difficulty curve. One of the MD's finest shooters.

Genesis shooters generally don't get much attention. My big problem with Gynoug is the fact that the levels are so long, that it gets tedious to play through from level 1 every time you die.

sffan · Post by **sffan** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 1:12 pm

Air Gallet. I found this one really hard at first, but it has a nice learning curve and good depth. I think it runs on Cave hardware. The only drawback is the long intro but if you play it in mame you can F10 that part and get on with the game. Nice weapons too, and great explosions.

CMoon · Post by **CMoon** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 1:15 pm

Daisen pu / Twin Hawk.

ST Dragon · Post by **ST Dragon** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 1:40 pm

Andi wrote:
Marc wrote:Gynoug on MD seems to be reasonably well-regarded, but should be much better thought of than it seems to be IMO. Beautiful graphics, amazing soundtracks, solidly designed, and a well-paced difficulty curve. One of the MD's finest shooters.
Genesis shooters generally don't get much attention. My big problem with Gynoug is the fact that the levels are so long, that it gets tedious to play through from level 1 every time you die.

Gynoug / Wings of Wor:

One my three all time favourite shooters on the Geny along side Thunder Force III & Gaiares.

Excellent, gameplay, music & atmosphere.

In case you didn't know...
The graphics of Gynoug are done by the same artist who made the bizarre/parody themed graphics of Cho Aniki series on the PC-Engine.
You can tell he has an obsession of mixing skin with metal just by looking at the Bosses of these games...

Also Agony, Apidya & Swiv don't get much attention either now adays, as they used to back in the day.

Diabollokus · Post by **Diabollokus** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 2:19 pm

Yeah I agree with you guys on gynoug, the graphics are good and the music in the first level rocks. The levels are a bit long and repetitive though, I think its the most grotesque game ever made though dam that boss with the giant cock is hideous the graphic artists really pulled it off.

Steel Empire dam I loved that game pretty underated, but I suppose it got a gba rerelease so maybe not...........

Guardian force, yeah I bought it cheap and still haven't beaten the final boss in time really different shmup thats hard to appreciate due to its differences particularly artistic styling, some of the bosses look totally uninspired them they pull out their chain saws.

Randorama · Post by **Randorama** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 2:36 pm

bloodflowers wrote:It'd have to be Cyvern or Vasara 2 from games in recent memory. Cyvern is just quality all the way through, and Vasara 2 is brilliant. I suspect the latter gets overlooked because IMHO the first game was quite weak in a few areas - notably presentation. Visco came back to the table with HUGELY improved graphics and sound, a tight game system, and a lot of interesting gameplay elements focused around the close up attacks. The main thing hurting both these games is the lack of a Cave logo - people are so obsessed with following brands these days.

Yeah, and i think that both games are basically obscure in Western lands (except for MAME users). I know that, however, both have a cult status and a a decent fanbases in Japan.On the old forum, there were some links by Matt to a "cyern maniax" site (with replays on DVD!) and some good infos. About Vasara 2, i know that it had a good success (but not that big to motivate a port) and some replays and guides as well. Personally, i think that Cyvern is better, albeit i remember the emulation to be poo (bad graphics and sound and it required a lot of horse-power).

I would throw in GWG (yeah, yeah, FPS bitching, but gameplay is quite deep and fast) and the whole 194X series: 1943 was a score fiend and a gold mine of secrets, 1941 a nice and fast game, 19XX an excellent title with a strong battle going on to see who reached the 20m. I would also say that Dangun is underrated, even if Cave, but maybe i'm just a disco fan-boy...i would put Dimahoo in, another game damaged by the lack of a port.

Accutron · Post by **Accutron** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 2:45 pm

Marc wrote:The Thundercross series gets little attention compared to Konami's other series', and I can't for the life of me understand why. Smoother, faster and more instinctive than the Gradius series IMO.

I second that. Been a long time since I played Thundercross...I believe one of Gradius V's option types is based on it. Undoubtedly gets less attention because it's never been ported to a home system (or has it?)

BrianC · Post by **BrianC** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 3:00 pm

Accutron wrote:
Marc wrote:The Thundercross series gets little attention compared to Konami's other series', and I can't for the life of me understand why. Smoother, faster and more instinctive than the Gradius series IMO.
I second that. Been a long time since I played Thundercross...I believe one of Gradius V's option types is based on it. Undoubtedly gets less attention because it's never been ported to a home system (or has it?)

I think part of the reason Thunder Cross gets less attention is becuase of the butchered US version.

angrycoder · Post by **angrycoder** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 5:04 pm

Having just gotten it last week, I would have to say Harmful Park. I'm not a huge fan of cute'em ups, but everything about this game is damn near perfect.

- the music is unique and wonderful
- the graphics are gorgeous - especially the little details in the backgrounds
- the weapon system is great - like radiant silvergun you start off will all the weapons in the game. Unlike radiant silvergun, you upgrade the weapons via powerups. All 4 weapons have their own uses, especially if you are playing for score.
- doesn't suffer from the loose a life and you might as well give up syndrome so common to many horizontal shmups
- fun scoring system. 1) collect chains of consecutive gems 2) killing multiple enemies with a single shot results in a multiplier - this is where the real strategy comes in, choosing the right weapon and the right moment to shoot.

I'm glad I found this game, it is definately a top tier PS1 shmup.

Zweihander · Post by **Zweihander** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 5:44 pm

Ghegs wrote:Side Arms and Forgotten Worlds, which are part of the same series as Section Z, so it's not much of a surprise.

thanks, i'll be on a lookout for Forgotten Worlds ^^ (another friend told me about that game last night too.. o.O) was Side Arms released in the US? if not, i could always look for a rom of it.. ^^;

Lyle · Post by **Lyle** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 5:58 pm

Herr Schatten wrote:Z-Out.

I know I told this before, but I seem to be the only diehard fan of the game around here. However, the reasons for this game being underappreciated are easy to pick out. It seems not many people know a lot about Amiga games in general and those who do try it out on a real Amiga or in emulation usually quickly write it off as being an uninspired R-Type clone. Which it is not. Despite its slightly amateurish visuals in the first four stages, Z-Out is the best R-Type style game that isn't a part of the series. Personally, I'd rate it higher than both R-Type II and Final. Z-Out has some very good stage designs and outstanding boss fights to discover, provided you put enough time in the game.

I like Z-Out a lot too. And it was considered pretty good when it came out. The best Amiga shmup along with Battle Squadron IMO.

Underrated :

- Carrier Airwing. At best considered average by most. In spite of the stupid gas/damage gauge system, I think it's one of the greatest hori ever made in the 90s.

- Subterrania. Perhaps because gravity shmups as a genre are often overlooked. Brilliant ideas, gfx and level design.

- Prehistorik Isle 2. Amongst my top 5 Neo shmups. But most people seem to find it ugly and boring.

- G Darius. Yes, that one too. Sure, it does get a lot of praise. But not enough, considering it's one of the greatest game ever made.

Ignored more than underrated : Cybattler, Nebulas Ray, Over Horizon, Space Manbow, Mr. Heli, Eco Fighter, Forgotten Worlds (the arcade game only), Section Z (arcade too), Mystic Rider, Slap Fight, Brave Blade.

Post by **Ghegs** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 6:01 pm

Zweihander wrote: was Side Arms released in the US?

The TurboGrafx port (very good, lacking only 2p mode) was, don't know about the arcade original.

jp · Post by jp » Mon Jul 25, 2005 6:41 pm

Blast Wind.

Just because its straight-forward shooting fun doesn't make it a bad game.

visuatrox · Post by **visuatrox** » Mon Jul 25, 2005 6:43 pm

Battle Squadron & Disposable Hero, both are superb and show that Europeans can make good shmups too!

shmups.system11.org

Most Underrated Shmup?

Most Underrated Shmup?

Re: Most Underrated Shmup?

Re: Most Underrated Shmup?