hardest Psikyo Shmup

[mesh control]

cholesterol

[emphatic]

Tengai, because it's a hori.

[KAI]

Gunbird 2 hori then.

[Op Intensify]

Gunbird 2.

Dragon Blaze is tough, but your weapons are stronger and the scoring is so much easier than coin chaining + gemheads.

Coin chaining can be pretty damn deadly...having to juggle the timing of flashes with the bullet patterns in your brain.

Zero Gunner 2 is probably the easiest, even with the lack of screen-clearing bombs, though I haven't played Pilot Kids. Strikers 99 can't be TOO bad, if I was able to 1CC the first loop in a week.

[mesh control]

Zero Gunner 2 is so fucking good

[emphatic]

Zero Gunner 2 is so fucking good

[Op Intensify]

Agreed. ZG2 is definitely the most polished and playable of their shmups. Shame it had to be their last (discounting the underwhelming Sengoku Cannon). It's balanced perfectly for the movement/aiming system and lack of defensive bombs. The boss transformations are radder than ever in Naomi 3D.

Ever notice that the high score table shows the street with their former office building? Reminds me of all the KOF stages set outside SNK's headquarters or Neo Geo World.

Zero Gunner 1 looks interesting, but not anywhere near the same level. I only got to play it once, with broken sound at a long-gone shitty boardwalk arcade.

[Psikyo_Ball]

1-4 boos on gunbird, have the same difficult than the mid boss at 1-7 on dragon blaze.

If you mean the second midboss I see what you're talking about, that thing is just move left, move right. If you mean the first midboss, the dragonfly thing, I have no idea unless Sonia trivializes that.

Also GB2 1-4 is EZ. If you activate the rotating turrets at the right time you won't get walled.

I can start a duplicate thread with a working poll if anyone wants btw

My strategy for the dragn fly thingy with sonia is : dragon atack in the face before that thing shoot- charged shoot withouth dragon while im dodging the bullets- call back the dragon- 1 more dragon atack and get your coins. Was talking about the second mid boss. Is too hard for get a good pisition at the start of patern because sonia is a litle slowy. Btw 1 bomb on the right and 2 dragon atack is better if you want pick this 2 coin bags. Boss at 1-4 on gunbird are a wall for me, i think i reach 1-5 stage only 4 or 5 times

[Illyrian]

The thing with Gunbird 2 is that it has really uneven difficulty and lightning fast bullets that are easy to dodge once you memorize them but hell until you figure out the trick behind the pattern. Dragon Blaze is more difficult in the end, but it has a better difficulty curve and dodging fast patterns is usually a punishment for not doing things right like in good Psikyo games, instead of something the game forces you to dodge as in GB2 or Strikers 1945 II.

Strikers 1999 is one of the easiest Psikyo games IMO.

Oh god this.

The difficulty really varies IMO based on what order you get the levels in, some bosses being easier on level 4 than others.
Then you hit stage 5 and the difficulty goes through the ceiling (I think so anyway).

My problem with Dragonblaze is I spend too much time focussing on shotgunning, instead of looking at the bullets.

[Hagane]

Agreed. ZG2 is definitely the most polished and playable of their shmups.

I think there's no doubt that Dragon Blaze is the best out of their games. Takes everything that's good about Psikyo and refines it. Easiest Psikyo game is probably Sengoku Ace, mainly because its second loop has no suicide bullets.

As an aside, I find it curious how so many people have such trouble with medaling in Psikyo games. Once you get the timing down (the same in all the games that feature it as far as I know, seven frames), it's one of the most intuitive and satisfying scoring systems in a shooter.

[professor ganson]

Once I started using Valpiro and treated Gunbird 2 as a memorizer, it became more manageable. I still think the opening stages are a bit more unforgiving than those in DB. Less bullet dodging in DB. More about knowing where to be with your dragon shot.

[finisherr]

wish I knew how to approach these games. they look pretty fun. Though I must say, any of these non-cave games with rank make me feel like I'm in a carnival; the games don't seem that tough at first, but you know there are mechanics that make them nearly impossible unless you know exactly how to exploit them, and even if you do know how to exploit them, it'll take some serious time to master proper execution.

[chum]

wish I knew how to approach these games.

Play one enough times and things will start to stick. Strategies will evolve naturally. Honestly I find Psikyo games are some of the simplest to approach first round in this entire genre, memorize the levels and patterns, and don't lose your cool during runs.

[PaulEMoz]

Utter bastards, the lot of them. I love playing them, but once things start ramping up I might as well be playing them blindfolded.

[Plasmo]

Edited the poll. Ready for the new millenium.

[trap15]

The submitted form was invalid.

[Hagane]

Yeah I can't vote either.