Are shmups too lonely?

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Skykid
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Skykid »

Cagar wrote: Source?
Oh I can't remember where, probably the thread where he was ragging on casuals. I remember him insinuating it on more than one occasion.
I've had a girlfriend for almost 3 years.
Great! So what's the problem getting some friends going?
Pallerå wrote:the forums and hoping for someone lonely to read the country tag below your avatar.
Sad.
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Pallerå
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Pallerå »

I recently moved to an actual cave to experience ketsui to its fullest.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by CptRansom »

Pallerå wrote:I recently moved to an actual cave to experience ketsui to its fullest.
The thread will not get better than this.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by DrInfy »

It really helps if you convince someone of your own level to compete with you. I had a friend to compete with in Touhou games (clearing a game on higher difficulty gives you a point or getting bigger score on same difficulty and only normal or above is counted) and had a blast. Too bad he gave up after I beat him too much. :<
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by KAI »

Now I finally understand why dakimakuras are selling so much.

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O. Van Bruce
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by O. Van Bruce »

so...

- there are people here who lack the means to get friends through shmups. It's mainly due to isolation from the arcade escene.

- That doesn't mean they are socially inept but when you actually try to be good on shmups it takes away a lot of time that could be spend on sociallizing.

- as a result, some of us (including me) feel that being a fan of shmups is a lonely hobby.

Is this true?
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Skykid
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Skykid »

O. Van Bruce wrote:so...

- there are people here who lack the means to get friends through shmups. It's mainly due to isolation from the arcade escene.

- That doesn't mean they are socially inept but when you actually try to be good on shmups it takes away a lot of time that could be spend on sociallizing.

- as a result, some of us (including me) feel that being a fan of shmups is a lonely hobby.

Is this true?
No.

It doesn't matter what hobby it is, you'd still be lonely because you're lonely people.

Stop blaming the fucking shmups.
Last edited by Skykid on Sun Mar 17, 2013 4:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by BareKnuckleRoo »

Skykid wrote:It doesn't matter what hobby it is, you'd still be lonely because you're lonely people.
Pretty much this. If you're doing whatever you're doing alone, then you've got a solitary hobby. Finding others in real life to hang out with who're into the same stuff (shmupmeets, woo) makes a big difference. You can always try to get people interested at a local gaming convention or whatever's in your area by demoing a game or something.
Last edited by BareKnuckleRoo on Sun Mar 17, 2013 11:44 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by neorichieb1971 »

Yeah well. If you like shmups some part of society must have disowned you, or you disowned society to find your way here. At some point, at some time.

If you suddenly found yourself partying while shmupping, I think you'd find it wasn't for you... perhaps.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Skykid »

neorichieb1971 wrote:Yeah well. If you like shmups some part of society must have disowned you, or you disowned society to find your way here. At some point, at some time.

If you suddenly found yourself partying while shmupping, I think you'd find it wasn't for you... perhaps.
hzt once turned up to one of my shmup on wall projector gatherings drinking a bottle of Jack, and at New Years we were playing Leo and assorted PCB's at CHI's place, watching Hokuto no Ken series and drinking enough alcohol to open a distillery. Shmups and partying mix: fact.
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O. Van Bruce
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by O. Van Bruce »

Skykid, you are forgetting one thing.

At least in my case, there is only 2 people I know who want to play shmups seriously near me. One of then is not even in my city and the one near me haven't played one in months...

I do share other hobbies with other people (I mentioned it here in this same thread) but when it comes to shmups, I have no noone (phisically) that likes it. As a result, the only way to share my achievements or do some competition is through the internet.

PD: The situation is so solitary here that I've considered to open an stand in some event to attract people to the genre in my area :lol:
Last edited by O. Van Bruce on Sun Mar 17, 2013 5:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Bananamatic
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Bananamatic »

all this talk about shmupmeets makes me depressed

we don't even have anime clubs here
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by O. Van Bruce »

Bananamatic wrote:all this talk about shmupmeets makes me depressed

we don't even have anime clubs here
I feel you Bananaman.

PD: Today I got my 1111 post! if only my join date would have been on january, I'd be the king of 1's right now :lol:
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Skykid
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Skykid »

O. Van Bruce wrote:Skykid, you are forgetting one thing.

At least in my case, there is only 2 people I know who want to play shmups seriously near me. One of then is not even in my city and the one near me haven't played one in months...

I do share other hobbies with other people (I mentioned it here in this same thread) but when it comes to shmups, I have no noone (phisically) that likes it. As a result, the only way to share my achievements or do some competition is through the internet.

PD: The situation is so solitary here that I've considered to open an stand in some event to attract people to the genre in my area :lol:
But I don't understand why your entire life needs to revolve around your videogaming preferences. Stop being so insular. I've been to Barcelona, it fucking rules. Go find some dudes, drink a bunch of San Miguel and hit the titty bars.
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O. Van Bruce
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by O. Van Bruce »

Skykid...

Who was talking here about "our lives are hollow, we don't have social live"?

we are simply stating the fact that no one (or barely no one) likes shmups in our area. It's difficult to find even serious Touhou players (you'll see lots of cosplayers though :roll: )

PD: And even though I don't like beer, an Estrella Damm is better than a San Miguel
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by casualcoder »

I'm not looking towards shmups (or any games) to alleviate loneliness in general. Whatever the rest of your life is should take care of that. What Im saying is that there is so much community building up around many games nowadays and it feels to me like this is lacking in the shmup genre.

I don't need to make friends, necessarily, but rather it would be nice to have an easy and direct way to interact over these games preferably within the games themselves. I think it's a normal extension of becoming interested in the subject in general. If you get into anything, naturally you seek out a way to share it with others in some way. Arcade scoreboards are a very primitive and early manifestation of this need.

I do not want Facebook tacked onto my shmups experience. I generally find that to be a shallow and, ultimately, lonely experience in and of itself. I would just like to see atleast one game in which I can fire it up and see others I can either compete against or set challenges in realtime, or just discuss tactics. Something like that.

I didn't know TSS could be played online. Thats interesting.
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Skykid
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Skykid »

O. Van Bruce wrote:Skykid...

Who was talking here about "our lives are hollow, we don't have social live"?

we are simply stating the fact that no one (or barely no one) likes shmups in our area. It's difficult to find even serious Touhou players (you'll see lots of cosplayers though :roll: )

PD: And even though I don't like beer, an Estrella Damm is better than a San Miguel
Sorry, everyone just sounds so reclusive. In which case I fall back to statement one, shmups are a solitary as anything other 1P geared genre. If you have no one to directly share them with, that's a shame, but life goes on.
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chum
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by chum »

I don't see the problem, we have such a wonderful community of hard working shmups players and knowledgeable connoisseurs right here. How could you possibly feel lonely. Everytime I log into shmups I feel at home. We are all friends, aren't we?

PoFV is fun to play online.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by O. Van Bruce »

casualcoder wrote:I would just like to see atleast one game in which I can fire it up and see others I can either compete against or set challenges in realtime, or just discuss tactics. Something like that.

I didn't know TSS could be played online. Thats interesting.
This, so much this. I mentioned I go to a group of guys who play fighters in a rented local: I allways start some mushi futari or Akai Katana run there whenever I go and people just watch and doesn't want to play, very sad.

And please, someone tell me how to play TSS online! I'm itching to play it versus :D
chum wrote:I don't see the problem, we have such a wonderful community of hard working shmups players and knowledgeable connoisseurs right here. How could you possibly feel lonely. Everytime I log into shmups I feel at home. We are all friends, aren't we?

PoFV is fun to play online.
Nothing compares when you play PoFV versus with your opponent besides you and a bunch of people cheering, or when you are the one cheering your friend. Done that and it's very fun.
Last edited by O. Van Bruce on Sun Mar 17, 2013 6:08 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

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chum wrote:I don't see the problem, we have such a wonderful community of hard working shmups players and knowledgeable connoisseurs right here. How could you possibly feel lonely. Everytime I log into shmups I feel at home. We are all friends, aren't we?

PoFV is fun to play online.
It just occurred to me. Why don't all of the shmup devs have a central scoreboard that they all post high score info to? IOS has gamecenter or feint or whatever it's called. But why is there no such thing for shmups which is all about high scores? I'm sure if Cave put out a site dedicated to this and had it automatically pull data from its entire game catalogue (that is connected) that it would become quite popular and the de facto standard that other devs end up using for their hiscores. It's just one idea.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Cagar »

What is TSS?

Also, yes, shmups are lonely hobby, if compared to for example badminton.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by O. Van Bruce »

I suppose it's too much problems for something devs and players have never really cared about.
Cagar wrote:What is TSS?
Twinkle Star Sprites.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by casualcoder »

TSS = Twinkle Star Sprites. The only directly competitive shmup that I know of (other than Senko no Ronde). Apparently it's playable online but I haven't seen how so.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by O. Van Bruce »

casualcoder wrote:TSS = Twinkle Star Sprites. The only directly competitive shmup that I know of (other than Senko no Ronde). Apparently it's playable online but I haven't seen how so.
Well, you also have the 2 Phantasmagoria from Touhou and the Seihou Phantasmagoria.

There is also Twinkle Star Sprites 2 for the PS2.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by pestro87 »

casualcoder wrote:
chum wrote:I don't see the problem, we have such a wonderful community of hard working shmups players and knowledgeable connoisseurs right here. How could you possibly feel lonely. Everytime I log into shmups I feel at home. We are all friends, aren't we?

PoFV is fun to play online.
It just occurred to me. Why don't all of the shmup devs have a central scoreboard that they all post high score info to? IOS has gamecenter or feint or whatever it's called. But why is there no such thing for shmups which is all about high scores? I'm sure if Cave put out a site dedicated to this and had it automatically pull data from its entire game catalogue (that is connected) that it would become quite popular and the de facto standard that other devs end up using for their hiscores. It's just one idea.
This is essentially what RedLynx did with Trials 2 (yeah, it's not a shmup I know, but still - same idea):

http://trials2se.redlynx.com/PlayerRankingSearch.action

They made the in-game online leaderboards publicly accessible through their webpage and added forum sections as well. If you click on any player you can see their times on each level (along with their world ranking on each level).
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by DEL »

Skykid wrote;
Shmups, like many arcade games, are designed to be mastered 1 player, so it's always better to take it on alone. The only problem is, arcade games are meant to exist in an arcade environment, which is social. Now they're like fish out of water, and that's the loneliest thing about them.
Yes the social real World arcade environment and lack of it nowadays is the stuff I've been bitching about recently.
We're living in divide & conquer times. Everyone being relegated back to their homes. It sucks.
Places where people have traditionally met and socialised like pubs and arcades are being wiped out.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by CptRansom »

OBVIOUSLY the governments have orchestrated this movement of keeping everyone entertained at home so when everything becomes a police state and we're all told we have curfews and shit, no one will mind.

LIKE COWS TO THE SLAUGHTER I TELL YOU.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by Despatche »

Skykid wrote:Shmups, like many arcade games, are designed to be mastered 1 player, so it's always better to take it on alone. The only problem is, arcade games are meant to exist in an arcade environment, which is social. Now they're like fish out of water, and that's the loneliest thing about them.
The only way this paragraph can even begin to make sense is if you had joined these communities in 2012, not 2007 or whenever.
Skykid wrote:Fighting games on your own, now that would be lonely. Online has done wonderful things to save that genre.
No. No, it really hasn't.
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

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CptRansom wrote:LIKE POPCORNS HEADING INTO THE DDP LASER I TELL YOU.
fixed
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Re: Are shmups too lonely?

Post by RNGmaster »

If you base your identity around video games, you're going to end up lonely, and socially and intellectually deprived. End of story.

There were a few weeks going for Touhou LNB stuff where shmups were really all I cared about and measured my personal worth on. That made my play worse and made me a pathetic mess.
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