Arcade: Mushihimesama Cave Matsuri ver 1.5 (2011)

[neorichieb1971]

I can't see them churning out 2-3 new 2D shmups a year ever again, but we'll probably see lots of offshoots of existing IP's, like Ibara the fighting game, Dodonpachi the FPS and Mushihimesama the GTA style free-roaming adventure.

I had a blast reading that.

So if they are getting rid of old stock, why not choose the cheaper route? Perhaps if its the end of an era than perhaps its a good idea to buy this stuff.

[TrevHead (TVR)]

While its true that Cave are moving away from STGs Ive always had the hope that they would continue making games with an arcade twist like that Nin2Jump. Still that kinect development could be for something similar to REZ & Child of Eden. As MS and Cave appear to be best buddies atm, I wonder if MS talked Cave into developing kinect games with an arcade feel. I suppose a quality Kinect game by CAVE would be helpfull for MS to attract core gamers, if MS put their PR hype machine onto it

TBH while it does suck that CAVE ar moving away from STGs hopefully theyll contine to support the genre in the future. I suppose I could be happy with just 1 new Cave IP plus a Guwange with extra modes per year. It would certainly give more breathing space for other STG devs like G.rev who dont seem to in good shape atm. Plus weve always got Cave clones 5pB

[Elixir]

In the Cave ustream last night, they were talking about directing their attention towards Kinect, and they have a Kinect oriented game in experimental stages (which wasn't for public view).

Pls say youre joking

I'm not joking.

I'm not actually annoyed by the news, there's at least 20 retail shmups for 360. If you can't find something to settle on by now, this genre probably isn't for you.

[Special World]

I'll be so sad if this game never gets a port. I know it's pretty unlikely at this point, but this game looks like an amazing re-imagining of the original Mushi. The original game had such good levels and such a unique style, and my only problem with it was that the scoring system was sort of strange. Futari's become my favorite shooter (and possibly game) of all time, though, and this looks like a great remix of both Mushi 1 and Futari.

The soundtrack is pretty terrible compared to the amazing ST of the first game, but I could easily forgive it because this looks so fun.

[Steve]

What am I missing here ?

There's nothing of any significance changed.
There is the option to start with maximum power / 4 options.
The options firing is colour coded to the main ship power type.
The new soundtrack is just a spurious remix of the excellent original.

It's not exactly Dafukkatsu BL (with regard to the changes).

I'll probably be flamed but it seems very much the same game to me.

Kings new clothes ??????

[Dronevil]

The movie looks a lot like the original mushihimesama.
The maniac "max-power" mode reminds me a lot of the ps2 arrange mode.. in fact in the video (3:04) you can see a bullet cancel in stage 3 that, at least in the ps2 port, only happens in the arrange mode, not in the arcade mode..
And in the ultra "max-power" part of the video (stage 2 boss) 2:32.. is that an autobomb?

Anyway.. i want to play it badly

[moozooh]

Yes, that was autobomb, Original mode has the enemies bleed gold ingots when attacked at point-blank, there's a lot of bullet-canceling that wasn't before, starting the game at max power makes enemies fire faster shots, all scoring systems were changed actually. Steve is clearly not paying attention.

[Steve]

You make some good points and it does look like an auto bomb.
It's some time since I seriously played the pcb.
Some more clips would be nice.

[Imhotep]

Cave is cashing in their kudos at the moment, which is based entirely on the outstanding and consistent quality of past releases. Unfortunately, they don't put much effort in maintaining their reputation by developing new quality titles.

From a player's standpoint, a home release pcb is a grotesque idea.

[Muchi Muchi Spork]

This doesn't appear to be a home release pcb any more than the Daifukkatsu Black Label board they sell on their website does (it takes coins). The only home release was the Akai Katana Limited one, and I agree there is something really wrong about an arcade pcb that won't accept coins.

[Nick420]

I wanna hear what the stage 3 tune sounds like now.....

[caincan]

session coming soon in Paris, french player "SGN" bought it....

[emphatic]

session coming soon in Paris, french player "SGN" bought it....

Awesome!

[rancor]

It's at HEY! now. I put a few coins in yesterday. I never played enough of the original version to notice the differences.

[genevois]

unboxing

http://sigrsw.blog.shinobi.jp/Entry/16/

[Never_Scurred]

unboxing

http://sigrsw.blog.shinobi.jp/Entry/16/

Never has a piece of cardboard had so much sex appeal.

[Strider77]

So this does have maniac and ultra in there also?

[Elixir]

So this does have maniac and ultra in there also?

Yes.

After watching a stream for a few hours, I'm quite impressed--especially with the new max power mode for all difficulties. I'm particularly fond of the fifth stage's theme.

I'll most likely buy this once it eventuates to console.

[supergrafx77]

I'll most likely buy this once it eventuates to console.

^This

[Never_Scurred]

I'll most likely buy this once it eventuates to console.

^This

^Yup

[cheuboh]

After watching a stream for a few hours, I'm quite impressed--especially with the new max power mode for all difficulties. I'm particularly fond of the fifth stage's theme.
.

Do you have a link to this stream by any chance ? Thanks ^^

[Dronevil]

I found this stream in livetube:
http://livetube.cc/%E3%81%BF%E3%81%93%E ... %8Aver1.5+
(it takes like 8 minutes to start.. be patient)

You can download it (.flv format) here
Don't really know if you need to be registered in order to watch or download it..

[CStarFlare]

You don't have to register, but it's 1.9 gigs big.

[Dronevil]

You don't have to register, but it's 1.9 gigs big.

Yeah.. it's quite long

first impressions after watching some footage..
The whole thing looks like a "black label" to me. There are more enemies in a few spots.. more popcorn enemies, more medium sized bugs in stage 3, more green beetles in stage 4.. not too different, just a bit.
I've never liked too much original mode, but with max power looks really really intense.
Maniac mode with max power looks a-ma-zing.. More bullets, faster bullets (quite fast!!). Stage 3 is hectic! It's a pity the guy playing didn't make it to stage 4 and 5. And the scoring system.. the guy keeps the counter high without much effort. Looks a lot easier.. and i like it.

I'm dying to play this..

[spadgy]

I'm stupidly late on noticing this (when I saw it on the Cave Shop I thought it was a Futari home kit) but now I've finally bloody cottoned on, boy am I excited!

I had an interview with Asada near-sorted for E3 (which I'm going to next week). Now Cave have decided not to attend the event as they are 'too busy' (good news in itself). I would have loved to quiz him about the possibility of a port of this. Surely it will happen?

[TrevHead (TVR)]

We can hope. There is certainly demand for it plus an acurate port of the original since the ps2 version has slowdown issues. Does anyone know if Japanese fans feel the same way?

Plus it seems to me abit of a waste of time and money in making 1.5 and only selling 9 or 10 PCBs and not making it available to the everyone else 1 or 2 years from now.

Btw I expected sales to be a little bit larger then that, I also heard the Akia Katana PCB only sold a handfull aswell. I wonder why this is so? My guess is that most PCB owners just arnt bothering to spend that kind of cash when they can wait a while and pick up a 360 port thats very close to the original

[StarCreator]

Plus it seems to me abit of a waste of time and money in making 1.5 and only selling 9 or 10 PCBs and not making it available to the everyone else 1 or 2 years from now.

There must be a fair bit more than 9 or 10 PCBs. We know there are at least two at Hey and six on GaijinPunch's floor.

[TrevHead (TVR)]

Plus it seems to me abit of a waste of time and money in making 1.5 and only selling 9 or 10 PCBs and not making it available to the everyone else 1 or 2 years from now.

There must be a fair bit more than 9 or 10 PCBs. We know there are at least two at Hey and six on GaijinPunch's floor.

Looks like I was way off the mark believing those rumours Unless GP has bought all 6 just to annoy the rest of us

Does anyone have a ballpark estimate as to how many PCBs Cave of their resent titles there is in circulation?

[brentsg]

Btw I expected sales to be a little bit larger then that, I also heard the Akia Katana PCB only sold a handfull aswell. I wonder why this is so? My guess is that most PCB owners just arnt bothering to spend that kind of cash when they can wait a while and pick up a 360 port thats very close to the original

The games weren't directed at collectors when AK was first released, they were directed at arcades. My understanding is that AK sold poorly because operators were tired of the inevitable version 1.5 being released, and that associated hassle. Worse yet was the inevitable Black Label release that would require another expensive purchase to keep customers interested.

So they took a wait and see approach, meanwhile the top players capped out the scoring relatively quickly and here we are. Cave turns the likely Black Label release into a "home PCB", that apparently sells well, and now we have Mushi 1.5. The good thing is that they opened up the no-coin feature of AKLE, so arcades are back in the picture. Now I have to wonder what Annex is thinking.

[Dave_K.]

Cave turns the likely Black Label release into a "home PCB", that apparently sells well, and now we have Mushi 1.5. The good thing is that they opened up the no-coin feature of AKLE, so arcades are back in the picture. Now I have to wonder what Annex is thinking.

It makes sense to me. Annex can't say anything, if they inked a deal for AC release of AK, thus the no-credit version of AKLE. I'm sure Annex has no deal on Mushi distribution, so Cave is free to sell to both AC and home markets.