Official Pink Sweets -Ibara Sorekara- thread (renamed)

Post by **Icarus** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 3:30 pm

I think the most important thing to note is whether or not this glitch will apply to Western players from a scoring competition viewpoint. Given that Japanese players are skilled and competitive enough to be able to exploit the bug might render their efforts null and void from a scoring aspect, whereas there are probably only a handful of Western players who will care enough about the game to attempt the same feat.

NTSC-J · Post by **NTSC-J** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 3:34 pm

Yea but this isn't something difficult like milking the last boss in Blazing Star. There's 3 extends in the third level, so one can pretty easily get the 5 lives invincibility even without being a world class player.

Post by **Dave_K.** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 3:35 pm

If this was such a serious bug, and people stopped playing it, then why hasn't the PCB price fallen to Ibara prices? How come we rarely see any on YAJ? Does this mean the kits that are still left of ECL and Legend have the bug?

NTSC-J · Post by **NTSC-J** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 3:39 pm

Prices seem to be going down pretty quick. It's already cheaper than the first Mushi and will likely catch up to Galuda 2 within the next 6 months. Maybe one reason you don't see it on YAJ often is because no one bought it in the first place.

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 6:57 pm

There are less than a dozen new kits left now. I've asked Fujita and they say the price will not fall much from its current 98,000 yen price before it sells out. The print run of Pink Sweets was very small.

I specifically said I'd like to buy it when it was 80,000 yen, and they told me new kits will never be that low. They don't bullshit, so I trust them. That's why I put in my order for the kit this week.

Post by **Icarus** » Tue Jan 23, 2007 7:00 pm

NTSC-J wrote:Prices seem to be going down pretty quick. It's already cheaper than the first Mushi and will likely catch up to Galuda 2 within the next 6 months. Maybe one reason you don't see it on YAJ often is because no one bought it in the first place.

I've seen two within the past month, both for around 100,000Y.
In fact, there's one up on there now.

jpj · Post by **jpj** » Wed Jan 24, 2007 10:53 am

there aren't three extends in stage 3; there are three fixed extends through the whole game (1 on stage 3, stage 5, and stage 7). i think triggering the extra extends is somehow related to dropping a certain number of medals (?). also, the invincibility glitch has your ship stocks constantly moving in the top left of the screen. however, i've seen other pink sweets vids (of presumably the bug-fixed version) where after getting five lives in stock, the next extend then reverts you back to having just 1 life in stock

if i'm right, and you can't trigger the extra extends on a good scoring run, you would therefore need to get up to stage 7 on 1 life for the bug to even come into play, which wouldn't really be a big deal.

PsikyoPshumpPshooterP · Tue Jan 30, 2007 2:41 am

zakk wrote:You people and your weird download services that hurt.

http://bigcore.rsdio.com/zakk/stuff/iba ... kasumi.zip

All of them. Go go go.

Thank you for this file!! and GODDAMN I Love the soundtrack to this game. Most Honorable Mention is Stage 5. Im in love with this soundtrack.

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Fri Feb 02, 2007 11:00 pm

Ok, I got my Pink Sweets kit today and I set the lives to 6 (=5 spare lives) and played through the level. I died and my live count went down by one. So it looks like I have a fixed board!

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Sat Feb 03, 2007 1:50 am

I've played it couple hours this afternoon and here's my opinion thus far:

I like the game a lot more than when I played it in Japan last summer. The gameplay is very strange at first, and the bombing takes getting used to. The first 3 stages are a bit blah but from Stage 4 on the game really heats up and it's pretty damn fun. The amount of enemies and bullets they throw at you in some stages is insane. There must be 50 different enemy and bullet patterns in Stage 6 alone. I can't recall ever playing a shmup with so much variety in the stages, in regards to bullet patterns and enemy types.

The stage 5 boss was a surprise, I think that's one of the best boss fights I've ever experienced in a shmup. I love those bullet patterns.

The rank is pretty brutal if you medal. I've medalled up to Stage 3, but towards the end of the stage, it gets pretty nasty. Seems very similar to Ibara's rank though.

Right now I'm playing with Shasta (her vertical bomb is quite nice) and a bit of Kasumi. Lace can be really powerful but she's a bit hard to control. I don't care for Meidi thus far.

This game has some wild graphic effects in it to, for example at the end of each stage you get a "picture-in picture" of the screen you're playing on, and the game takes and saves snapshots from your run and displays these at the end during the credits. Really cool.

Harder mode feels very much like Mushi Futari's Ultra mode in regards to the bullet swarms. All the enemies spew suicide bullets when you kill them, so the screen gets pretty cluttered pretty fast. Seems a lot harder than Ibara's Harder Mode (indeed, I don't believe anyone in Japan has 1CCd PS's Harder mode yet). That said, if you bomb properly you can absorb a lot of the bullet hell and it's not too bad to get past the first stage at least (I got to stage 2 on my second try).

On the test menu, you can set extends anywhere from each 1mil to 9mil points. The default, of course, is no score-based extends. You can set the lives from 1-6, and there is also another option called "multiply", which I haven't tried yet. Maybe gives you invincibility?

There are two rank difficulties on the test menu as well (labeled 1 and 2). The first one defaults to "Normal", the second one "Midium" (sic). Gotta love those Cave typos.

I wish the game let you assign the 'speed change' function to button C instead of having to press "A+B". I've looked everywhere in the test menu and there doesn't seem to be an option for this.

Overall, while I personally still prefer Ikeda's recent works like Espgaluda 2 and Mushi Futari 1.5, I'm really pleased with my purchase. Highly recommended for all Raizing and Cave fans.

Post by **BulletMagnet** » Sat Feb 03, 2007 2:20 am

twe wrote:The rank is pretty brutal if you medal. I've medalled up to Stage 3, but towards the end of the stage, it gets pretty nasty. Seems very similar to Ibara's rank though.

Unless I misread it, this sounds sort of contradictory...Ibara's rank (as far as we know, at least...) is similar to Garegga's, i.e. pretty much everything affects the rank, and to control it you've got to score well and earn suicide-able extends, more or less end of story. PS's, again as far as we know, seems to be more dependent specifically on whether you try to score or not, so you could ostensibly play "for survival" or "for score." Figures that they made the medals easier to grab in the game where you really don't "have to" get them.

If I'm off on something, feel free to correct me.

There are two rank difficulties on the test menu as well (labeled 1 and 2). The first one defaults to "Normal", the second one "Midium" (sic). Gotta love those Cave typos.

I honestly wonder if that's just a really bad pun...IIRC Ibara had a "Midium" difficulty setting as well, but none of Cave's other stuff has misspelled it like that...I'd guess that it's a lame play on the character "Midi."

I wish the game let you assign the 'speed change' function to button C instead of having to press "A+B". I've looked everywhere in the test menu and there doesn't seem to be an option for this.

I always wondered why shmup developers sometimes seem to insist on limiting you in really stupid ways, like this...at least this time they actually let you select your ship freely regardless of which side you're playing on.

Off to the side, are there any signs of different "types" of each of the ships (speed up, shot power up, etc.) being available? I don't recall anyone else having mentioned it...

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 12:39 am

I've been playing this game some more, and it's still pretty fun. I'm not totally sure I'm going to keep it though. I mean I like it but I'm not sure it's $900 fun. For me at least. Could be up in the selling forum here soon.

I think it's cool that on the bottom of the screen it shows your current rapid fire rate while you play. It defaults at 10hz, but when I turned up the dial on my Sigma controller's rapid fire circuit, it went up to 20Hz, then maxed out at 30Hz. Once you lock it in it seems fixed. I don't know how to get it to go back to the default 10Hz.

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 1:39 am

Okay, I read up on Pink Sweet's Rank in Arcadia 9/2006 and here's what it says:

Rank increases quickly if you primarily use the Rose Cracker (this is the name of the bomb) throughout the stages. This rank is basically impossible to subdue once it has peaked, no matter what you do. So using the bomb a lot is precisely what you should NOT do in this game. You need to shoot stuff with your guns as much as possible in order to keep the rank manageable.

All of the power up items increase rank gradually, but the special power up items (for options and shot) should be avoided when possible as these make the rank violent rather quickly.

They don't really say how to lower rank, just that you should lay off the bomb, avoid power ups, and use your shot.

As a side note, contrary to what icycalm wrote in his review, the shield gauge does NOT charge up faster if you're absorbing bullets.

Wanderer · Post by **Wanderer** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 10:40 am

Finally got to play Pink Sweets courteous of Twe. My overall impression is it’s another solid Cave/Raizing style game. It’s inherently less accessible compared to Ibara as it requires you to enjoy both the Raizing ranking/medaling gameplay and the zany “killer clown” type aesthetics.

Gameplay wise it’s as solid as Ibara. You basically get the same rehashed ranking/medaling system with the exception of a new bomb/shield system which gives it a subtle Giga Wing type appeal. Difficultly ramps up after Stage 3. The enemies may look whimsical, but they are out to kick your ass hard.

I had a feeling gamplay was a lot deeper than what was apparent on the surface. Pink Sweets would do great as a port where you could really spend the time sinking your teeth into the game mechanics. I can also understand why it failed in the arcade.

Bottom-line, not as polished & accessible as Galuda II and Mushi Futari, but IMHO Pink Sweets is definitely a worthy addition to the cave library.

Can't wait to play it again if Twe doesn't sell it

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 10:46 am

Wanderer wrote:
Can't wait to play it again if Twe doesn't sell it

Haha, well I'm still on the fence with that! Man, I just played score attack a few more times and I can't beat your freaking score
you got the first time you played it.

icycalm · Post by **icycalm** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 1:51 pm

twe wrote:As a side note, contrary to what icycalm wrote in his review, the shield gauge does NOT charge up faster if you're absorbing bullets.

I corrected it now.

Thanks for pointing that out. Let me ask you something; did you read this in Arcadia or did you figure it out yourself? I was never 100% convinced that bullet-asborbing grew the shield faster, but in the frantic moments of the boss fights when I desperately needed the shield, it just somehow always felt like it worked that way.

Post by **Dave_K.** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 5:15 pm

Wanderer wrote: Gameplay wise it’s as solid as Ibara. You basically get the same rehashed ranking/medaling system with the exception of a new bomb/shield system which gives it a subtle Giga Wing type appeal. Difficultly ramps up after Stage 3. The enemies may look whimsical, but they are out to kick your ass hard.

I had a feeling gamplay was a lot deeper than what was apparent on the surface. Pink Sweets would do great as a port where you could really spend the time sinking your teeth into the game mechanics. I can also understand why it failed in the arcade.

Well I'm looking forward to trying a new medaling type system. Its obvious the Japanese Cave fans don't want to waste time figuring it out, and just go for the simpliest 1CC avoiding as much rank as possible (no medaling). So you can't compare this to Galuda II or Mushi Futari, and maybe thats why TWE is hesitant about keeping it. It's going to require a lot of attention for probably the better part of a year for someone to figure it all out (*looks at Icarus*). I can't wait for a real superplay to come out. I wonder if Archer has been playing it?

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 7:17 pm

BulletMagnet wrote:Off to the side, are there any signs of different "types" of each of the ships (speed up, shot power up, etc.) being available? I don't recall anyone else having mentioned it...

Strangely I just figured this out last night, but each ship has four different types just like in Ibara (select them the same way, by pressing A, B, A+B, or Start). They differ not in their speed and bomb type like Ibara, but rather in their option/shot types and their special power up types.

@icycalm: I figured out your Rose Cracker gauge charges up at the same rate no matter what just by playing. I also read it somewhere, probably Arcadia, as you guessed. I thought it would be cool if it charged up faster as you absorb bullets but there just isn't any difference.

Dave_K. wrote: Its obvious the Japanese Cave fans don't want to waste time figuring it out, and just go for the simpliest 1CC avoiding as much rank as possible (no medaling).

Well some of them have taken the time to figure it out, as evidenced by their crazy 15-20+ mil ALL-CLEAR scores for each character. I have no clue how they're getting such scores. I heard a superplay DVD is in development, I would LOVE to see that.

On a related note, I bombed something in Stage 5 the other day and found a medal fountain, just like in Stage 2 in Ibara! So those are hidden in this game, which obviously gives you a nice score boost.

Post by **BulletMagnet** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 9:42 pm

twe wrote:Strangely I just figured this out last night, but each ship has four different types just like in Ibara (select them the same way, by pressing A, B, A+B, or Start). They differ not in their speed and bomb type like Ibara, but rather in their option/shot types and their special power up types.

That's cool, I always liked that extra bit of "customization" in Raizing's games.

I really do wish there was more concrete rank data out there though...one source says it's medals, another says it's powerups and using the bomb, and there's almost nothing on which things do the most versus the least amount of damage...argh. I honestly wonder if the idea's ever crossed Yagawa's mind that actually telling people how to properly play his games might help to solve their popularity problem, without having to actually change anything about the games themselves.

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 9:50 pm

Bulletmagnet: you know what I was wrong about the speed thing, different types of each ship have different speeds. For example Shasta "S-Type" is faster than "A-type" on the default speed setting.

As for rank, I think the purple roses on the ground LOWER rank. I saw a Midi video where the guy misses all the medals but tries to pick up all the roses on the ground. Anyway I was playing the game this morning and I did these things:

1)Medal chained all the way through stage 4
2)Used the shot most of the time, only bombed in a few spots when
necessary
3)picked up all the roses on the ground I could
4)After powering up at the start of stage 1 I avoided all the powerups I could
5)I didn't die until the stage 3 boss. I'm not sure if dying has any effect on rank. I saw a guy get 7 spare lives in a Midi video and the rank doesn't seem to skyrocket due to it, unlike in Ibara.

Doing this, the game was quite manageable through Stage 4. I'll try and get better at Stage 4 and see how it is in stages 5 and 6 with a medal chain going through the game. But in any case I'm pretty sure it's possible to medal chain your way through the game for a Clear and a nice high score while still having a manageable difficulty level.

Post by **BulletMagnet** » Sun Feb 04, 2007 10:34 pm

twe wrote:Bulletmagnet: you know what I was wrong about the speed thing, different types of each ship have different speeds. For example Shasta "S-Type" is faster than "A-type" on the default speed setting.

Hmm...can you tell whether one button confroms to a certain 'type,' i.e. a "speed up" type, etc?

I'm not sure if dying has any effect on rank. I saw a guy get 7 spare lives in a Midi video and the rank doesn't seem to skyrocket due to it, unlike in Ibara.

Hm...well, in Ibara hoarding lives technically wouldn't raise your rank, it would just fail to lower it via suiciding/dying...as another thread mentioned, Garegga has been one-lifed, though apparently whoever did it needed to control the rank like crazy in all other areas. Maybe if you don't play for score sacrificing lives isn't necessary, if you balance it out in other aspects of how you play.

But in any case I'm pretty sure it's possible to medal chain your way through the game for a Clear and a nice high score while still having a manageable difficulty level.

If this is the case, it sounds more along the lines of Bakraid in that regard, which is fine with me.

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 1:36 am

I've played some more today, and I've concluded this game really isn't my style. I've put it up for sale in the trading forum, if anyone's interested.

Post by **BulletMagnet** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 2:52 am

Two whole days, eh?

Well, thanks for the info you managed to get from your time with it. Too bad it's almost certainly never getting a console port, I'd like to try it eventually.

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Mon Feb 05, 2007 2:56 am

Yeah, it's just not clicking with me. I've been playing Mushi Futari again today and that game is so much more fun for me.

I'm not a Raizing fan mind you, the only Raizing-style game I really like is Ibara.

Radiant · Post by **Radiant** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 5:38 am

How can i change the Game Mode?
In test menue i have the option, but i can not select something?

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 6:24 am

You mean Normal, Harder, Extended, or Score Attack?
Just load up the game and at the title screen press these buttons:

NORMAL: press Start
EXTENDED: hold DOWN, press Start
HARDER: hold UP, press START
SCORE ATTACK: HOLD A+B, press START

Radiant · Post by **Radiant** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 6:33 am

thanks!

this game is strange.....the more i play it the more i like it.....

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 6:42 am

Yeah, it's a weird game. I was playing it again today and having a lot of fun (??). If it doesn't sell in a couple days I'll take it as a sign that I should keep it.

Post by **Dave_K.** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:50 am

twe wrote:Yeah, it's a weird game. I was playing it again today and having a lot of fun (??). If it doesn't sell in a couple days I'll take it as a sign that I should keep it.

Raizing rank/medal games are a perfect complement to Cave manic shmups. A nice break to mix things up after getting burnt out on the same damn manic runs day in and day out. I swear if it wasn't for Batrider, I would have thrown in the DDP towel a long time ago!

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Tue Feb 06, 2007 7:54 am

I change my mind on this game about as often as I change my underwear. One day I love it, the next I hate it. I'm having more fun with it now when I avoid medalling and all powerups as the rank isn't so brutal.