DoDonPachi (New Thread #4)

[stanski]

Calling someone a fast or slow learner is the same as saying they have a high initial skill level (raw talent) or a low initial skill level (slow reflexes, bad eye hand coordination, slow finger/hand movement). It is just like any other sport, some people will never be able to reach the highest levels no matter how much they practice, just due to physical limitations and such. If you don't believe this is true, we can take it to the extreme and say how much chance do you think a blind man would have against the TLB in DDP? IMO not being blind is a 'raw talent' that is kind of necessary.

[PROMETHEUS]

I'd say a lot of it also has to do with different people's willingness to get better. Most people are casual gamers and have no interest in even improving at all at anything they play or really anything they do.

Yeah completely agree with this.

[PROMETHEUS]

Calling someone a fast or slow learner is the same as saying they have a high initial skill level (raw talent) or a low initial skill level (slow reflexes, bad eye hand coordination, slow finger/hand movement). It is just like any other sport, some people will never be able to reach the highest levels no matter how much they practice, just due to physical limitations and such. If you don't believe this is true, we can take it to the extreme and say how much chance do you think a blind man would have against the TLB in DDP? IMO not being blind is a 'raw talent' that is kind of necessary.

Very few people are handicaped enough that they wouldn't be able to reach very high levels if they worked properly. Take a look at this article about talent in drawing, it says and explains a lot of what I think for video games : http://www.drawspace.com/lessons/view_lesson.php?id=a02 (it's about "understanding talent")

[Plasmo]

That "talent"-discussion, albeit being off-topic, is very interesting imo.
I completely agree with Prom and that link he has posted. If you're blind or have no hands, you won't get far. Everyone else (so at least 99% of all people, probably a lot more) is able to break every world record score ever done. The two most important things however are:

1. When you start playing
2. How you start playing

Experience is very important. If you've already played shmups for several years, a new shmup won't seem as hard as to a newcomer of this genre. If you let two people, who have never played shmups before, play DOJ, there still can be a huge difference in skill. A person who has trained his reflexes and/or hand-eye coordination already with other activities, will definitely be better than the other person, which doesn't mean, that the first one is more "talented" - he just had more practice already.
If you are 12 and never had any kind of training, you'll be already ahead of a 40 year old after let's say 20 credits, simply because you can learn things faster, the younger you are. However, age is by far not as important as experience. The 12 year old kid would never have a chance against a 25 year old, who already has 5 years of experience.
The other important factor is, with what kind of mentality you're approaching shmups. If you just want to play them, to have some fun after work, without ever trying to score, you, of course, won't ever get good scores. If you want to get better scores, but you think taht you're not talented anyway, you'll have a hard time beating your own scores. However, if you want to challenge yourself, have some kind of competitve surrounding and a lot of discipline, you'll get high scores much faster than others.
It's kinda funny to see other people reactions. People who aren't really good at games (this doesn't only count for games, it's universal for anything), usually show the same reaction when they see really good gamers, it's always something like "Wow this guy's very good at this game, but I bet he never does anything else/never leaves the house" and of course the all-time classic "Wow this guy's very good at this game, but he's already 30 and I bet he never got laid. Lol I'm so awesome I can fuck my girlfriend".
In a culture where it would be more accepted to play shmups, we would obviously have more talented players. In a culture where it would be more accepted to be excpetionally good at something, that is not particularly useful to others (read: hobby), we would obviously have more people being exceptionally good at something. Let's take football for example. In a country where football is very popular, you have more and better players, in a country where other sports are more popular, you'll definitely find less good football players. It's difficult to keep going with a thing that others call a "waste of time" everyday, if you get praise and even media attention, it'll be much easier for you to improve.
If you want to get WR scores, you need to be completely obsessed with what you do, which doesn't mean that it's easy for you or anything, it still is hard work and often very painful. You just have to know whether it's worth it for you or not.
There is no kind of thing called talent, you don't get born and immediately can clear DOJ 2-ALL. It'll take years and huge amounts of frustration. It's not easy, for noone. You have to spent hours into the game each day, you need a training plan, you probably need to have fun and good self esteem. You need to have a goal, you need to be mentally and physically well, you need to be motivated and full of energy. Encouragement and support from others can help a lot, too.
There probably are numerous of other factors that are important. In theory everyone could beat every score, it's not a matter of talent why some are getting these scores and some don't, it's a question of attitude and approach.
The only two things you'll probably have a hard time, when you want to learn them are: discipline and obsessive nature. You don't get born with these either, but they imo originate from very early childhood and are the result of certain education methods.

[Ravid]

attitude and approach

I don't think it's necessarily fair to dismiss talent as completely nonexistent: all people are not created equal. However, I agree that these two aspects are massively more important, and a poor attitude or approach is what prevents most people from being good at shmups (or indeed anything).

Updated.

[third_strike]

Nice discussion here I would like share my experience too, but my English sux.
Cool!

[TLB]

I think you should try anyway, bro, we'll help you if you want :)

Cool!

[PROMETHEUS]

[...]

Completely agree with what you wrote there. It's an important thing to understand when you're having a hard time getting better, and need motivation/spirit to keep going. In particular, I like how you point out how even character traits are developped in childhood. I believe even those traits can be altered and changed at any age through identification of one's flaw, and effort towards changement.

This topic of discussion is very interesting and important indeed, a topic about it in general chat would have been nice. It's one of the things I'm discussing in that "guide" I was writing. I think I'll try to finish it during winter holidays (but where to publish it ? it would be best on a website but I don't really have time to make one). It also reminds me of stuff BER (bernard doria) wrote on his website ; he also discussed such topics, occasionally, in his diary thingy (http://www.shmups.com/beepreying/old/st ... index.html).

[linko9]

It's kinda funny to see other people reactions. People who aren't really good at games (this doesn't only count for games, it's universal for anything), usually show the same reaction when they see really good gamers, it's always something like "Wow this guy's very good at this game, but I bet he never does anything else/never leaves the house" and of course the all-time classic "Wow this guy's very good at this game, but he's already 30 and I bet he never got laid. Lol I'm so awesome I can fuck my girlfriend".

True, that's a very common reaction, but the opposite reaction is common as well. Some people think, "Wow, that guy's incredible, there's no way I'll be able to be as good as him," and most importantly, they don't understand that that guy put in hundreds and hundreds of hours to get where he is now. I myself had a mild form of this reaction upon seeing some of the scores on this board, specifically Prometheus' score for this game. When I first got onto the scoreboard a couple weeks ago, I had played about 60 or 70 hours, and for some reason, I assumed that the people near the top of the scoreboard had probably played 100 or so hours. It was certainly nice to find out that Prometheus had spent such a long time with the game (though I'm sure that even if I spent that much time with DDP, my score would be nowhere near as good).

Anyway, it's my suspicion than some activities, like playing quarterback or point guard, require a lot more talent than other activities, such as playing shmups. I think that even if most people practiced for 6 hours a day since they were a kid, they still wouldn't be good enough to play quarterback/point guard professionally. On the other hand, I think pretty much anyone can achieve very good scores in a shmup if they just put in enough time, though it will certainly take some people more time than others. To put things in perspective, if you can't sing, you can't sing. No amount of practice will make you a virtuoso. That's just a skill set that some people inherently have, and some lack, and it can only be improved to a certain extent. Playing videogames, on the other hand, requires a skill set that I think everyone inherently has; using your eyes to react to your surroundings (strictly speaking, not everyone has this skill set, as has been mentioned before, but you get the point). Sure some will be naturally a bit better than others, but I think natural skill is a much less important factor than practice time and experience when it comes to shmups.

Of course, all of this is just my generally uninformed an unscientific opinion on the matter, so take it for what you will.

[PROMETHEUS]

I agree that some activities take more skills than other, and that some activities require qualities that some people may find hard to develop, but now quaterback / singing ? I don't know why you think singing isn't something you can learn if you were bad at it to begin with, because it definitely is. Quaterback... don't know exactly what it involves, I guess you need to be not too tall or not too short, as for muscles they can be built, and the rest... why the hell not ? The thing is, if you want to be a professionnal, you need to be not just good, but better. It means there are all those thousands of guys playing all the time everyday that you need to be better than. The difference is made by... how well you work, luck, and perhaps a bit of natural advantages (though we don't really know how big that part is).

Now shmups have this weird ratio memorization / skill that's way high compared to other competitive activities, but they still take a fairly big amount of skill, and consequently work, to get good at. And if you had to be better than thousands of guys playing all day everyday it'd be just as hard to be a professionnal. This is the case for other games, for example Starcraft, where a lot of guys put a tremendous effort (10 hours a day for several years) and still fail to achieve progamer status in korea. There's a limited amount of spots to get the pro licence, so even if they were all just as good, there'd be a selection somewhere, and so luck comes into play.

[Enhasa]

Anyway, it's my suspicion than some activities, like playing quarterback or point guard, require a lot more talent than other activities, such as playing shmups. I think that even if most people practiced for 6 hours a day since they were a kid, they still wouldn't be good enough to play quarterback/point guard professionally.

This is because the pool of people who try athletics is so much deeper than the pool of people who play shmups. If it came with the same prestige and big bucks and accessibility and everything as athletics, it would be equally tough to make it at a professional level. The person who ought to be the world's best shmup player right now is probably someone who has never even played a shmup. The only field of human competition where you can almost safely say that we probably know the world's best is sprinting, because you can be identified as a fast kid even if you come from a disadvantaged background.

I guess you're trying only to go into skillsets and not physical attributes, otherwise nosetackle or center would make better examples than quarterback and point guard. I'm not sure those are the best examples of exclusive skillsets anyway. Too many people are excluded from physical limitations or lack of opportunity, for the competition amongst candidates to be as fierce as it could be.

[linko9]

I don't know, I guess I used those examples because I know lots of people who have tried really hard, and practiced a lot to be good at a sport, but then were beat out by people who didn't practice much, or even didn't really care much, but had a lot of natural talent. My experience comes from running track all throughout high school, and trust me, this is quite common. I haven't ever met anyone who tried really hard to get good at a videogame but then was unable to. But then again, I haven't met many people who try to become serious competitors (as in one of the best in the world) in any videogame; I'm sure many have tried and failed at that endeavor. You're certainly right that if more people played shmups, it would be much harder to be a top player, and perhaps it would be just as hard as making it in pro sports. However, I still have a suspicion that practice time is a more important variable when it comes to shmups than with many other activities, such as sports. Obviously, practice time is the primary variable in determining your success in both areas, but if shmups success is based on 95% practice and 5% skill, and sports success is based on 90% practice and 10% skill (these numbers are arbitrary, but I hope they demonstrate my point), you're twice as likely to succeed in shmups as opposed to sports if you dedicate yourself equally in both fields. I don't think I explained that very well, but hopefully you got something out of it.

And as for singing, I've been singing for most of my life, and trust me, there are some people who will simply never be able to sing well . I'd say that your skill as a singer is a function of 90% innate skill, and 10% coaching/practice.

[unsane]

Perhaps a mod could cut out this side-thread and move it to its own thread in Off Topic? It's interesting and deserves more attention than being hidden here.

[PROMETHEUS]

"90% practice 10% skill"
skill comes from practice so I guess you mean natural qualities ?

I know there are people who play a lot of DDP or Starcraft and take it seriously but fail to get better at some point. I think that's because they haven't learned to learn properly. Natural qualities.. bleh, I don't believe they matter much. Or they come mostly from education. Except physical qualities.

Well, what do we know, really ?

Even scientists and researchers haven't found how the brain works, much less how much of your intelligence and mental skills depend on your genes instead of your training.

[moozooh]

You can also study more effectively if you constantly analyze and try to improve your methods as opposed to just repeating the same thing over and over.

[PROMETHEUS]

You can also study more effectively if you constantly analyze and try to improve your methods as opposed to just repeating the same thing over and over.

yep!

[nii-san]

After a hard month, this is the result.
I will try more.

74.966.210
Area 2-3
max. hit 343
C-S

[linko9]

Just a couple more shots...




linko9 - 50,409,150 - A-L - 1-6 - 464 Hits

[linko9]

Well, after discovering how to make wolfmame99 not look blurry as hell, I started using it to record my runs so that I could capture my very first first loop clear. Luckily, I succeeded within the hour! Here it is:



linko9 - 55,059,480 - A-L - 2-1 - 464 Hits

inp here, if anyone cares

I'd welcome any feedback if anyone happens to watch it (I guess you'd have to be pretty bored). I practiced the stage 4 boss yesterday, so I was able to keep my bomb bonus into stage 5 for the first time ever. My first death was a little before it usually is, but considering I've never practiced anything past stage 4, I'm fine with it. The boss was terrible, but at least I didn't die. Stage 6 was pretty standard for me. I loved the commander's speech ("Psych! You're dead meat"). Anyway, very happy with this, but I never expected it would take 135 hours. Hopefully I can continue to have fun for another 135.

[PROMETHEUS]

I'm not bored and am just preparing to go to sleep but I watched your inp anyway.

I think your qualities are that you have some pretty nice dodging skill when facing a single pattern, you have a good sense of timing and enough precision to pull off decent moves. You have a good sense of danger which allows you to quickly find a path to completely avoid an imminent danger, or bomb, which you're also pretty good at because you don't seem to overestimate your dodging skills (not many players develop that quality so early).

Then I think your flaws are that you're rather weak at reading and finding a path when there's more than a single pattern at a time, and you sort of lack some dodging techniques such as waiting before a quick & precise dodge, or moving in the right direction to make a safe move (for example, moving backwards + right to go through a linear pattern aimed towards the bottom of the screen, or even just to get in the right position between 2 bullets). I don't think I've seen you do a lot of bullet herding too but I'm not sure (positioning yourself so as to make the situation safer in the next couple of seconds).

I think now if you want to improve you should relearn stage 1 (unsafe path somehow! you're using a very simple chaining path but it's somewhat unsafe and you have enough skills to follow a more complex path). If you want to make it more fun for yourself you might want to learn how to get the bees in stage 1, 2 and 3 too, by copying videos, it would also earn you a decent amount of points. You also have to try not to focus only on the chaining when you are chaining, and a little more on the bullets aimed at you whenever they are dangerous, because it seems to me sometimes you are unaware of stray bullets while chaining and almost get hit or obviously ignore them even though they're in your path.

I think your skill should allow you to chain up to stage 4, although you will probably have a pretty hard time with it for a while. Outside of stage 4 chaining practice, you could improve your dodging / reading skills by playing 1-6 boss patterns, it'll be a little hard for a while too but I think you can manage it pretty soon. Obviously, use savestates intensively for those parts !

[linko9]

Thanks a lot for the feedback. I definitely should watch more replays. I've watched yours and KOs a few times, but that was a while ago. I think I'll practice stage 5 for survival next so I don't just panic bomb through the stage, but then I'll tackle chaining stage 4. I actually practiced it a while back, but couldn't pull off the flowerbed trick, so I gave up after only about two hours of practice.

[jeremycarrier]

Hey, I'm still in the top 25! Man, haven't touched this gem in forever.

[nii-san]

Now, this is my best play, but I have lost 2 ships in stage 5 .
I practise the combo in stage 2 (460, 470 hits)


86.269.600
Area 2-3
hit 459
C-S

[Krondelo]

Well, heres some minor improvement. I was playing really strong up to this point...

Then I think my nerves got the best of me, died twice on the next boss which I shouldn't have with full bomb stock.
Then really botched stage 5.. disappointed in myself but w/e, could have hit 30 mill.

[Ravid]

Updated. Keep at it Krondelo (and everyone else of course)! I remember when I got 26mil stage 5 in DDP, it was my first shmup score that I was proud of.

[ncp]

lol I accidentally bombed the 1up in 2-3, destroying my chance to break 100m. I had a couple 90m+ scores tonight but never got that goddamn 100m. Haven't played in a couple weeks, I was really hoping to finally sit down and get that damn 9th digit, but it escapes me once again...

ncp / 98,261,220 / C-S / 2-4 / 470 Hit



Is there any way to manipulate which way the first boss moves? Goddamn, I swear it always comes toward me so I can't point-blank the circle things without damaging the boss, but EVERY ONCE IN A WHILE, it doesn't. It's driving me insane trying to figure out if it can be controlled or not.

edit: also of note, this is the first high score I've posted that wasn't caffeine-assisted!

[PROMETHEUS]

Exactly, it tends to move towards you but sometimes doesn't. Nothing you can do about that as far as I know. Just move where you'd like it to move.

[Krondelo]

Exactly, it tends to move towards you but sometimes doesn't. Nothing you can do about that as far as I know. Just move where you'd like it to move.

Yeah I agree, I have tried manipulating that boss soo many times I'm convinced it cannot be done.

[ncp]

LOL no missed up to stage 6 then FOUR MISSES IN A ROW. Then, I died with bombs before the 2-3 1-up. But still got 100m. Top 10 baybee. I have the .inp if you guys wanna laugh at my stage 6, but this score will be improved on very soon.

ncp / 105,626,930 / C-S / 2-3 / 473 Hit



Are there any C-S superplays on the internet? If not, anyone wanna make me a copy of the gamest ZBL-NAI superplay?

edit: anyone know if K.O (from the A-L run on super-play) is the same person as the 3rd Strike player of the same name?

[linko9]

Well, there is a TAS C-S inp file that gets around 750 million, but that really only helps you for chaining routes, and even in that regard isn't too helpful. If you want it I'll post it.

In other news, I've gotten to 2-2 twice now after not playing for a long time, but my scores were only a tiny bit better. Hopefully I'll play this some more when the new year rolls around.