Harmful Park

[CStarFlare]

CSF - 10,221,932 - ST6 - Normal

While putting together a guide for the game I realized that I could pull at least an extra 500,000 out of stage 5. Unfortunately, I left over a million points on the table between stages 3 and 4.

Then I went into the final boss with three lives and thought "Finally, I have enough breathing room to go for a x16 on this guy!" But I got hit by those blimps that come from behind. More than once. I hit my goal, but it's hard for me to say swear off this while my high score isn't a clear. I guess 11 mil is on the horizon, with 12 being possible but I figure I have to burn out on this game sometime.

[spadgy]

Updated... 11 million would be amazing CStarFlare! 12 million? I can't even image it!

[CStarFlare]

Getting back into this.

CSF - 2,635,019 - Clear - Score Attack



I think 3mil is possible. I am really sure that I'm leaving a lot of score on the table at those two UFO things at the end - thinking I can get one really weak then finish it off along with the other's hangers-on, or weaken them both and kill them along with the bubbles the enemies below shoot.

Would love to record a run of this but everything I try makes the emulator slow down. Might have to track down a VGA > Composite (or S Video) cable and record through my DVD player.

[spadgy]

It's updated. I'm glad you're back, and I'd love to see some runs of your Harmful Park plays!

[CStarFlare]

CSF - 2,647,416 - Clear - Score Attack

If you've ever wanted to see what scoring in Harmful Park is like, look no farther! A new record for me (barely). While watching the video after recording, I found a couple areas where I could "easily" improve, but it's still the best HP video out there!

-The face ship can be x16'd. Only got x12 this time... I bombed too early in case it didn't die the first time.
-The battleship that comes at the same time as the face ship can also be x16'd by weakening the clown faces before - I just Ice Beamed through them like a wimp.
-One of the UFOs at the end can be killed with a multiplier - at least x5. I think I've worked out a method of pulling it off fairly consistently, but pulling it off in the heat of a good run will be tough. Need to go into it with a full stock of specials, and the other will probably get away.

Also a couple of gem drops and mistimed bombs throughout the stage, but those aren't major sources of points (100k+) like the above are.

[CStarFlare]

CSF - 2,998,723 - 1 -Score Attack

I've confirmed that you can x16 one of the UFOs at the end, which is huge. It's hard; I think I got x7 on this run and it basically made this run. 3 million is right there; I suspect my previous theoretical max of 3.5 isn't far off. 3 mil will be my stopping point - maxing would involve a lot of well planned and very precise bombing that I don't have the patience to determine and get perfect.

edit: Played a round of easy tonight by accident. Turns out you get many, MANY more gems in Easy, to the point where I game overed in stage 5 with 8.9 million while missing basically all of the significant multipliers in the stages. This could be fun.

[CStarFlare]

I keep hoping someone will take this game up. You all disappoint me.



CSF - 3,004,651 - Clear - Score Attack





CSF - 13,099,380 - Clear - Easy

I love this, Easy is really neat. I ended this run with six lives in stock, so obviously I am not bombing enough.

[Tyjet]

Gave this a shot. Pretty fun chaining enemies with the potato bomb, but then you have to chase all those gems.

Tyjet Poison - 6,825,955 - ALL- Easy

[CStarFlare]

If massive numbers of gems are annoying you, less of them spawn in normal. Maybe even less in Hard and Very Hard, I haven't tried those yet.

[javel]

Low effort score:

Javel - 6,331,610 - ALL - Normal

Loving the music in this game. That is why I keep coming back to it. Is there a PSF or a MP3-rip out there somewhere? I've searched but to no avail

[CStarFlare]

Not that I can find; my attempts to do it myself failed pretty quickly. If anyone knows of a rip, it would be nice to have.

CSF - 14,138,352 - ALL - Easy

Too lazy to upload a pic, I'm sure I'll hit 15 mil soon.

[javel]

Javel - 11,338,472 - ALL - Easy
Javel - 8,156,345 - ALL - Normal
Javel - 4,283,363 - ALL - Hard
Javel - 2,965,342 - St 5 - Very Hard

[CStarFlare]

Javel is making me a bit nervous about my Normal score... 2 mil isn't that big of a gap.

But Easy has taken over my life for the time being:

CSF - 16,130,775 - ALL - Easy



So many mistakes in this run - I'm not sure how I set a new record, because so many parts were just embarrassing. Throwing out a Jelly special instead of a Potato? Yeah, that happened.

I thought 16 mil would be a good place to stop, but there's so many obvious places to improve I don't really know if I can. Where will it end - 17? 18? 20!?! (that might be pushing it)

[javel]

Javel - 9,395,284 - ALL - Normal

Missed the 9x multiplier on the whale :/ How come I always get it in the crap runs...

Javel - 2,342,539 - Clear - Score Attack

Nah, score attack is kind of boring.

[spadgy]

Update. And what an update! CStarFlare and Javel - you are totally destroying the previous top scores. Amazing work! Your scores too, Tyjet, are pretty amazing!

[javel]

Javel - 10,112,053 - ALL - Normal

Grzzghaa. Missed the top score due to a x12 multiplier on the fourth boss. I've always been getting x16 before but I guess my bomb timing was slightly off here. Stage was great otherwise, I think I got about 3,5 million points off it.

[javel]

Javel - 10,511,671 - ALL - Normal

http://i117.photobucket.com/albums/o66/ ... 72ebc8.jpg
http://i117.photobucket.com/albums/o66/ ... 039cd6.jpg

Javel - 5,181,931 - ALL - Hard

[CStarFlare]

Woah, very nice. And you got to that level much faster than I did.

Have you managed to work out a good strategy for getting a multiplier on the stage 2/5/6 bosses? A way to consistently pull more than 50k on them has eluded me for a while now, and together they probably have a maximum value of 1.5 or 1.6 million.

[javel]

Well, I got some good advice from your guide :)

I usually get a x2 (and a whoppin' 50k extra) from the 2nd boss by shooting him down together with the first pumpkin that he throws out. Just keep your Lv4 Laser on him the whole fight and time your last shot when the pumpkin is right in front of him.

5th boss - you'd ideally want to take him down together with the circles of archers, but I've never managed that. Instead I try to kill him when those little guys with the fireworks appear for the 2nd time. Very low sucess rate, but I've gotten a x5 or a x6 a couple of times (not on this run though)

No clue on the last boss. I just milk his rockets for one or two waves.

Another tip is to try and kill the 2nd panda on stage 3 together with the row of turtles, but you'll have to weaken him a bit with your shot first before you bomb. You're probably already doing that.

[CStarFlare]

Indeed, those three bosses probably hold the game's hardest payoffs. For the stage 6 boss, I've kind of just resigned myself to trying to kill him every time he opens his core. You can only get a x5 or x6 from the blimps, but it's almost a sure thing. Those missiles... you'd have to be really lucky to kill them THEN the boss because of how much health they have. I hit x15 on Easy once; it's much simpler because the missiles have less health.

Do you have a goal in mind? I think I learned some new tricks on Easy that will help me make my comeback, but readjusting to enemies' increased health is a pain.

[javel]

10 mil was my primary goal and I don't know if I feel like pushing it much further. It would be fun to see the
Normal WR though. I bet it's something totally absurd, like 16-17 million.

[CStarFlare]

10 mil is the point where you're hit most of the obvious areas of improvement, and all that's left is tweaking your technique on non-critical enemies and praying that you can kill certain bosses properly. It's definitely a wall.

I'm not sure what the Normal WR would be. 16+ mil sounds like a stretch, but after a day of practice I've already increased my stage 1 record to 2 mil (+200k or so) so there is no question that there is plenty of room left for optimization. Hitting that level would almost certainly require a near-perfect run on the stage 2/5/6 bosses, and I am kind of at a loss on how one could make the happen without one-in-a-hundred luck. Since Harmful Park was console only, the first shooter by an unknown developer, and made in a fairly low quantity it probably didn't get attention from any God-tier gamers, so the record may be much lower. Still, if someone knows Japanese and wants to dig around (or ask 2ch?) I'd be very interested in the answer.

[CStarFlare]

Javel keep playing!



CSF - 12,141,943 - ALL - Normal

OK so completely disregard my last post. I left at least 2 million points in really obvious places in this run, so I have to assume scores in excess of 15 mil aren't at all a stretch. I probably scored somewhere around half of what I should have during stages 5 and 6.

It is kind of surprising to see how my time with easy has improved my route. I figured all of the extra points were coming from gems (especially because I still miss a lot of big multipliers in Easy) but I'm definitely doing other things right too.

Started tracking my progress after stage 3:

Stage 3 5,103,299
Stage 4 8,633,256
Stage 5 10,085,484
Stage 6 12,141,943

[spadgy]

Wow! More insane scores. I'm so glad you guys are still at it!

Updated.

[CStarFlare]

CSF - 13,131,111 - ALL - Normal

Video here

The limit to my current strategies is probably 14.5 million or so. Stage 4 in this run had a lot of silly mistakes and I probably short changed myself more than 500k in that stage alone. I could see 15.5 million being possible in a master's hands, though 16+ is probably doable and I just don't see it.

But I just want to be done, so I'm walking away (again).

[Nifty]

Maaan, sometimes it takes some time away from seeing a game to remember how good it is. Great score and great run to watch - you've put so much excellent work into discovering what this game really has to offer.

Looks like the final boss went a bit awry too, but it did make that score satisfyingly symmetrical

[CStarFlare]

Those elephants don't generally move that fast. I don't know why they did, it should have been a x6 kill.

The final boss is tough, ideally I'd bomb the missiles for a x16 but it's so hard to gauge the damage on him and they take almost the whole bomb to kill. Worse, the boss only gives you three cycles - if I'd skipped bombing then, I risked bombing the next (last) cycle and not finishing him off. I was also a little skiddish - on my last high score I got to him with 2 lives in stock, and flubbed the whole thing.

But yeah, it's got a surprising amount of depth and you should play it a lot. Post scores! Go!

[spadgy]

Amazing work CStarFlare! Updated!

But I just want to be done, so I'm walking away (again).

You sure?

[Mero]

Normal difficulty

Mero - 7,553,183 - ALL - normal



I've cleared score attack too but I didn't take a picture, is it just me or do the enemies have tons more hp in that mode?

[spadgy]

Updated. Sorry that took a while!

And a great score there Mero. Third place for normal well and truly taken!

And, yes, I believe enemies do have more resilience in Score Attack. Can anyone confirm?