DoDonPachi Saidaioujou coming to Xbox 360 (REGION-FREE!)

[PAPER/ARTILLERY]

the trail on the ship made things tricky for me at first but you soon get used to it.

[Jonst]

It screwed my eyes up at first,but I adjusted eventually...

[japtor]

Same, took me a while to get used to the feeling the center correctly. It was the turrets when lasering and the cockpit vs hit marker screwing me up at different times. Turning off the marker actually helped me but I'm used to the defaults now.

Stage 3 boss, second pattern. WTF. everything else is manageable, but that second pattern is just brutal right now.

Is that the little blue shot spread around everywhere with directed blue orbs? Starting high and far left helped me on that one (also because you can get more damage with the laser aura before the pattern starts), then sweeping right following the pattern before shooting up through a gap, and repeating the other way as much as you can follow and finding another gap.

[SchoBoogie]

buy the 3,000 coin item in the shop, which was the first thing I saved for. Then press select on the character select screen if patched or right analog stick if you're unpatched.

Is there anyway to select Saya using a stock Xbox controller?

[trap15]

You just quoted the answer...

[SchoBoogie]

You just quoted the answer...

I bought the item in the shop for 3000. She does not appear on the character select screen and I cannot make her appear no matter what button I push. I know I'm probably missing something obvious, but I sure as he'll can't figure it out.

[Giest118]

Then press select on the character select screen if patched or right analog stick if you're unpatched.

Lemme just make this clearer

Then press {the select button, aka the back button} on the character select screen {if your game is patched} or {push on the right analog stick} if {your game is unpatched}.

[Thjodbjorn]

You just quoted the answer...

I bought the item in the shop for 3000. She does not appear on the character select screen and I cannot make her appear no matter what button I push. I know I'm probably missing something obvious, but I sure as he'll can't figure it out.

EDIT FOR IDIOCY. Other than that, you press either select (post patch), or right stick button (pre patch).

[SchoBoogie]

Thanks guys.

[Giest118]

You cannot be in score attack mode.

FALSE

[Thjodbjorn]

You cannot be in score attack mode.

FALSE

Oh, gods. That's right. Sorry. For some reason I was confused about that.

[Shalashaska]

Damn, arcade is rough. The second boss fucks me over every time; I just can't seem to consistently dodge its' second and third attacks. Novice expert is really fun as well as the 360 mode.

When the pink bullets start coming out on the second pattern? I recommend doing U motions at that point. For some reason just going left and right won't open any holes (at least for me).

The third pattern sucks. Just try to stay still and only move only when absolutely necessary. Focus mostly on those giant X patterns that layer over it because that's when the openings are the smallest.

The last pattern isn't so bad. Just slowly go left and right and move up if you're getting cornered by the patterns that look like / \

Yeah it seems I always get trapped by the blue bullets during the second pattern. I can get through it without dying or auto-bombing at like a 2:10 ratio. I've been trying to go from side to side across the screen so I'll give the U motions a try when I can play again in about a month.

The third pattern just fucks me every time though when those pink bullets come through. My mind can't process the gaps fast enough or something. The final pattern I have no problems with.

I was trying to carry over a level 10 hyper into stage 3 for the mid-boss but those two patterns keep screwing that for me.

[powerflower]

Please help!

Two days ago I'd tried 360/Team Mode and guess what, didn't work. P1/Pad1 and P2/Pad2 were signed in but nothing...some sort of "meh" massage comes up.

I'm feeling stupid right now:( Is Team Mode really 2P with score and everything shared? That would be awesome.

[nZero]

Please help!

Two days ago I'd tried 360/Team Mode and guess what, didn't work. P1/Pad1 and P2/Pad2 were signed in but nothing...some sort of "meh" massage comes up.

I'm feeling stupid right now:( Is Team Mode really 2P with score and everything shared? That would be awesome.

Team Score Attack has ended. It wasn't anything like what you imagined. It was the same game as regular score attack, except your score was added to your team's score instead of ranked individually. If you lucked into being assigned to Team D, you can go get free gamerpics by pressing Y (I think) on the team leaderboard results screen for Weeks 1~8.

[powerflower]

Thanks for the answer. So that means it was online team play and this service is not available anymore? It was never meant to be local 2P? I'm confused.

[BulletMagnet]

Yeah, basically you'd play that mode (the same as "Normal" Score Attack, one player/all defaults/one credit), try to score as high as you could, and you and your score would be assigned to one of several "teams" (IIRC) at random; the same would go for anyone else who played that mode. After a certain amount of time, the total high scores for each "team" were tallied up (or were they averaged?), and the one with the highest total got a few digital bonus baubles for its members.

If you want to play regular ol' local 2P just start up "Normal Play" and have someone press start on the second controller to join in.

[strykr]

Still really enjoying this game, I took a week or so off it and my god did it take me a few goes for my eyes to get used to it again!

Ways off an arcade clear, but still fun to crack through the novice & 360 normal modes. i'll get to hard and the proper arcade mode one day lol

[powerflower]

Thanks for the clarification BulletMagnet:)

To bad that there aren't shmups out there with a real co-op including team moves like Lightning Fighters has.

Nevertheless Saidaoujou especially 360 mode is just awesome. I hope Cave will continue producing shmups.

[powerflower]

Hmm, am I right that standing still lasering in Hyper Mode increases the hit counter more rapidly?

And furthermore I have noticed that lasering bosses while moving left/right gives more damage? Because the health bar decreases sometimes at different speeds.

Last question, is there any chance to deactivate the wallpapers cause that sucks a little.

[Giest118]

Hmm, am I right that standing still lasering in Hyper Mode increases the hit counter more rapidly?

And furthermore I have noticed that lasering bosses while moving left/right gives more damage? Because the health bar decreases sometimes at different speeds.

Last question, is there any chance to deactivate the wallpapers cause that sucks a little.

1) Yes.

2) Just moving left/right shouldn't result in more damage. Point-blanking with the laser will increase damage, though.

3) Apparently not.

[powerflower]

Ok, thanks. You are right the bosses "nosetips" seem to be more vulnerable.

Man, Cave shmups are so deep you have to process so many things at once it isn't even funny anymore, haha.
Especially Espgaluda 2 is ridiculous complex.

Oh, another question: Why ist there sometimes bullet cancelling at bosses by destroying parts of them and sometimes/most of the time not?

Sorry for all that questions but I wanna make a 1cc better than rank 119 in high score 360 mode

[PAPER/ARTILLERY]

The bullet cancelling on bosses is due to you gaining a hyper by destroying sections or passing certain patterns I think. Could be wrong though.

[Jeneki]

Team Score Attack has ended.

Whoa, seriously? The game hasn't even been out for three months yet.

[Bonus!]

I've now received the LE, which I ordered from AmiAmi. Shipping was quick, but they didn't package the item properly since the bubble wrap didn't cover the top and bottom of the box (which is made from cardboard). As a result, there is some minor damage. Thankfully the artbook (really nice quality!) and steelbook with the game are unharmed. I think the package was worth the money.

I did email AmiAmi about the damage on the game box, telling them that their packaging didn't protect the game properly, and got a reply saying that they "unfortunately have no control when postal workers treat packages roughly." I'm not sure I'll order from them again. By comparison, when I ordered from Solaris, they wrapped the entire game in bubblewrap and added air cushions too, so the game was really well protected and arrived in flawless condition.

Also, what about the bookmark or whatever it is AmiAmi adds to the box. Is this really the shape of a typical Japanese bookmark?

Lastly, do I need a Japanese Xbox live account to get the patch for the game?

[NeoStrayCat]

Do I need a Japanese Xbox live account to get the patch for the game?

No, just pop in the with on your account and it'll still update, this worked with Bullet Soul when I did it.

[denpanosekai]

I did email AmiAmi about the damage on the game box

Thanks for that info. I've used them 3-4 times now, they've always sent stuff in box. I may try solaris next then.

[Bonus!]

I've got a few questions about the port:

1) How do I enlarge the screen size? I can only turn the screen in 90 degree steps but I don't see how I can make the game window fill the screen.

2) Is there any kind of filtering/smoothing option? I couldn't find one either. The game looks fine in motion but static images are a bit pixelated.

3) What is the meaning of "link rotation" and "wide mode" in the screen settings?

Thanks!

[BulletMagnet]

Going off the top of my head here, someone correct me if I screw something up:

1) How do I enlarge the screen size? I can only turn the screen in 90 degree steps but I don't see how I can make the game window fill the screen.

When you first boot up the game, and before you select which mode you play, the only screen options you can access are "General Screen" (the one that lets you flip the orientation). Once you actually get into Arcade, 1.5, 360, etc. mode, if you go into the Options menu there before starting the game you can also go into a separate set of options simply titled "Screen." in there you can mess with the screen size and a handful of other things. You'll have to set the screen up to your liking for each individual mode, though the "general screen" settings apply across all modes.

2) Is there any kind of filtering/smoothing option? I couldn't find one either. The game looks fine in motion but static images are a bit pixelated.

I believe there's a "Smoothing On/Off" setting in the "Screen" menu mentioned above, though it's obviously not as tweakable as some other 360 ports were.

3) What is the meaning of "link rotation" and "wide mode" in the screen settings?

I believe that putting "link rotation" On rotates the menus along with the game screen when you set it to tate, while Off leaves them in yoko even if the game is rotated. "Wide mode" supposedly lays things out more optimally in general for widescreen displays while turning it off is better for standard-def, but I couldn't get into specifics.

[Bonus!]

Thanks a lot for all the info! Looking at the game in vertical orientation with the stretched game window is a sight to behold.

While DDP SDOJ is quite polished in general, I'm a bit baffled by some of the design decisions regarding the user interface. The pixelated font and backgrounds in the main menu stand out in a rather bad way. I don't remember this being an issue in any of their other X360 ports. It's a fantastic game, though, so this is only a minor blemish.

[Pretas]

They used the same engine as the Muchi Pork/Pink Sweets port, so you'll find the same interface problems there.