∀kashicverse -Malicious Wake

[Cadrin]

Let's post links to these two interviews with Endless-Shirafu, translated courtesy of the excellent folks from Shmuplations.com, in this general thread - just for future reference, so they don't get lost in the depths of the internet.

Oh, one last thing before I forget: I must thank you thousands of times over, Cadrin, for your excellent work in gathering the names of the bosses of ∀kashicverse: Malicious Wake as well as all of their Methods! They were extremely helpful in enhancing the quality of my translations!

Heh, glad my sperging was of some use to someone.

So, has anyone unlocked all the encyclopedia entries yet?

I'll be working on it.

Nevermind. Sorry for not saying this earlier, but it looks like I have no easy way to check how many entries I've unlocked so far, because I just can't figure out how to make the Japanese characters show on WinXP. I also got a bit tired of the game. You know, nobody really plays it for the score thanks to its gimmickiness and lol noreplays.

But hey, Hellsinker had to wait many years for the fan translation, and Akashicverse is even less popular, so there's no rush...

-----

Sorry for the bump without any real contribution. Here's a little bit of boring trivia stuff as compensation. I did some reading up on hornets on Wikipedia and stumbled upon this term: Hymenoptera. It's apparently an order of insects which includes bees, wasps, hornets, and the like. My guess is that the word is the very source of Hymeno/Himeno's name, since she seems to be friends with bees and whatnot, and her Eliminator is modeled after Ophrys Apifera, the bee orchid. (Same goes for Aranha/Aranya, named after the "Arachnida" class of animals, aka arachnids, but that's more obvious.) (BTW I have no idea what subspecies of orchids the remaining Eliminators are modeled after.)

Also, about that track from the game OST, Hymenostica... "Hymenoptera" means "ones with membranous wings" in Greek, so I wondered if I could find out what "stica" means. I googled it and got tons of weird dolls in images. So, uh... "Hymeno doll", then? Not that any of the track names seem to make ANY sense whatsoever.

EDIT:

I like how everyone didn't notice this amazing fact that is killer for scoring/survival.

Using annihilator 2 (whatever it is) makes you invincible for like a second, you can avoid entire waves with this for the same cost of a bomb that does next to no damage.

Annihilator: Stinger. No, we've noticed it. It's really good because it does not destroy bullets and does not hinder energy recovery, allowing you to chain it for a long time and dish out considerable damage. Specifically while fighting the Extra Stage boss, this technique can be used to great effect.

[50Hz]

Sweet, cheers for the interview links, they made for some interesting reading (especially the part on game balance)
Really is a shame to hear about the lack of active players though, my copy of the game should be arriving fairly soon.

[Zaarock]

Thanks for the reminder on those interviews, somehow missed them when blackoak put them up! awesome read.

—And yet, a “high-speed movement attack” sounds exactly like the kind of thing you WOULDN’T normally see in a STG. (laughs)

hart: Well, there’s the Zero Shift attack from Zone of Enders.

Nicolai: And the Assault Armor attack from Armored Core: For Answer.

these guys

I hope I get into this game someday, there is a lot to like but it never really clicked with me

[Cadrin]

Hey, look guys, look!
Remember this?

However happy news for fans of them.
They have a project of sequel!

Well...
Endless-Shirafu have been busy. Look, sadly I don't understand what any of this blog post means, but you have the new game's logo there. It will be called "Akashicverse: Pandemonic Nightmare", it seems. I think it's going to be a second game, anyway?...

And now for the really interesting stuff: here you can watch a preview of a single stage (called "Stage MW") from Pandemonic Nightmare. (a YT reupload would be nice if someone could do that winkwinknudgenudge)

I hope this is just the super early alpha version or something, because this game has way too many reused assets. It's like everything is recycled with new music and backgrounds.

Also, dubstep. Actual one this time.

Then comes the boss... I'd say it's "pretty crazy", but I'll drop the pretense and admit it's incredibly fucking silly, at least as far as the effects are concerned. Even after everything that happened in Malicious Wake. The boss throws everything the previous game had at you and then some: the Malicious Wake, the Phalaenopsis Ex Machina, the Cardinal Sin (Akashicverse:MW's old sub-title), Utsuho Reiuji's Giga Flare... I don't get it. Is this even real?

[SuperSoaker360]

All recycled. Pretty interesting though. This just looks like an arrange mode or something since the interface, movesets, and even enemy patterns are all recycled.

Really diggin' the boss music though. Not so much the wubwubwubwubwubwububblblblblblb during the stage though. I was even more disappointed that there wasn't an attempt at any musical synchrony to it.

It honestly looks like "What if ∀kashicverse had a Touhou-style Extra Stage"

EDIT: Reuploaded

[Squire Grooktook]

Pretty sure it is an extra stage, not a sequel or arrange.

[Aisha]

At the Digigame Expo 2014 convention last week, Endless Shirafu organized and held a score attack competition featuring various doujin STGs. I think Pandemonic Nightmare is a build created just for that, and copies were also sold at their table for 200 Yen each. I can't tell if it will become anything more than that. I don't think so, but I could be wrong; I haven't been paying much attention lately. They're scheduled to participate in Comiket 87 at the end of December, so I guess we'll know more as that time draws near.

Since Akashicverse they've been focused on creating unrelated Hardcore/EDM albums; the two so far being Force of Will and CruelUltimatum.

[Captain]

I really like the concept of fighting your character's own eliminator.

Now if only Hellsinker had you fight your characters as prayers...

And then there is that other ridiculous game...

[Cadrin]

Oh, nevermind then. I saw the new sub-title and thought this was a next game from the series. (I really want to believe Shinimai's words...)

[chronicdog]

Where can I buy the full game without speaking Japanese? This shit looks amazing, it would get greenlit in a heartbeat on Steam, why dont they release it there?

See Slowbeef play it in 60FPS glory here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w58x_Ohd_ts

[Mischief Maker]

Where can I buy the full game without speaking Japanese?

If you don't mind waiting a couple weeks Rancor can hook you up!

[chronicdog]

Good looks man, Im ordering now. This site could get expensive for me! ^_^

[BPzeBanshee]

Can't recommend the game enough. It's a great game to play, worth the wait.

[Cadrin]

This shit looks amazing, it would get greenlit in a heartbeat on Steam, why dont they release it there?

I know, right? Doing that would fix some of the game's problems. If the game went on Steam, Endless-Shirafu could add online leaderboards using steamworks, much like the one in Crimzon Clover World Ignition. That way people could actually play the game competitively for score and it would be fun times for everyone.

@Slowbeef's video of the game: cool stuff. Wish he played more. He'd really like the true final boss.

[SuperSoaker360]

So I've been wanting to buy the soundtracks from http://ameroad.net/l/PEi but I'm not quite sure how it works. Do I need a Twitter account or something because it asks me to log in to Twitter.

[Aisha]

So I've been wanting to buy the soundtracks from http://ameroad.net/l/PEi but I'm not quite sure how it works. Do I need a Twitter account or something because it asks me to log in to Twitter.

I last used Ameroad a few years ago to buy Stellavanity's soundtrack, so unless something has changed since then, yes. You'll have to log into Twitter and authorize Ameroad like an app, giving it permission to read your timeline and see who you follow. It's not a big deal; you can de-authorize it after you download your music or just use a fake account.

[SuperSoaker360]

http://endlessshirafu.blog.fc2.com/blog-entry-92.html

Looks like they released v1.02 of Pandemonic Nightmare as a free download! Holy crap they added in speed-ups and shit to the wubwubwubwubbbb

Good to see new content from this game and I certainly am still waiting quite warmly for the "sequel"

[KAI]

Free? Holy shit! I love these guys so much.

[Shepardus]

Awesome, thanks for the news!

I just downloaded this and tried to credit-feed my way through it, though there's a limited number of continues (I think five). Quite a lot of fun so far, I think the game's lives system (or lack thereof) works better for this sort of "extra stage" format than for a multi-stage game.

Those bullet speedups (and even crazier stuff, I'm not going to spoil it) are so ridiculously over-the-top.

[Captain]

This is so damn fun, and the boss music is nice too. The stage music is meh. I no-missed it to the end but the boss' final life bar was only like 20% depleted, and methods did nothing.

What did I do wrong?

[CStarFlare]

Free? Love it.

Long live Endless Shirafu.

[KAI]

64-bit...

[Shepardus]

Is the part where the boss splatters the screen with blue paint supposed to be the end? I've gotten there with continues but I'm not sure if there's anything after that.

Edit: It's not, I think I wasn't doing enough damage to proceed. I got to some end with the screen fading to white and the "clear" screen showed up.

[SuperSoaker360]

Fairly easy enough stage after a few tries. Definitely great score-attack stage too, even complete with the "beat timed boss phases for extra enemies to cash in on + eliminator recharge", might need to set up a high score thread on this in a bit.

Yeah a bit stumped for the ending too considering how it was different compared to the earlier version in the video. I've done all I could too: activating eliminator, cycling through all boss attacks on the first phase + beating each attack early on the second phase -- all done without continues.

[Captain]

Same here.

[Shepardus]

Fairly easy enough stage after a few tries. Definitely great score-attack stage too, even complete with the "beat timed boss phases for extra enemies to cash in on + eliminator recharge", might need to set up a high score thread on this in a bit.

I'd also be willing to set up a high score thread if anybody's interested. Speaking of which, does Malicious Wake have a highscore thread?

[Captain]

[Shepardus]

Welp I knew I should have used the search function after not finding anything in the index of highscore threads.

I wonder if continues should be allowed for a highscore thread; since they're limited to 5 in Pandemonic Nightmare they're actually mechanically more similar to lives than typical continues. Besides, the game doesn't even let you enter your score unless you either reach the end or use up all the continues. It's different from Malicious Wake since the continues in that are unlimited as far as I can tell.

[Zeether]

I just tried this but I cannot do any of the special commands at all and I'm not sure why. Playing on keyboard, is it just some stupid input problem? I hold down the command key and do the inputs but nothing happens and I swear this worked on the other game.

Edit: Tried on pad, it still doesn't work. What the hell is going on with this? Am I doing the inputs wrong? I played Malicious Wake before and was able to do them just fine yet this game seems to hate me.

[SuperSoaker360]

After the command input, do you press the shoot button?