Elixir wrote:Why are we even mentioning fighting games here? Let me just start off by saying that Follett still takes skill in order to be used effectively. Her shot combined with her option does the most damage though, which also makes her the easiest to use.-Bridget- wrote:They might not be cared for, but character specific leaderboards are still important in this sort of game.
This isnt a fighting game. These characters can be as unbalanced as Cave wants them to be. And I could see it being done on purpose; some characters are very easy to use, but others are for more advanced players that want more of a challenge.
The world records for Shikigami II beg to differ. By the way, the highest score isn't done with Koutarou.Shiki 2 is a good example. That's a PS2 game, and therefore does not have scoreboards, but if it did, they'd NEED to be seperated by character. The main character... I forget his name, he summons that spirit that zooms around and smashes things... can score WAY easier than anyone else in the game BECAUSE of the spirit. He's very clearly a character made for beginners. Whereas I use that dude with the hat... who is clearly NOT made for beginners, and is MUCH harder to score with. The scoring potential is totally different for the characters. Putting them on the same board without having character-specific boards would be bloody stupid.
As covered in my blog entry--it's this kind of attitude which the port caters to. If you want to use Lei, I'd recommend sticking with Arcade.As such, I'm glad there are specific boards for this game. I dont want to have to use Follett just because everyone else does. My favorite character is Lei of course, and I'm bloody well gonna use him, because I want to, not because of scoring potential or power level. The seperated boards give me a chance to compare my scores to other players that use him, and are thus dealing with the exact same scoring potential throughout the game.
First of all, Shiki 2, I merely used as an example because it was the first thing to pop into my head. There's ALL SORTS of shmups that work that way. I dont care whatsoever who has the world records with who; the point still stands, the characters still have different scoring potential. That's why I find seperated boards useful.
And I'm sure Follett takes plenty of skill to use. I mentioned her because I keep hearing "ZOMG she's broken" whereever I look (not necessarily on this forum).
Anyway, I spent some time experimenting with Arcade myself, trying to learn the reasons for all of the preference to it, and....
....yeah, I'm not seeing it here. First of all, in terms of survival, this isnt any harder (all level 3, again). I dont think it's any harder anyway, others may find different. I noticed less slowdown, but... this isnt Futari, this is Deathsmiles. It didnt change the difficulty of the patterns for me; probably this is due to my very fast reaction speed, which is likely to lead to me crashing into bullets LESS in Arcade than in X because instead of trying to react overly fast to something that isnt moving fast, I'll be reacting to things that are moving at a matching speed, if that makes any sense. This tends to happen to me in alot of shmups, to be honest. Throw a complicated pattern at me slowly and I just might stupidly crash into it; throw it at me faster, as in without the slowdown, and I'm probably not going to get hit.
And the scoring system is DIFFERENT, yes, but... frankly, I wouldnt say either of them are better. Experimenting with Arcade, I'm not having any more trouble learning it than X-mode. I understand the basic ideas behind scoring well here, after seeing some vids, and it really just isnt all that hard to do (as opposed to the first game, where I really just wasnt much good at it... dunno why that is). I like BOTH of them. Instead of complaining about one, I'll probably keep up with both of them somewhat equally.
Either way, I'll step out of this topic at this point, I think, and leave the arguing to the rest of you. I agree with Chempop in that of the arguements are for the most part bloody pointless. Heck, the only reason I joined in at all is because I'm hotheaded and I've been really, REALLY bored the last few days due to craptastic weather. Gaming is great and all, but I gotta be able to get OUT of here or I go crazy.
So yeah.... you all have fun with that... I'll go have fun playing the game instead.
GET BODIED 
