New Neo-Geo shmup -- Last Hope [also for DC]

ROBOTRON · Post by **ROBOTRON** » Fri Mar 30, 2007 3:21 am

I want that creepy waters cut...the game music on thee cd is broken up into parts...grrrrr. LE please so I can burn someones copy.

Ceph · Post by **Ceph** » Thu Apr 05, 2007 3:07 am

In case anyone still cares:

Dear Sirs and Madams,

you receive this email because you have preordered the Limited Edition of Last Hope DC at Play-Asia.com or the Van Basilco Online-Shop. Due several problems while the production of the Limited Edition we had to postpone this edition again and again. Unfortunately we have to announce another delay.

The problems had their origin at the CD factory we authorized with the production of the Limited Edition. As you can imagine the Vinyl CD hybrid is a very special format and is only offered at a chosen few factories in Europe. Therefore the order of the production was executed by a large and prestigious factory in Germany which is a subsidiary of a well-known media group.

Unfortunately we had to recognize very soon that we play a minor role in their tasks. After several misunderstandings at the beginning of this deal we made a clear assignment which didn't meet our satisfaction when we received the final units. After another delay of the regular edition - because this problem accrued twice - we were very unhappy and decided not to work together with this CD factory in the future. Sadly this also influenced our business connection and the Limited Edition got a lower priority.

Last week - when the final release date was set by redspotgames - was another disappointing moment when we received the Limited Edition in time but with three mayor errors. We could not sent the Limited Edition out to our wholesale partners under this condition.

Now - after we almost had to take legal proceedings - we are confident to receive a 100% correct and satisfactorily Limited Edition within this week. Please also notice that it will take about 2 - 3 more days to ship it to our wholesale partners.

We at redspotgames are deeply sorry for the delays and promise to hold on the given release dates for our future projects.

My best regards / Mit freundlichen Grüßen / L'expression de mes salutations

Max Scharl
Executive Director
Van Basilco / redspotgames

Specineff · Post by **Specineff** » Thu Apr 05, 2007 3:11 am

Boy has this been quite an embarrassment overall, huh?

The Coop · Post by **The Coop** » Thu Apr 05, 2007 4:19 am

**hugs his regular edition that he's had for nearly two months**

qatmix · Post by **qatmix** » Thu Apr 05, 2007 5:58 am

I wouldnt say that them checking that the supplied goods were not good enough quality was an embarasement. They did the right thing and have ensured that they suply what they said they would. Personally I think its very admrible. There are lots of logisticle issues when manufacturing, and these guys are new to it, are doing the right thing for there customers. I will be letting someone else publish my game when its ready.

Strider77 · Post by **Strider77** » Thu Apr 05, 2007 11:29 am

to bad they weren't as picky about the game that was being pressed on those CDs.....

pixelcorps · Post by **pixelcorps** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 8:45 pm

forgive my ignorance, but what IS a vinyl CD hybrid?

Super Laydock · Post by **Super Laydock** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 9:34 pm

pixelcorps wrote:forgive my ignorance, but what IS a vinyl CD hybrid?

As far as I know in this case it means a CD with a vinyl look (and even partly made of vinyl).

from the official website wrote:The Vinyl-CD will be playable on every current CD player and the Dreamcast and the upper side will have a complex vinyl structure as well as a label.

Never_Scurred · Post by **Never_Scurred** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 9:40 pm

whats the point? You Dreamcast people sure love getting that extra dicklick with your games, huh?
Why even bother with a worthless Limited Edition version anyways?

I would not want to be the two or three people stupid enough to have bought this game AES. I'll wait for teh r0mzoRZ.

pixelcorps · Post by **pixelcorps** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 10:12 pm

Super Laydock wrote:
pixelcorps wrote:forgive my ignorance, but what IS a vinyl CD hybrid?
As far as I know in this case it means a CD with a vinyl look (and even partly made of vinyl).

from the official website wrote:The Vinyl-CD will be playable on every current CD player and the Dreamcast and the upper side will have a complex vinyl structure as well as a label.

wow, how pointless.

nice to know the people are waiting for something really worthwhile...

Damocles · Post by **Damocles** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 11:15 pm

Man, I hope the "Vinyl CD" isn't one of those CD-R disks that you can buy at Wal-Mart that are slightly ridged and kind of look like a record but otherwise are completely normal CD-R's.

Never_Scurred · Post by **Never_Scurred** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 11:18 pm

Damocles wrote:Man, I hope the "Vinyl CD" isn't one of those CD-R disks that you can buy at Wal-Mart that are slightly ridged and kind of look like a record but otherwise are completely normal CD-R's.

LOL..I was thinkin the same thing.......funny if they were, though....

iatneH · Post by **iatneH** » Tue Apr 10, 2007 11:33 pm

I'd venture to say that I am pretty sure that's what the vinyl CDs will be. But pressed, not burned. Lame, anyhow.

Plus, I am guessing more than half the people so eager to get the LE will discover that the game sucks beyond their tolerance for sucky games.

About that wiki entry, yes, no doubt it's challenging, but it's hard for all the wrong reasons, and that's what makes it a bad game.

icepick · Post by **icepick** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 12:31 am

Never_Scurred wrote:Why even bother with a worthless Limited Edition version anyways?

soniq-man wrote:The extra soundtrack CD with the LE is of course more special than the pure in-game music. Apart from being re-mastered for a better listening experience, the tracks are in full length, i.e. as originally composed. Due to level design, gameplay constraints etc. the full tracks can't always be heard in full while dodging plasma death and space debris. So you are getting more music as such. Apart from that, the DC version itself has 2 more music tracks than the original NeoGeo version. That, plus the extra booklet and the knowledge that your copy is one of only 500 out there should make it nice to own. Anyway, it is sold out as is, so there you go.

If someone didn't like the game or the soundtrack or limited edition items, then I'd have to agree with you on that one.

As LEs go, the Last Hope LE looks like a pretty nice package. I'm sure that the developers and publishers didn't want to have this situation with the LE release, of course... but if I were them, I'd be determined to get it done if I said it would be so. This is what they're doing, and if they didn't have to deal with the financial repercussions of a number of factory errors, I'm sure that they would offer some sort of consolation bonus in addition to the finished LE.

This is also an independent production, and hopefully everyone pre-ordering knew that from the outset. The main difference is that the order is charged right away, unlike standard commercial channels (where orders are charged when shipped). The main similarity is that titles get bumped all the time, so while it's unfortunate, there are only so many things that one can do.

pixelcorps wrote:nice to know the people are waiting for something really worthwhile...

Some people love their soundtracks. As long as it's pressed, it's still high-quality exclusive CD audio of the soundtrack which can't be found anywhere else. Yes, someone could simply buy a different soundtrack and enjoy it perhaps just as much, but, this is Last Hope.

iatneH wrote:I am guessing more than half the people so eager to get the LE will discover that the game sucks beyond their tolerance for sucky games.

You might be right. Given that they could like it or not like it, I'll field a guess that at least 200 people will be very pleased.

We'll find out when the time comes, though. To the people that ordered the LE and have waited for it without playing the game at all, I have to compliment you on your determination and patience. I hope that finally playing your ordered LE is a grand experience, whether you love it or want to rip a wall apart.

(My name is on one of the copies owned by the latter, since I missed pre-orders.)

Strider77 · Post by **Strider77** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 1:57 am

Some people love their soundtracks. As long as it's pressed, it's still high-quality exclusive CD audio of the soundtrack which can't be found anywhere else. Yes, someone could simply buy a different soundtrack and enjoy it perhaps just as much, but, this is Last Hope.

you can pop the game cd in a cd player and listen to the music without the LE....

pixelcorps · Post by **pixelcorps** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 2:18 am

Strider77 wrote:
Some people love their soundtracks. As long as it's pressed, it's still high-quality exclusive CD audio of the soundtrack which can't be found anywhere else. Yes, someone could simply buy a different soundtrack and enjoy it perhaps just as much, but, this is Last Hope.
you can pop the game cd in a cd player and listen to the music without the LE....

ahhh, but it's not a vinyl CD is it??

icepick · Post by **icepick** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 5:35 am

Strider77 wrote:you can pop the game cd in a cd player and listen to the music without the LE....

I was thinking the same thing on page nine, which was when soniq-man (Rafael Dyll, the soundtrack composer) posted to clarify the nature of the LE's bonus soundtrack disc. It does indeed present longer, higher-quality editions of the game's music tracks, as quoted in my post above.

So, there is still a fair reason on the soundtrack front for individuals to be interested in the LE... if they are very much into game soundtracks, that is.

pixelcorps wrote:ahhh, but it's not a vinyl CD is it??

Ha ha, very funny.

In all honesty, and not to disregard what the developers or publishers had in mind for the LE, I would have been perfectly happy with a standard, non-vinyl CD soundtrack. Then again, this problem wasn't even supposed to happen in the first place, and with utmost respect for the factory, if they have trouble producing their own advertised special CDs, they might just as well have trouble producing standard CDs.

qatmix · Post by **qatmix** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 12:51 pm

the Vinyl CD will not look like a record, it will look like the cover of the box but all embossed etc.. Its a guess but the music CD's I have got which are vinyl cds are like that.

The question is.. its a week later.. has the game shipped yet?

J-Manic · Post by **J-Manic** » Wed Apr 11, 2007 9:56 pm

Strider77 wrote:you can pop the game cd in a cd player and listen to the music without the LE....

That's the first thing I did when I got my regular edition. Great tunes, this game has. Then I made a CD-R copy for a friend of mine, which he can play on both his Dreamcast and CD player no problem.

ROBOTRON · Post by **ROBOTRON** » Thu Apr 12, 2007 3:31 pm

Custom vinyl cd?

Looks neat...too bad about the wait. At least they were forthcoming about the problems, but its still unreasonable. The music is pretty good, but not worth the aggravation. Fortunately, the game CD will play in most cd players. I'm really curious to see if any of the songs are longer or remixed, otherwise...its a ripoff ( if all your getting is a loop of whats on the original game disc).

icepick · Post by **icepick** » Thu Apr 12, 2007 7:03 pm

Thanks for the picture, those CDs do look cool. It'd be funny if you could put them on a turntable and hear a special song or something.

ROBOTRON wrote:I'm really curious to see if any of the songs are longer or remixed, otherwise...its a ripoff ( if all your getting is a loop of whats on the original game disc).

Well, the composer of the music tracks ("soniq-man," Rafael Dyll) did register to post on page nine of this thread, stating that the tracks on the soundtrack are in full length "as originally composed," so if they were originally composed as loops, then I suppose that the music would be the same. Also mentioned was that the songs were remastered, and that the DC version has two additional songs in comparison to the NeoGeo version, but I'm not sure if that means that they're in the game, the soundtrack, or both.

I could totally keep going.

BrianC · Post by **BrianC** » Thu Apr 12, 2007 7:33 pm

For some reason, those vinyl CDs have me thinking of the Ah My Goddess TV series where Tamiya and his friend released an evil female demon by playing a CD with a record player.

Never_Scurred · Post by **Never_Scurred** » Thu Apr 12, 2007 8:48 pm

BrianC wrote:For some reason, those vinyl CDs have me thinking of the Ah My Goddess TV series where Tamiya and his friend released an evil female demon by playing a CD with a record player.

I'd think you'd release the demon in anyone if you tried to play their discs on a turntable. Totally would fuck up the stylus as well, and those things cost a grip to replace.

J-Manic · Post by **J-Manic** » Thu Apr 12, 2007 9:24 pm

icepick wrote:Well, the composer of the music tracks ("soniq-man," Rafael Dyll) did register to post on page nine of this thread, stating that the tracks on the soundtrack are in full length "as originally composed,"

Actually, there's one track that doesn't start from the very beginning, but instead fades in from after almost a minute into the track. I forget which number track it is, but it's the best song on the soundtrack IMO.

Lawfer · Post by **Lawfer** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 5:30 am

The Limited Edition been released at Play-Asia.

szycag · Post by **szycag** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 5:38 am

Lawfer wrote:The Limited Edition been released at Play-Asia.

May god have mercy on us all

Lawfer · Post by **Lawfer** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 12:21 pm

Hurry up, play-asia has some limited edition copies left at 79.99$!!!!!!!

Super Laydock · Post by **Super Laydock** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 12:35 pm

Lawfer wrote:Hurry up, play-asia has some limited edition copies left at 79.99$!!!!!!!

Thanks for the heads up!

They had about 80 left due to cancellations...

now it´s certainly down to 79 at least.

Ceph · Post by **Ceph** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 12:38 pm

Not surprising that a few people cancelled their orders (after the mixed reviews and the long wait).

Super Laydock wrote: They had about 80 left due to cancellations...

Where did you get that number?

Lawfer · Post by **Lawfer** » Mon Apr 16, 2007 12:38 pm

Super Laydock wrote:
Lawfer wrote:Hurry up, play-asia has some limited edition copies left at 79.99$!!!!!!!
Thanks for the heads up!

They had about 80 left due to cancellations...

now it´s certainly down to 79 at least.

How do you know how much they had left?