Official: Mushihime-sama Futari (1.0, 1.5, BLT)

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 10:03 am

Sorry to hear that NTSC-J. As of 12/18 Hey still doesn't have them, but Try has at least one so you might want to head over there and check it out. Maybe Hey will get them on 12/19.

Some changes from ver 1.0>ver 1.5

-Original mode is easier, the bullets don't go as fast in some places and there's less of them. In the first 3 stages at least. The last two stages are said to be more or less unchanged, though some have said stage 5 is actually HARDER in ver 1.5 (the bullets are faster). There is much more gold so your score will be much higher. The extends are at 35 mil and 100 mil now. The last boss is pretty much the same.

-Maniac mode is only slightly easier compared to ver 1.0. Most of the bullet patterns are unchanged. You can now kill the 2nd midboss with Normal Palm without bombing. Some boss patterns are tweaked. The enemy placement after the 3rd stage midboss is different. There is a ton more gold, like Original mode. You can get a multiplier of 9999 by the 1st stage boss without trying too hard, for example. Much higher scoring potential. Extends are at 100 mil and 250 mil. The last boss is pretty much the same.

-Ultra mode is said to be harder than the first game's Ultra. There is a ton of gold so this should be the highest scoring mode. Extends are at 350 mil and 650 mil (!!). Not sure if this is true, but one guy said Ultra uses Original mode's scoring system rather than Maniac mode's (??).

Other things:
-There are bombs before the 2nd and 3rd boss now (for a total of 7 bombs in the game).
-Abnormal Palm's laser attack was strengthened.
-There are marks on the life gauge of each boss showing each form change point. Just like Espgaluda.
-The placement of the 1up in Stage 5 was changed, apparently it's in another building that comes after the building it was originally in.
-The Stage 4 boss's crazy end pattern was altered (not sure how though, hope it's at least managable now)
-An Abnormal Palm "demonstration" was added.

NTSC-J · Post by **NTSC-J** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 12:40 pm

It sounds like they changed it in every way we were hoping. Ultra with Original's scoring mode sounds great to me, I look forward to seeing the usual character's smashing this game into the billions.

Moving the stage 5 1-up was sort of an asshole move...although considering I've never once missed it maybe they wanted to make us work for it a bit more like in Ketsui or DOJ.

I'm going to HEY likely on Wednesday the 20th, so I hope they have it by then.

LUNardei · Post by **LUNardei** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 5:27 pm

twe wrote:...

Ok, a month of version 1.0 was the actual location test

Post by **Icarus** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 5:56 pm

LUNardei wrote:Ok, a month of version 1.0 was the actual location test

By summer next year, expect ver2.0.

LUNardei · Post by **LUNardei** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 6:28 pm

Icarus wrote: By summer next year, expect ver2.0.

Nothing to be worried about if you're still busy with the first Mushi, I guess

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 6:38 pm

Here's a pic of an Ultra mode boss (not sure which one):

Here's a sequence of pics put together by a Japanese guy as a joke, to poke fun at Western gamers' when they see Ultra mode for the first time. It has some excellent, clear shots of Ultra mode in it:

And as you can see, Ultra does indeed use Original mode's scoring system rather than Maniac mode's!

LUNardei · Post by **LUNardei** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 6:45 pm

twe wrote:http://www.kmc2ppm.jp/stgup/img/1221.jpg

Err, that's what is really going to happen

Plasmo · Post by **Plasmo** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 6:55 pm

http://b-board.rdy.jp/torrent/index.php
the first videos are up.
it looks way harder than the first ultra mode.
beautiful to watch though

Frederik · Post by **Frederik** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 7:19 pm

Plasmo wrote:http://b-board.rdy.jp/torrent/index.php
the first videos are up.
it looks way harder than the first ultra mode.
beautiful to watch though

The first two ones with the "1.5", or are there more?

jpj · Post by **jpj** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 7:48 pm

ultra mode is already enabled on the v1.5 boards then...?

ArrogantBastard · Post by **ArrogantBastard** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 7:57 pm

Plasmo wrote:http://b-board.rdy.jp/torrent/index.php
the first videos are up.
it looks way harder than the first ultra mode.
beautiful to watch though

Oh. My. God.

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 8:00 pm

jpj wrote:ultra mode is already enabled on the v1.5 boards then...?

Yep.

sven666 · Post by **sven666** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 8:21 pm

haha love the pic, its totally spot-on too

Gorecki · Post by **Gorecki** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 8:30 pm

Why? Why would any sane person want to expose themself to such unrelenting evil? Cave should be prosecuted for war crimes.

parodius · Post by **parodius** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 9:15 pm

Gorecki wrote:Why? Why would any sane person want to expose themself to such unrelenting evil? Cave should be prosecuted for war crimes.

Yeah, prosecutedt to the full extent of the jam

Stormowl · Post by **Stormowl** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 9:22 pm

Plasmo wrote:http://b-board.rdy.jp/torrent/index.php
the first videos are up.
it looks way harder than the first ultra mode.
beautiful to watch though

well dang. looks like this years tax return is spoken for.

Wang_MacTavish · Post by **Wang_MacTavish** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 9:48 pm

I fully expect Ultra Mode superplays for this game to become legendary, even among mainstream North American gamers.

A funny thing: back when I first saw Mushi's Ultra Mode I thought "Where does Cave go from here?". I'm thinking that same thing now. I'm not sure in how many more ways Cave can make their games difficult, as they're hitting the limit of how many bullets you can toss at the player. Hopefully they'll continue to meet our expectations in the future.

Frederik · Post by **Frederik** » Mon Dec 18, 2006 10:35 pm

Wang_MacTavish wrote: A funny thing: back when I first saw Mushi's Ultra Mode I thought "Where does Cave go from here?". I'm thinking that same thing now. I'm not sure in how many more ways Cave can make their games difficult, as they're hitting the limit of how many bullets you can toss at the player. Hopefully they'll continue to meet our expectations in the future.

I have to say that it looks incredibly hard, but also not very inspired. I´d trade such modes in with mindbending patterns like in Espgaluda II or Ketsui any time. They increased the number of bullets, but the single patterns themselves aren´t that hard - just hard to concentrate on, since there are so many at a time. And yeah, there must be other ways to increase difficulty than spamming the screen that in a way that leaves you 10 pixels space to survive.

MSZ · Post by **MSZ** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 11:30 am

Just watched a couple of ultra mode videos at youtube. I think it is harder than Mushi 1.

eretsua · Post by **eretsua** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 4:11 pm

i agree with you FrederikJurk, it does look like "more of the same" rather than "renewing". ESPgaluda II looked a lot more like an innovation to me. i do hope that Cave will continue to path of innovation rather than just throwing familiar patterns at us with even less safe-spots.

don't get me wrong, i'm excited about futari and it will undoubtly be lots of fun to play and i look forward to the day that i can play it (and i'm hoping that day will dawn). (but) the ultra mode is way too difficult for me as i can not even single credit the first mushi on any difficulty setting.

~eretsua.

Wang_MacTavish · Post by **Wang_MacTavish** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 5:08 pm

New torrent appears to be up at the previously linked site (http://b-board.rdy.jp/torrent/index.php). I'm at school and behind a firewall so I can't report on its contents, but just to let everyone else know.

gionmatsuli · Post by **gionmatsuli** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 8:01 pm

The guy finish stage2 on Maniac with 178.000.000
But stage 2 in this version is too easy compared to Version 1.0

And for now there is a huge level diff between Maniac and Ultra, too sad

Shalashaska · Post by **Shalashaska** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 9:04 pm

Wow....I might have to make Futari 1.5 my first PCB purchase.

Frederik · Post by **Frederik** » Tue Dec 19, 2006 10:14 pm

MSZ wrote:Just watched a couple of ultra mode videos at youtube. I think it is harder than Mushi 1.

Wanna post some links? Thanks in advance.

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 3:29 am

gionmatsuli wrote:The guy finish stage2 on Maniac with 178.000.000
But stage 2 in this version is too easy compared to Version 1.0

And for now there is a huge level diff between Maniac and Ultra, too sad

The scoring in Maniac mode was improved to make it more lively. You can also do more fun things with the bosses. Ver 1.0 was too limited and it started to get stale in this regard pretty quick. I'm glad Cave corrected this.

As for the difference between Maniac and Ultra, I don't think it's more than the first game. Ultra in Mushi 1 is FAR more difficult than Maniac mode (which is pretty easy actually).

As for the talk on "innovation", well, as far as Espgaluda II goes they just added a "bullet regenerating mode" full of random, often unpredictable bullet clouds that slowly fill the screen. It is a nice evolution from the standard Galuda system, I'll agree. With Mushi Futari they threw out the original game's chaining system (probably because it was so prone to hacks) and started anew, focusing on a gem system (which was a great idea). They then split this into two scoring systems, one for Original and Ultra and the other for Maniac. Perhaps not innovative in the eyes of some of you, but can you name a game that uses a scoring system like Original/Ultra mode's? Even Maniac mode's system is innovative as it is basically a fast paced Kakusei-type system blended with the underlying chaining idea of the first Mushi. Ultra mode in this game has some beautiful patterns, and looks to be another fine work of shooting art by Cave. All told it looks like Mushi Futari 1.5 is a brilliant package, and one of Cave's best works to date. Can't wait to pick my PCB up on Jan 5th.

MSZ · Post by **MSZ** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 4:05 am

FrederikJurk wrote:
MSZ wrote:Just watched a couple of ultra mode videos at youtube. I think it is harder than Mushi 1.
Wanna post some links? Thanks in advance.

You guys may have seen them already:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKCFw5N3yKI&eurl=

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ4OgbYaH8A&eurl=

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 4:15 am

A series of pics of the last boss's attacks in ULTRA Mode (note: this is not the TLB, just the regular last boss):

http://www.kmc2ppm.jp/stgup/img/1220.jpg

I'm not aware of any TLB info yet. It may be that you need to one credit the first last boss to see the TLB this time. And it will probably be awhile before someone 1CC's Ultra mode up to the TLB.

Post by **system11** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 9:37 am

So, which version is the better one, and which is best for a mediocre player? I was waiting for the price to come down (which it is, steadily), but seeing a 1.5 appear for $100 more kind of threw me.

LUNardei · Post by **LUNardei** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 10:24 am

twe wrote:With Mushi Futari they threw out the original game's chaining system (probably because it was so prone to hacks)

I don't think tht's the reason. Probably they only wanted a change of pace just to avoid a "Mushihimesama with Hypers" but...

focusing on a gem system (which was a great idea).

I can't agree again

I don't like the idea of a sequel almost equal the first game, but I like less the idea of a sequel which is totally different from it, gameplay-wise. Don't get me wrong, these are only personal feelings/tastes, and most of all I have to wait other two weeks to try Futari 1.0. I still hope to have a good time with it and change my mind

EOJ · Post by **EOJ** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 10:24 am

bloodflowers wrote:So, which version is the better one, and which is best for a mediocre player? I was waiting for the price to come down (which it is, steadily), but seeing a 1.5 appear for $100 more kind of threw me.

Yeah, Excellentcom is selling ver 1.5 for $1547 and the original version for $1438.

I wouldn't be surprised if ver 1.5 stays a bit high in price for awhile, like the first Mushi, as it has three game modes and the difficulty balance is very similar to the first game. I am assuming the artwork is the same in both kits (as when I exchanged my board for a ver 1.5 board I was told I didn't need to send back the artwork and instructions, just the box and the PCB), but maybe ver 1.5 has a sticker on the box a la Ibara Black Label?

@Bloodflowers: definitely get ver 1.5! It's a bit easier in Original and Maniac modes, all the annoying bugs and game imbalances are fixed, and you get 3 game modes to play with.