Ninja Gaiden [NES] + R2RKMF: Scrolling Action Monogatari

[WelshMegalodon]

Never saw much in the Matendouji girl. The one from PCE Ys, on the other hand...

Is it time to revive the 240p cuties thread?

EDIT: 556 posts, will you look at that...

Spoiler

[Sumez]

for matendouji? dang it, i already bought the fc game :O oh well, got it real cheap in a bundle from a friend. what's the difference, exactly?

I think there are reasons for either version, and I actually really wanted the FC one. It has the cooler underworld stage, with faces trapped in the walls. There are also some gameplay differences, but I've never actually played the FC one, so I couldn't tell which one is better. I got the US one simply for the translated text - the shopkeeper has a lot to say, such as summarizing stuff you've been doing on the previous stages in her news channel and stuff. It's cute and funny, but of course entirely flufff.

[kitten]

the text is actually what has led me to be afraid to start it up! is there anything that is going to impede my progress without it?

- - - -

meanwhile! i played war of the gems again and got a nomiss clear. didn't feel a whole lot like a nomiss clear, but hey, i'll take it. there were a few bits where i got down to pretty low health on bosses i felt i shouldn't, and i feel i'd have probably scrapped this as a recording. fortunately, i wasn't recording and didn't have to think about it :B i think i might try to record one for this game, but please excuse if it's not quite up to my usual standard of play. some of the game just feels... too loose, i guess? i warmed up to a bit on this play, but it still ain't nothing i'd call good.

protips:

characters

hulk - reach is utterly absurd, doesn't seem to be very good for much outside of his basic combo & reach (both help trivialize the final boss fights). customarily slow & sluggish, as you'd expect. i reliably use him for egypt and the final bosses. tried mixing things up with his special moves, but they're a little demanding to pull off and don't really do enough damage for them to matter much. his dash can still be useful for creating distance, though.

captain america - seems to be, hands down, the worst character. i couldn't find anything useful about him. has numerous projectile attacks but they have really slow fire rate and damage output that isn't exceptional. they also leave him temporarily without his shield, which disables his dash attack. has iron man's absurd height and tall attacks without any of his advantages.

spider-man - useful for his short height, particularly against the game's midgame stage boss. basic combo is fast and one of the most damaging in the game, but has 6 total hits and can leave him a little tied up. web slinging dive does disappointingly little damage but looks cool and is fun to play around with. web shot is a nice stun for crowd control, but useless on bosses.

wolverine - i want to tell you he's the same as mutant apocalypse, and his moveset actually is, but his damage output has been severely toned down and i'd place him barely above captain america in usefulness, honestly. downward plunge is now poor enough to barely be considered worth using, dash attack is the only really good thing he has and god is it weaker. i guess if spider-man is dead and you don't have a revive...?

iron man - if not the best character, the most fun character. double jump, aerial combo, projectile attacks with a bit of beef to them, an aerial dash attack that totally rules for speeding around, and a nasty little downward bomb attack. highly flexible, only weakness is that he's tall and therefore punches/shoots over some enemies depending on their current action. his basic combo also leaves him a tad open at the end and doesn't have the highest damage output, but it's a pretty minor gripe. at a disadvantage if you can't jump around, which some stages prevent. i wouldn't advise using him in egypt or the midgame space station (or antarctica, because of the 3x puck fight) but you can make him work about everywhere else. keep in mind his aerial dash smashes barriers, helps to make the aquarium stage way less horrendous.

items

gems - these are passive boosts that you can slot onto your character for bonuses. there's a total of five (there's a sixth that is obtained as part of the plot), each with a different purpose. going to antarctica first will net you the gem that allows you to see a few bonus items per stage, including health restores (very valuable), and going to the amazon first will net you the gem that doubles your movement speed and amusingly increases the speed at which music is played [Edit: apparently, the gems are randomly distributed, oops - i just had a few in the same spot several plays in a row. you will always get slow & bonus items in first tier of stages, power mid-game, and then the others in the last set, however]. imho, the former is more useful than the latter. the stage where picking one or the other matters most is the mid-game stage where you fight the magus, as speed will make the boss easier (he has a conveyor belt running, essentially), but the other one will spot you both a hidden revive and give you a little health bonus before his fight.

after beating the mid-game stage, you get the power gem, which doubles your attack power. there are still two more gems to obtain after that, but imho you want the attack power gem for the rest of the game (unless you're deeply amused at the idea of a double jump height gem making iron man silly).

everything else - you do NOT recover health between stages in this game, so you need to pick-up these blue items to be able to do that. they're paced evenly throughout most of the stages, some of them slightly off the beaten path. there are also hidden revives, necessary for bringing a character back to life, and glowing orange items that will replenish your health immediately. the last item is a panel indicated by a "G," which will give you one consumable gem allowing you to perform a super move (up -> forward -> down -> attack). you can stock three of these on a character before going into a stage, and ending a stage with extra will put them back in your total stock. if you pick one up mid-stage, it will display as if you have one that you can use, but you will be unable to use it (had me thinking i was just screwing the input up, but nope).

iron man, hulk, and captain america all get screen clears with the gems that can even hit bosses while they're knocked down, so keep that in mind if you've got a particularly problematic boss you want to just spam three of these suckers on. spider-man's special requires he actually hits the opponent with a web string, which is awful (it seems to only do as much damage as the screen clears, too, yikes), and wolverine turns into some weird glowing golden mode capable of firing wave projectiles. looks cool, not sure how useful it really is, you can still get hit when activating it and it has a short duration, so i immediately was not a huge fan.

problematic bosses

double iron man fight - this is the boss for the aquarium, and it seems almost cruel at first. however, it's actually really easy! these dipshits do not have a ducking attack, nor do any of the regular enemy versions of them. stay low, crouch to hit often (iron man's little bombs are quite useful), pummel them when they land on the platform above you. easy peasy. watch out if they fly over you, though, i think these uniquely gain the ability to fire downward.

the magus - the boss fight for the mid-game space station, and arguably the hardest boss. dude flies all over the place, spamming two different types of projectiles. the electric beam will go over your head if you're spider-man or wolverine, so try not to jump all over the place and you can often get a quick one in on him. don't bother using dash attacks, as he'll often interrupt with a projectile. stay as much to the left side of the screen as you can (otherwise you'll get pulled away mid-combo and sometimes smacked for it), and when he teleports in, get a combo in on him. his little meteor projectile can be jumped over, but don't be pre-emptively jumping, it'll alter trajectory and be likely to fly up right into you (if you're super close to him, you can still jump it, but it's risky to stay persistently close to him, his jab can combo and it hurts).

black heart - boss of the asteroid field. first off, don't forget to go to the bottom right of the screen after fighting doom to grab a large health-up in this stage, just in case you lost some health. this guy appears to be a randomly behaving and cruel jerk when you first fight him, but he's actually an easily manipulated baby! if you don't see him on-screen, he won't attack you, so use this to your advantage. stay right in the center, and then try to move over to him as he pops up from a black hole and do a basic combo on him (if you don't have time, run). upon success, run away until he's offscreen. wait until you hear his teleport sound, head back to the center, and then repeat. never jump over him, he always counter-attacks. this guy is easy to get a flawless victory on with this strategy, just be patient.

- - - - - - - - - -

there we go, a rough guide! i'll try to record a video, soon. this game ain't so bad, and i feel like with this info, you shouldn't have too hard a time. the guide for this game on gamefaqs is awful and i suggest only reading it for the movelist, which isn't even complete iirc.

[BIL]

Nice writeup. Bit more enthused about revisiting now!

[Sumez]

the text is actually what has led me to be afraid to start it up! is there anything that is going to impede my progress without it?

Not as far as I recall. Aside from a maze-like level at the end of the game, the game is very straight forward and almost linear.
The text is mostly for fun.

[mycophobia]

Got to Jaquio on one credit today

Still don't really have the hang of it yet, but I managed to get him down to about a third of his health left. The urge to savestate practice is strong, but I will resist.

edit: also learned that if you die on the final boss gauntlet and fight your way back up from 6-1 you don't get that full health refill again D:
Brutal!

[FinalBaton]

meh. using savestates to practice a boss/some part of a level is perfectly kosher. It saves you a shit ton of time and to be perfectly honest, I wish all games had a code/game genie code for level select, including going straight to a particular boss

[BIL]

edit: also learned that if you die on the final boss gauntlet and fight your way back up from 6-1 you don't get that full health refill again D:
Brutal!

However, note that you can now keep your subweapon + ammo. Master 6-3 and you can potentially instakill Jaquio with Jumpslash, or at the very least take a chunk out of him with the updraft. Even the windmill star makes connecting hits easier (both UD and WS are right outside the door).

If you reach the top floor of 6-3 at critically low health, it's probably best to suicide for a new lifebar. Note the life restore in the first candle - as long as you reach the top with 50% HP, you're doing okay. Actually, even if you've no lives left, I'd suggest Game Overing rather than taking on the boss rush at low HP. Restarting at 6-3 and getting another crack at improving your performance is obviously preferable to a draining 6-1 knockback.

6-3's top floor itself is dead simple - no pits, the gollum drop setpiece is easily neutralised by simply not breaking stride, and the last line of enemy defense is very vulnerable to methodical piecemeal attack:

Spoiler

Or you can just make a break for the door once it's in sight, taking a hit then running like hell with the horde in hot pursuit... not graceful but it works.

[kitten]

edit: also learned that if you die on the final boss gauntlet and fight your way back up from 6-1 you don't get that full health refill again D:
Brutal!

you're also still hit with the die-once-and-go-back-to-the-start stipulation, which compounds for a seriously masochistic punishment

boy was i mad as spit at this game on my first play! haha. must have beaten it for the first time shortly after it appeared on virtual console, probably sometime around 2007. one of few games where i really started to feel the urge to savestate practice. the last game i ever savestate practiced with was holy diver, though, and that was around the same time, i believe. something felt scummy about the whole experience and i've not brought myself to do it, again. i feel fine with the idea in theory, but in practice it still feels like i'm cheating and a tiny bit of the game's pacing & overall experience is in the suffering it thrusts upon you in the learning process, for better & worse.

that said, i'm not bothered by reading up on or looking at strategies employed by others, which you think would tickle the same kind of irritation up in my thought process! i've always viewed games as a bit of a social experience, i guess. explains why i've got some fondness for druaga & its history.

[mycophobia]

meh. using savestates to practice a boss/some part of a level is perfectly kosher. It saves you a shit ton of time and to be perfectly honest, I wish all games had a code/game genie code for level select, including going straight to a particular boss

I just don't like using them; I'm not in any hurry. Taking a break when I get frustrated and coming back later to run through the game again is perfectly fine with me.

[__SKYe]

I also don't like using savestates, nor knowing/reading strategies for games I've yet to play (and intend to).

Whenever possible, I like to play games blind, as if I was a kid that got the game back in the day, with no outside help other than the manual.
Of course, before I've come to appreciate this way of gaming, I've learning many things I now wish I hadn't, so this is not always possible. On the bright side, it has been long enough since I did, so I don't recall a good part of it (specific strategies for games, enemy/boss behaviour, etc).

Mind you, I've nothing against how others enjoy their gaming -- this is but my own way of doing it. I do enjoy comparing my own strategies/tactics with others', after I've played through a game.

[mycophobia]

Now I will watch the hell out of some replays, especially when I get stuck on a specific part. No qualms about that :P

[FinalBaton]

meh. using savestates to practice a boss/some part of a level is perfectly kosher. It saves you a shit ton of time and to be perfectly honest, I wish all games had a code/game genie code for level select, including going straight to a particular boss

I just don't like using them; I'm not in any hurry. Taking a break when I get frustrated and coming back later to run through the game again is perfectly fine with me.

Oh, I don't use them either, so I hear ya (actually I never play on emulatorz; only on real hardware with carts/discs. no everdrive thingies). Just saying I don't have a problem with people who use savestate to practice, then do their runs legit.

[mycophobia]

meh. using savestates to practice a boss/some part of a level is perfectly kosher. It saves you a shit ton of time and to be perfectly honest, I wish all games had a code/game genie code for level select, including going straight to a particular boss

I just don't like using them; I'm not in any hurry. Taking a break when I get frustrated and coming back later to run through the game again is perfectly fine with me.

Oh, I don't use them either, so I hear ya (actually I never play on emulatorz; only on real hardware with carts/discs. no everdrive thingies). Just saying I don't have a problem with people who use savestate to practice, then do their runs legit.

Oh totally. 100% Agreed


I play almost exclusively on emulator despite owning an actual nes with the actual game lol. I just like using my HRAP3

[Jonny2x4]

All this Ninja Ryukenden discussion makes me wish my NES wasn't dead. The last time I remembered clearing the game was way back in my teen years, when I "credit-fed" my way through the final act. I need to get around fixing it, or at least buy an actual Famicom.

[BrianC]

I use flash carts, but I don't use save states. I noticed there is a full translation hack for the JP version of Mutendoji.

[kitten]

All this Ninja Ryukenden discussion makes me wish my NES wasn't dead. The last time I remembered clearing the game was way back in my teen years, when I "credit-fed" my way through the final act. I need to get around fixing it, or at least buy an actual Famicom.

do both, imho. nes has a few cool region exclusives and it's often cheaper if you're in the states to just get nes versions for quite a few things. i've got a hybrid collection that's currentlyyyy... 213 fc and 125 nes. i prefer fc but i still have a bit of warmth for nes carts. it's also nice to be able to go into a mom & pop shop and just pick something up and play it that night, too, which you'll not get a lot of opportunity to do w/ fc.

[drauch]

I've pretty much gone full emulator myself. Current prices are too soul-crushing and I don't have the room for all my other hobby stuff, so I've had to compromise. A bit of me died a couple of years ago when I slowly switched, but I've come to terms with it. Long live ye brave warriors.

[FinalBaton]

I use flash carts, but I don't use save states. I noticed there is a full translation hack for the JP version of Mutendoji.

Flash carts are pretty damn great. I should get me some of these jawns but I have yet to procure one

[Jonny2x4]

I don't trust emulation that much anymore ever since I experienced instances where they would dump bootleg versions of games and tried to pass them off as the originals. Even arcade games on MAME are not emulated with 100% accuracy, as I experienced with games like Contra and Devastators. I much rather play on original hardware if given a choice, although that's out of the question when it comes to most arcade games unfortunately.

[WelshMegalodon]

I dislike savestates myself, which is why I learned Acts I-IV without them, but feel like you don't last long enough at the later stages (and, for that matter, the boss rush) to make the old-fashioned way efficient. That all of you had enough patience to learn and practice Jaquio without savestates is just unbelievable.

The infinite continues are great for practicing no-subweapon strategies, though.

All this Ninja Ryukenden discussion makes me wish my NES wasn't dead. The last time I remembered clearing the game was way back in my teen years, when I "credit-fed" my way through the final act. I need to get around fixing it, or at least buy an actual Famicom.

FPGA implementations are a thing and, depending on what you're looking to play, might cost you less in the long run, although most of them have significant issues. I don't do enough twitch gaming for laggy emulation to be an issue (assuming it even is for most people - Squire managed to beat Ryukenden on an emulator setup), but I've heard good things about the retroUSB AVS in spite of it only outputting 720p.

I don't trust emulation that much anymore ever since I experienced instances where they would dump bootleg versions of games and tried to pass them off as the originals. Even arcade games on MAME are not emulated with 100% accuracy, as I experienced with games like Contra and Devastators. I much rather play on original hardware if given a choice, although that's out of the question when it comes to most arcade games unfortunately.

While it's true that emulators almost always require ROM dumps to work, emulator development and ROM dumping are usually separate projects, so I wouldn't swear off emulators for that reason. And in MAME's case, they usually label bootleg ROMs as such and let the user know if a better dump isn't available. If an emulator for anything older than 1995 sports high compatibility, passes a bunch of test ROMs, works with a bevy of crazy demos, and is widely used, it's probably good enough for the job. (Being open source is another plus, but only if it's in the interest of preservation or otherwise sharing knowledge about the system. Making the source open can also mean the developer has fewer dirty hacks to hide.)

As far as accuracy is concerned, the accuracy status of any MAME driver can be viewed with the -listxml command and significant deviations are usually documented in either the source code or MAME Testers. The latter will show that the issues you describe with Devastators have been known for at least three and a half years. So MAME is at least honest. Not sure how many others are, but byuu (for example) redumped the entirety of the Super Famicom's North American library and is working on PAL in the interest of eliminating bad dumps, and there's no shortage of groups like Redump, No-Intro, Darkwater, and TOSEC aiming for the same. (These are more about faithfully reproducing the disc image rather than outright bootlegging, but you get my point.)

[BrianC]

I like the AVS, but there's an issues where some games show white artifacts on the everdrive on most later versions of the firmware (no issues with the 1.10 firmware). There were some known bugs in firmware 1.2 beta 8, but they renamed it to 1.20 without any changes. Does not give me high hopes for fixing any issues, though they are mostly related to homebrew and unofficial games.

[kitten]

recorded a run for war of the gems earlier today and was feeling like it was basically what i predicted would happen - not quite up to my usual par, not feeling good about it. there were a couple of bosses where i played kind of embarrassingly on. debated on uploading it anyway, played a little more and did another full run while recording, much happier on that time around. i should have it up tomorrow. in playing the game a whole bunch, i feel like my opinion of it has risen quite a bit. it's still no mutant apocalypse, but it's not as much worse as i was making it out and it has some of its own strengths, honestly. falls apart less toward the end, has a little bit more stuff, has slightly more exciting character variety, is more punishing (well, that last one is both good & bad). it is, however, less cinematic, less aesthetically cohesive, less tight in its best moments, more focused on stupid gimmicks, and much worse about recycling bits of its content.

my play should be highly indicative of how most bosses fight and how you should handle a lot of trouble segments if you're looking into this one, yourselves. there are a few times where you can just bypass a few of the enemies on screen and get to the next set, and this helps makes several key barrages of the obnoxious 'puck' enemy much less draining. i really wish there had been more action games in this vein, mixing brawler/fighting mechanics up into the equation can lead to some really fun & exciting moments. in particular, i feel like they leave a high skill threshold for play that extends quite far beyond merely getting a nomiss.

you'll notice i still don't use any special moves with the hulk except maybe a couple right at the beginning - his toss and air slam are seriously just no good. there's absolutely no reason to ever use them over his basic combo or the dash, as they just leave you wide open and end up doing equal damage, at best - and usually on fewer enemies. he's still a fun character just for how beefy he is, and i like him better than beast in mutant apocalypse because his 3rd hit in his combo and his dash don't cause that nasty, punishable rebound that beast's do.

sorry for just going on and on about this one, i feel i've turned the last page into the war of the gems: the kitten chronicles, but i felt it compelling to keep picking at and ultimately very well worth it. it's incredibly rough for quite a while, though! don't expect to immediately like this one, and don't expect to necessarily like it after getting to the ending the first time. however, after all the play i sunk in, i think i've ultimately settled on upgrading this one to "good - with a few caveats, but indeed good."

STORY TIME:

this game has been kind of a personal journey, for me, because my brother & i received this and super adventure island as gifts probably nearly 20 years ago, at this point. a good friend of my mother's gave the two of us a super nintendo game each, and we were extremely excited to be getting entire snes games as gifts. however, we barely liked super adventure island and couldn't get very far in it, and we ended up hating this one because it felt impossible. though i eventually came to quite like super adventure island years ago (i inherited both games as my brother moved onto pastures like league of legends), every few years, i'd go back to war of the gems and discover i still hated it, still felt like it was brutally difficult and impossible to understand - even as recently as within the last couple of years. this was the first time shit just clicked, and it's only after playing and becoming competent with quite a few beat 'em ups i feel i began to really understand how these games operate.

this last year has been very rewarding, in that regard. TNWA kickstarted a lot of it (obvious thank you, bil), and it was great fun chatting in here with skye about a few genre classics, too. it was also the thread's consistent praise of mutant apocalypse that had me give it a shot, and that was the final push i needed to go back to war of the gems will full effort. the saga has concluded! i feel good about my ability with these games, now! i know that war of the gems is half scrolling action, but it was the beat 'em up half of it that always left me mystified! now it feels quite easy and a good bit of fun.

frankly, this isn't a very remarkable clear in everything i've played at this point, but it's very personally meaningful. thanks, everyone~!
let's positive thinking. be attitude for gains. take a key for coming in.

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edit:

play is up!

[mycophobia]

Jaquio's a motherfucker

[mycophobia]

I keep dying to him when he has like 3 or 4 hp left ;_;

[Sumez]

We should have a Jaquio strategy guide stickied at the top of the thread It's probably the most repeated subject in here.

[BIL]

This is my usual reference. But tbh I think it's more interesting to observe new players' reactions.

You know about the [down+B] air sword glitch, mycophobia? Basically, you cancel a jumping sword slash with down, then slash again and repeat ad infinitum. The tapping rhythm's hard to describe, it's not a simultaneous press - experiment a bit. It can help you tag an extra hit or two onto Jaquio per attack. Outright rushing will quickly end in disaster, but it's a handy edge provided your attack plan is solid.

Keep in mind, evading the flames is a matter of manipulating their velocity. You want to be far enough away that by the time they reach you, they're going fast enough to fly offscreen. Plan your moves around this principle and you won't get swarmed. If you do get swarmed, hit the floor to prevent more from latching on. The others will leave soon enough.

[__SKYe]

The easiest way you can do it, is by staying on the right side of the screen (where there should be a pillar) and whenever Jaquio sends fireballs from the left side of the screen, while moving towards you, jump to the mid-right pillar, slash him and quickly come down, so as to make the fireballs disappear.

The rate at which he moves from side to side is faster than the rate at which he spawns fireballs, so at first it looks as if he spawns them somewhat randomly, but after several iterations, his pattern repeats (pattern meaning where he is when spawning them).

If you observe the pattern, you'll get used to see when he'll start spawning fireballs from the right side of the screen, at which point you can/should move to the opposite side (the left) and dodge them as you'd normally do on the right side, but without jumping at him.

After a couple fireballs, he'll start to spawn them on the eft side again, and all you have to do is repeat the initial pattern.

The things to keep in mind at are to not touch him (it's better to hold off attacking if you don't think you'll be able to do it cleanly) and not to rush -- you have plenty of time to beat him, even doing single slahses (ie. not using the fast-slash glitch). Really, the best you can do is to stop yourself from jumping at him when you're not fully sure you can slash him without taking damage (I don't mean the accidental hit -- you'll get used to gauge just when you can jump at him safely).

It's a bit hard to explain this fight, and even watching a replay isn't enough in my opinion (there's a fair difference between seeing it done and actually doing it). This is the best I can put it.

EDIT: BIL wrote a good tactic first.

[BIL]

Tricky to describe, indeed - and what's moreso, once you nail the groove down it's hard to remember ever not knowing it! (at least in my case... I was like ten when I went on a nerdrage-driven campaign to finally see NG1's end credits )

Maybe it's like riding a bike? Trying to cram in a bit more TRP-STGT play so I'm rushing, but the cliche seems horribly apt. >_> I shall return!

[__SKYe]

Tricky to describe, indeed - and what's moreso, once you nail the groove down it's hard to remember ever not knowing it! (at least in my case... I was like ten when I went on a nerdrage-driven campaign to finally see NG1's end credits )

Maybe it's like riding a bike? Trying to cram in a bit more TRP-STGT play so I'm rushing, but the cliche seems horribly apt. >_> I shall return!

Very much so, yes. I've recently revisited NG (haven't played it much since the 1LC) and breezed through Jaquio, so it definitely stays with you.

It's all about watching the fireballs and not rushing it -- if you rush it, you're very likely to lose.