Macross 2036

[shinsage]

Any opinions?
It's for the PC-Engine CD, I believe.

I saw a video of this earlier tonight, doesn't look half bad. Better than that Saturn game, at least.

[Damocles]

Mediocre, methinks.

[Specineff]

Blasphemy.

It runs on a miserable 1.0 system card, and the parallax in one scene is absolutely stunning.

Not the be-all, end-all horzie shmup ever, but it's far from mediocre.

[Ganelon]

Much better than the SS/PS game, worse than the SFC game. A decent, very pretty game with simple mechanics that would surely appeal to any Macross fans.

[Ceph]

Macross 2036 shows what happens 27 years after the events of the first anime, and it's by Big West with illustrations by Mikimoto, so I suppose it's "official" (don't expect to see Hikaru Ichijo [Rick Hunter], Misa [Lisa] and Minmei, they went off with SDF-2 Megaroad-01 in 2012). Pretty cool if you like Macross. The game isn't half bad either. Great music and nice graphics.

[Sklabah]

Timely. I just popped this in a couple nights ago, and was struck by how much fun I was having with it.

The bulk of the levels are straight-forward, Horizontal shooter goodness, with power-ups that slowly build and carry over, even after death. You gain points each level, and can buy secondary weapons with those points from a stock of about 12. The catch is, you can't use the same SW twice in a row, forcing a slight bit of strategic thinking, though I emphasize "slight".

The Boss encounters have you transforming into a robot. (Not manually executable within the levels.) The 1 and 2 buttons rotate your mecha, as the guns are constantly firing. Essentially, the boss battles play similiarly to the whole of Capcom's Forgotten Worlds.

There are some cool set-pieces, such as escorting a giant missle/ship to ram a Zentraedi command craft. A full battle rages on in the background while you take care of your end of the battle. Also, a later level has your invading the inside of a base/ship in gerwalk mode, allowing for a more corridor/r-type experience.

As mentioned, the art and cutscenes are really good. It's much better than the DYRL game for Saturn and PS1, though I do wish there was the option to transform at will. Plus, there's NO drunken-missle barrages, a Macross staple that is conspicuous in it's absence.

All in all, a fun game, and a definate treat for Macross fans.

[shinsage]

(don't expect to see Minmei, they went off with SDF-2 Megaroad-01 in 2012).

Isn't she a singer? I think I saw her in one of the cinemas, or maybe that was some other lady...

Honestly I'm no fan of Macross, I just don't have the time or desire to envelop myself into an anime as huge as this. I did buy DYRL? for the Saturn a long while back because I thought it would have been an interesting shooter (the bunches of missiles that leave white streaks looked kewl), but that ended up disappointing (would've been great if the reason it took 2 discs was because of the game itself, not the videos).

2036 actually looks like something I'd enjoy, despite me not caring about the source material one bit. As a shooter, on its own, I think it could hold itself.
Thanks guys.

[dave4shmups]

Some videos:

http://www.youtube.com/results?search_q ... rch=Search

Doesn't look like the greatest PC Engine shmup ever, but it certainly looks and sounds fantastic-the explosions in particular are nice and loud!

[Pixel_Outlaw]

I love how the Japanese lazers sound like hair dryers.
Imagine the chaos if one replaced a heavy beam weapon with a hair dryer.

*VAROOOOOOOM*

[dave4shmups]

I love how the Japanese lazers sound like hair dryers.
Imagine the chaos if one replaced a heavy beam weapon with a hair dryer.

*VAROOOOOOOM*

True, although it wouldn't be much stranger then kids riding on vacuum cleaners, which has already been done.

My favorite Macross shmups are the arcade ones; too bad they never got home ports.

[Sengoku Strider]

I posted this in the 1CC thread, but I figured I might as well put all this in a relevant thread for posterity rather than somewhere it'll promptly be lost. Especially since this is the only real discussion thread on the game here and it hasn't been updated in 16 years.

I got the 1CC for this over the weekend, I ended up liking it way better than I expected to. The game is a good but not remarkable shooter - the main area it lacks is in stage design, with lots of empty gaps without much happening. Dialling up the difficulty increases the enemy count and fixes that, however. It's also a horizontal shmup without much in the way of environmental obstacles throughout much of it.

But this game's ace in the hole is its production. They got the character artist for Macross on board, used the real music, voice actors, sampled sound effects (except for your ship's shooting, the one effect you hear far more than any other, WAIIII) created new mech designs, and the game tells a canonical story (based on the alternate Macross II timeline) that takes place following Do You Remember Love? There are copious well done cinemas, so the whole thing really does feel like a lost Macross movie, the Super CD format letting it do this more effectively than the Super Famicom's Scrambled Valkyrie (also part of the same timeline) does.

It works in a few tricks from other games - the boss battles have you in mech mode and control like Forgotten Worlds, the buttons rotating your firing angle. This is super awkward until you get the hang of it, but once you do it does a decent job of evoking the sense of a mech duel. Your ship's main fire is reminiscent of UN Squadron, and it has you buying secondary weapons between stages in a similar fashion (your score doubles as currency).

I've also seen it referenced as difficult, but uhh....it's pretty casual overall. There are at least two 1ups hidden in every stage, there are score based extends, and hidden invincibility pickups midway through every (I think) level that last the duration of the stage until before the boss. That's not to say it didn't take a number of playthroughs to get the 1CC, the game finds plenty of ways to kill you in the back half, and those items can't help you until you've discovered where they are and mentally mapped them out. Which is a little challenging because the backgrounds, while great looking, are mostly endless repeating loops with occasional foreground elements; there were some I assume were there but never did find.

Anyway, recommended for fans of the series, you'll get more out of it than others will and it's certainly one of the better video game representations of it.

Random sidenote, the Military Madness-esque strategy game Macross: Eternal Love Song on PC Engine is a direct sequel to this.