Gardening by helicopter (Seta thread)

[Ed Oscuro]

So, after Arasoi told me he got Meta Fox, and after listening to some digitized music samples in that game and Twin Eagle, I finally played the two games.

Twin Eagle is actually pretty fun, upgrades drop like whoa, but it gets hectic and what's going on during the helicopter rush at the end of stage 1 isn't easy to see - I feel lucky whenever I survive that with all my parts intact. Shrubberies grant 4000 points, they must be hiding fifth columnists. Also, tanks are tiny and you can shoot watchtowers out from underneath soldiers with no ill effects to the soldiers, awesome.

Meta Fox...not sure what happened there. The title screen shows F4U Corsair -> F86 Sabre -> F15 Eagle? and the very beginning of the game is very hard because of the extremely slow speed. At least they made big tanks and little tanks (flashes of Daisenpuu here).

[spadgy]

Just to clarify - Twin Eagle (published by Taito, developed by Seta, 1988) - does it have anything to do with the Taito-developed game of the same year - Fighting Hawk?

Meanwhile, Toaplan's Twin Hawk (or Daisenpuu in JPN) (1989) is the 'sort-of' sequel to Twin Cobra (Aka Kyūkyoku Tiger, released 1987), which is itself the sequel to Tiger Heli (1985). Those games are unrelated to Twin Eagle?

I wondered if, as Romstar licensed Toaplan stuff from Taito and Jorudan's Meta Fox from Seta, maybe there was a link? I guess that's maybe the only link - Romstar distributed Taito, Seta and Toaplan stuff in the US (along with Capcom and other stuff).

Obviously I know Twin Cobra II(1995/6) was the real sequel to Twin Cobra. I just get all these games confused.

[PC Engine Fan X!]

Yep, you're right about Romstar being based out of the USA that distributed the lesser known Japanese arcade PCBs from the listed respected arcade devs and publishers. Romstar even got the exclusive rights to distribute Hyper Dyne Sidearms Stateside back in 1986. This was during the same time that Harmony Gold's Robotech was still playing on USA TV airwaves with Japanese mecha madness galore. Since Sidearms featured this henshin (transforming) aspect throughout the game, it was a no-brainer to have done so. Talk about perfect timing with the Capcom & Romstar licensing deal of it at that particular moment in arcade game history. Even the promotional Romstar branded Sidearms arcade poster is a beauty to behold/marvel at with the conceptual playable mecha suit characters placed at the forefront and done in an oil painting medium with lots of intricate detailing . ^_~

PC Engine Fan X! ^_~

[Ed Oscuro]

Meanwhile, Toaplan's Twin Hawk (or Daisenpuu in JPN) (1989) is the 'sort-of' sequel to Twin Cobra (Aka Kyūkyoku Tiger, released 1987), which is itself the sequel to Tiger Heli (1985). Those games are unrelated to Twin Eagle?

All those other games are Toaplan-developed, while Twin Eagle was made by Seta. I did notice the Romstar screen on Meta Fox though. Of course Romstar also released some early Capcom games.

Daisenpuu isn't really a sequel to Twin Cobra, it's more of a WWII-again themed game, plays considerably differently from the chopper games. The trailing planes / bomb system is completely unique.

Fire Shark seems sort of like a sequel to Flying Shark, but again it plays very different. If anything the wildly different shot types make it feel more like Truxton on Earth.

Fighting Hawk always felt more like a sequel to some Toaplan game, but it's unclear how much involvement Toaplan had in it...not a lot it seems, since it's got problems.
______________________

I played more of Meta Fox, the game's powerup system is gloriously weird. You spend the first stage and a half trying to powerup your plane, but throughout the latter half of stage two, all shot powerups do is make your shots go wide, which dilutes its power something awful. A little bit of spread seems OK though. I haven't managed to stay alive long enough to see if there's another tier which gives you a Raiden-style wide shot that's actually useful on medium-chewy enemies.

The speed and enemy firing patterns are odd too. The F4U Corsair is always slow, but if you select the F86 you start skating all over the place. It seems that this was intended because you're seriously too slow to get out of the way of things with the Corsair, and stuff moves down the screen quickly enough that you won't be able to shoot it all without some real white-knuckle flying. The F86 is fast enough for stage 2, but enemies have an annoying tendency to shoot immediately after they've disappeared from being exploded or sunk, and otherwise to pop off sniper shots I didn't see coming. It also feels like the plane is dragged back over to the position of a bullet when it's hit, which is also annoying when you're hit because the game tries to make you look like a dumb cow got run over by a locomotive.

[TomuS]

Seta rocks!

Twin Eagle is probably my favourite shooter of all time. The combination of the fast scrolling sections and the music in them is unbeatable. Wah wah wah, gonna break you down!!
I've been playing Arbalester too, which usually appears in the "worst shooters" threads. I think it's ok. Trying to see how much I can score in it, my best so far is 2,908,000. Is the game's default difficulty setting really set at easy? Seeing as the options are easy, hard, harder & hardest, makes me feel hard would be the same as normal.

Meta Fox has such a great soundtrack, I actually like it even more than Twin Eagle's overall. It's insanely addicting, and the boss theme is better than I could have imagined. It would be nice if someone could translate what she is singing in the song, I'd REALLY like to know the lyrics. Now I'm just hearing my own words in it, just listen to the last shout she makes, it's clearly "LOLLIPOP!!" The game itself is awesome too, even though the programming feels strange at times. It's the only shooting game I know the enemy can only fire in 8 directions (don't remember if every enemy was like this), and some of the bullets "follow" the player a little when you try to dodge them, it's irritating. I'm trying to get a higher score in this game, my current one is not good..

Tokusyu Butai U.A.G. (Thundercade/Twin Formation) is damn fun! As usually my attention is on the music, and I have to say this game's first stage track, Yatsu Ga Ki Ta!!, is simply brilliant! The graphics are great too! I cleared this today, was a bit suprised.. Now I've cleared all of Seta's arcade scrolling shooters, except Twin Eagle II. I have to learn to play that game, as now it's like all over the place and I don't know what some things do etc.

[Estebang]

For the record, Twin Eagle 2 is really easy in comparison. It's also hilarious how pretty much anything in the background can be destroyed by your ground bombs (and for lots of bonus points), from parking lots to oil tanks.

Twin Eagle is probably my favourite shooter of all time

[spadgy]

Hooray! I just bought a Meta Fox board. Once it arrives, hopefully I can work out if it was developed by Seta (most likely) or Jorudan (as some places online claim). Perhaps it was both. I don't know.

One day I really hope to clarify the mixed up relationship between Seta, Jorudan, and Romstar (and find out about the links with those and Toaplan and Taito). There's conflicting information everywhere about what Seta actually developed. I don't even know who Jorudan are, but their name crops up on wikipedia and a few other places as the Meta Fox developer.

EDIT: And Seta developed Thundercade did they? I thought that it was Taito developed, and sometimes Romstar distributed. It says that on KLOV, but then the same site lists Seta's Twin Eagle as the sequel to Thundercade (AKA Twin Formation, AKA U.A.G. Un-Attached Grenadier).

EDIT 2: Oh god! It gets more complex. This old magazine review suggests Toaplan made Thundercade. Maybe they are confused with Rally Bike!

[spadgy]

I just took delivery of a Twin Hawk PCB, and it's dripping in Seta chips, despite being on Taito X System hardware and Toaplan developed. That lot really did work closely.

[BPzeBanshee]

Damnit spadgy, I thought this thread was going to be about an awesome crop duster shmup that finally made Facebook games worthwhile, but oh no it's just some Toaplan game.

Jokes aside, there actually does seem to be quite a consistent bunch of "I have no idea" when it comes to Toaplan specifics isn't there? I don't think we even figured out what part of Toaplan ended up in Cave after all or if even the Wikipedia stuff about it is true or bull. At one point I was doing a project where I was trying to dig up some history and all that I got out of looking up Toaplan is a long-running rumor mill.

Anyhow, excellent job on putting one more puzzle piece into the giant puzzle board that is Toaplan.

[Randorama]

EDIT: And Seta developed Thundercade did they? I thought that it was Taito developed, and sometimes Romstar distributed. It says that on KLOV, but then the same site lists Seta's Twin Eagle as the sequel to Thundercade (AKA Twin Formation, AKA U.A.G. Un-Attached Grenadier).

EDIT 2: Oh god! It gets more complex. This old magazine review suggests Toaplan made Thundercade. Maybe they are confused with Rally Bike!

Seta produced Thundercade, which was published by Taito. Romstar should have distributed it in the US. As far as I know, Seta and Toaplan were really satellite companies to Taito until '90 or '91.