Out Zone

[Steven]

I definitely have to figure out how to trigger those ships.

Get 8 C icons. It will reset to 1 if you pick up another and reset to 0 if you die, so ideally you would get 8 and then never die or pick up another one, but that can be difficult because of stage 5 potentially forcing you to pick up the Super Burner or Super Ball. Picking up the Super Burner or Super Ball won't change the counter, and picking up one of them before you hit 8 and then getting another C will allow you to have the 3-way while the counter is at 8, but if you don't want either the Super Ball or Burner, you'll have to pick up another C item to get back to what you had, resetting your counter. The hardest part of the game, at least for me, is forgetting what number you are on if your counter gets reset.

Super Ball is the best weapon in the game by far, and it's so powerful that I go out of my way to avoid it entirely because it makes the game too easy, but if you have to be stuck with something other than the 3-way, make sure it's the Super Ball. Burner does the most damage, but the Super Ball goes through walls, making it an extremely good weapon for almost every situation in the game. Hold the button to spin to win and release to shoot. The shot does more damage than spinning.

There are 0 Zigs on stage 1 (this lets you easily fix the position of your C counter on loops without missing anything. The counter carries over between loops, BTW, unlike everything else except the energy extend and bomb stock) and then 1 each on stages 2, 3, and 4, and then 2 each on stages 5, 6, and 7. Make sure you shoot them when they are at the far right edge of the screen for the most points, and if you get all of them in a loop you'll get a lot of points from doing so. Dying at any point on most stages other than the beginning of stages 1 or 3 or the end of stage 7 will probably result in you missing at least one of them, so try not to die. No extends are given after the first loop, too, so... yeah, try not to die lol. Milking is basically impossible, or at least highly not recommended, because of this.

Oh yeah, and don't be afraid to bomb. Bomb the shit out of the game if you need to, especially if you feel at any time that you are at risk of dying; bombs are worth points, but it's way better to bomb than to die and the game gives a huge amount of bombs. Don't hesitate and don't think about it. Just bomb if you even remotely think it would be good to do so for safety.

[Some-Mist]

All really good sound advice. I honestly only stuck with the 3 way for the majority of the game and don’t really care for the super ball or the burner but I make it work in certain segments.

I only use those weapons in specific areas (ones where you need to shoot behind you where the 3 way won’t work).

I see stages 5 and iirc 6 as “reset” stages because of how many bombs/power ups drop from the red enemies/worms. Even if I’m having a bad run, if I get to that point I can usually turn it around

[Some-Mist]

triggered the zero wing ship once, but I ended up dying on stage 3 and just said screw it. doesn't beat my last score, but I only threw a couple credits in. I'll get there

Spoiler

[Steven]

Yeah stage 5 is definitely a powerup/recovery stage, although you can be forced to switch to an undesired weapon during the last part if you are unlucky. If you have 0 lives left and exactly 1 bomb when you defeat the stage 5 boss, you'll get some bonus enemies to kill at the start of stage 6 that will give you a bunch of powerups. You're at risk of dying from them and getting a game over right there, so best to just bomb them with that final bomb.

There is a lot of confusion about how to trigger the Tatsujin ship in stage 4, and I mention this because the activation conditions are similar to the extra enemies at the start of stage 6. Most people seem to think that triggering the Tatsujin ship requires you to start stage 4 with 7 bombs and then destroy the door, but it isn't true. You just need to have 7 bombs when the door is destroyed and be on loop 1, so if you finish stage 3 with 10 bombs, waste 2 on stage 4 before the door, and then use one more to actually destroy the door, the Tatsujin ship will show up.

You probably shouldn't get the Tatsujin ship if you are playing for score, not only because you may have to waste bombs and therefore points to get him, but mostly because he can mess you up by shooting the Zig when it's at the left side of the screen, costing you even more points. Same with the Hishouzame plane formation on stage 2, but at least you can get them to show up without having to waste bombs and I guess you can get either helper type and just let them be shot down before you get to the Zig.

Unlike the Tatsujin ship, which can only appear on loop 1, the Hishouzame planes can appear on any loop. I'm pretty convinced that there is an activation condition for those Hishouzame planes that I haven't seen mentioned anywhere online: you must be standing in a certain area in order to get them to spawn when you shoot the trees.

For the extra enemies on stage 6, you must have 0 lives and 1 bomb when the stage 5 boss is destroyed and stage 6 begins. Even if you are not on the moving platform at the beginning of stage 6 and you waste bombs to have 1, the enemies won't appear.

I don't bother switching weapons just to shoot behind me or sideways in places like the maze in stage 3, though; easier to bomb so I don't have to get 7 more C items plus a Ball or Burner and then another C item just to get the 3-way on 8 C items and risk not getting a Ball or Burner and being stuck with the 16-way, missing a Zig, losing track of what number I'm on, or all three of them, which is usually what happens. I usually just begrudgingly stick with the Super Ball if I am forced to pick it up on stage 5 for this reason, although I do typically go through the 8 C items process if I am forced to get the Burner and can't get the Super Ball during that section. You'd think it would be easy to just remember what number I'm on, but I forget ALL THE TIME.

BTW the 16-way and the Burner fire a shot every time you change directions while holding the shot button. You can practically insta-kill bosses with the Burner using this, but for the 16-way 30Hz auto is still probably better.

[MJR]

My first loop clear on Out Zone PCB.
MJR - 1,865,650 - 2-3 - Yes - PCB

2-3 is a guess. I don't remember any more which stage it was where I died. Sorry! I had intense week with work and I was not able to come here to upload record immediately.



But why am I getting Zero Wing bonus on later stages even though I play solely with Super Ball with no intention to collect C letters?

[UD2]

But why am I getting Zero Wing bonus on later stages even though I play solely with Super Ball with no intention to collect C letters?

Your C count was likely at a multiple of 8 when you switched to Super Ball, so since you didn't collect any more Cs, every time you encountered the Zero Wing spawn check, it passed.

[Steven]

That's exactly what happened, and 128% is indeed probably 2-3.

I really need to get back to this game and at least get 4 million, if not the counterstop, which I still really want to get.

[MJR]

But why am I getting Zero Wing bonus on later stages even though I play solely with Super Ball with no intention to collect C letters?

Your C count was likely at a multiple of 8 when you switched to Super Ball, so since you didn't collect any more Cs, every time you encountered the Zero Wing spawn check, it passed.

You are probably right, but I could swear that I collected no more than 2-3 C letters on that stage!
I wonder if I should start recording my sessions to video to really inspect what happened, it's too easy to lose track in the middle of things. Then again, now that playing the first loop on super ball starts to feel ludicrously easy, I should maybe just focus on getting those Zero Wing bonuses

[Steven]

That's why I actively try to avoid the Super Ball. It makes the first loop too easy.

On stage 5 you might be forced to take either Super Ball/Burner or a C, and in that case I will take Ball/Burner because I will definitely lose track of which C I am on if I try to do the whole sequence all over again.