Your shmup game session length

[Seahawk]

I was reading the Sine Mora thread, and came across this.

1cc time is around 80-90 minutes, so it's pretty long.

This post was followed by comments about how that sounded too long for a shooting game. By the way, I'm not complaining about those posts or that opinion.

Rather, this opinion surprised me because a lot of my runs took at least an hour. For example, Gradius III took 63 minutes, Gradius Rebirth took 65 minutes, 1942 took 69 minutes....my longest run is 1943 on the NES, which took 82 minutes total. And I never minded those lengths. But it's not like I don't have preferences on time, for example Gradius V is just a real slogfest drag for me, and I haven't even 1CC'ed that game yet.

So I'm interested on hearing about other players' preferences on shooting game lengths .

[Uzumakijl]

Any lenght is ok.

It's just the way i play the game, When i want to play for about 10~30 mins i play a game i'm really bad at and i try to push myself a bit more, That way when i die or something i stop playing but the result of the game feels very satisfying.

When i have A LOT of time i play something with loops like Parodius or Gradius V.

[MathU]

A scoring run of Gradius Rebirth for me takes forever because of all the looping and milking. By the way, Seahawk, I know something you don't know.

[tinotormed]

15 to 20 minutes
- Majority of every 'boss rush' mode of every shmup
- Blue Wish Resurrection
- PatriotDark

25 to 30 minutes
- Magical Chase
- Dead Moon
- Raiden Fighters 2 (except when played on Special)
- Star Soldier Boss Rush
- Galaga Arrangemnt 05
- MUSHA Aleste

40 minutes to an hour
- Aleste (MSX)
- Gunhed (Blazing Lazers)
- Super Star Soldier
- Soldier Force (both loops)
- Gunnac (counterstop)

[ChainsawGuitarSP]

I'm fairly certain now the only reason I haven't been able to 1cc a single Toaplan shmup yet is because they tend to run over 35 minutes per loop. I believe 10-25 minutes would be my average.

[Ruldra]

I love long games. I play on a mindset not to score high, but to beat it. I lose all motivation after beating it, so I pretty much NEED the game to be as long as possible to get as much fun out of it. Short games gives me a impression of lack of content, and adding a loop in the end is a lazy way to make it last longer.

Some shmups I love that takes an hour or more to beat:
Truxton / Truxton II
Dogyuun
Gradius III/ Gradius V
Varth (30 stages!)
Space Invaders Infinity Gene

[man9child]

I prefer shorter than longer for the simple reason that it takes less time to get to the good bits. Any shmup over 40 minutes is kind of pushing it for me.

If the game is good I really won't care, but that's my general thought on the subject.

[gray117]

If you're used to 1 loops then 2 loops is obviously twice as long. If another game only takes 20/30 mins more that then you could be tripling your [normal?] play time.

Proportionally these are pretty massive differences and a repeated practised perception/concentration towards 30 min bursts could clearly baulk at 90 mins continuous.

Of course, ultimately, these are quite small periods of time - but there's no doubt it could effect someone's expectation, acceptance, completion and enjoyment of the game.

[Ghegs]

If a shmup (or any game that's supposed to be played through in one sitting) lasts 20-40 minutes from start to finish, that's the sweet spot for me. Anything less feels short, anything longer feels like it's wearing me down. If the game's really good then I won't mind if it's a bit longer, but it will wear me down quickly. Even when I'm playing a game more seriously I tend to play it only 30-60 minutes daily (to avoid burnout and frustation) so if it's shorter, I can do more runs every day. Back when I was playing Contra: Shattered Soldier (which lasts ~45 minutes) I did only one run a day, when I was at the point of doing full runs.

[Bananamatic]

20-25 minutes are perfect

[Suslik]

5-20 minutes

[gct]

For a single session playing any number of credits, probably 20-40 minutes. Never looped any game except Pop'n Twinbee because I suck.

And I won't get any better, because I don't have any consoles hooked up long-term. Basically I need to spend a few minutes taking everything out of storage and setting it up before playing, and then putting everything away right after I am done. I don't feel like playing any more once I think of that, so I don't take anything out in the first place...

[z0mbie90]

25-40 minutes is a great length I think. And when you don't have 20 or so then start a Caravan Mode 2 or 5 minutes

[saucykobold]

30-40 minutes is probably ideal for me, but I enjoy shooters of just about any length.

[Deca]

If it's going to be longer than Garegga it better be REALLY GOOD.

Not counting loops. I personally have never cared for loops, but I'm starting to reconsider. Either way I don't think it's unreasonable for a 2-ALL to go over an hour by a bit. Personally I find anything more than 2 loops unacceptable.

[Gus]

25-40 minutes is perfect. Anything longer is stupid and boring.

[iconoclast]

If a shmup (or any game that's supposed to be played through in one sitting) lasts 20-40 minutes from start to finish, that's the sweet spot for me. Anything less feels short, anything longer feels like it's wearing me down. If the game's really good then I won't mind if it's a bit longer, but it will wear me down quickly.

This. 25-40 minutes is the perfect length, but I can still enjoy a game that goes on for 60+ minutes if most of the content is good and there's enough variety. Metal Slug 3 and Hard Corps Uprising come to mind (I know they're not the type of shooting games the OP was talking about).

[man9child]

I'm glad you brought up Metal Slug 3. The final stage is so over long that it sometimes stops me from playing the game.

Contra was 12-15 minutes long. That's good enough for me.

[DragonInstall]

15-30 min is a good amount

Most Cave games is about that long per run, but varies if you're scoring and causing slowdowns or not.

[Slump]

Yeah, I'd say 15-45 minutes is good in my book. Time is a really as important a factor as enjoyment for me though. As others have mentioned it can be a lot longer for games that loop and if it's an enjoyable endeavor I'm usually fine with sticking it out longer. By the same token, if it's an intense short bit I'm usually fine with that as well. These days the shorter the spurt the better though as I have much less free time than I used to.

[professor ganson]

15-20 mins. a day. More time is hard to fit in, though I think my scores would benefit if I spent more time.

[chempop]

On weekdays just a credit or two before work if I have time (20-30min). Sometimes I play a few more in the evening if I'm not wiped.
Weekends can be a on and off throughout the day if I don't feel like going out. But usually no more than an hour or so per sitting.

I prefer games not to take much longer than 30 min to clear, if Sine Mora take over an hour I'll be hesitant to want to play it often.

[Casper<3]

Depends on the game itself. Most of the time about 30 minutes does the fix for me but if I get caught up on making something work I can spend hours. Also sometimes I'll do a run or a few at one game then move on to the next. So it could be a few hours session with several different games.

I've easily spent a half hour more than once just trying to get GALUDA 2's stage one right. lol

[BPzeBanshee]

If it's going to be longer than Garegga it better be REALLY GOOD.

Not counting loops. I personally have never cared for loops, but I'm starting to reconsider. Either way I don't think it's unreasonable for a 2-ALL to go over an hour by a bit. Personally I find anything more than 2 loops unacceptable.

How about Raiden II which loops infinitely?

Appparently there are players that exist that go through the first 4 loops of it like a breeze.

I thought I'd already posted here before but I guess not. No longer than 30-40 minutes for me here. Deathsmiles is stretching it a bit for me, and the Raiden Fighters games (especially JET, Japan version without the 2-loop stuff) are perfect for play length IMO.

[ptoing]

How about Raiden II which loops infinitely?

I never got that kinda stuff. I mean seriously, what's the point.
And then you got stuff like Gradius V which takes ages for one loop and people got to I dunno which loop. Go pause the game and play a loop a day or what?

And the most ridiculous has to be stuff like Every Extend Extra Extreme. I got Qubed for Rez HD, and played E4 a bit, and got 100ish trillion points which took 1.5 hours or so, with the highscore on that level (the first unlimited one) being 7 something QUADrillion. I don't wanna know how long that would take. Plus it is not even hard. Some people have too much time.

[iconoclast]

Deathsmiles is stretching it a bit for me

Same. Death Smiles without the canyon is a little on the long side, but I'm okay with it. Add the canyon in, and it starts to overstay its welcome. The final two stages (including the canyon) being exponentially harder than the first six stages doesn't help matters either.

Then Cave decided to add the Ice Palace to MBL, as if the game wasn't long enough already.

[Treasurance]

2 hours to start the game, 10 minutes of actual gameplay

[Gus]

I really never had much of a problem with DS. I admit the Ice Palace taking like 10 minutes to play through on the patched version is stretching it a bit but the level is so good it doesn't matter.

Also regarding the first 6 levels being easier than final ones, that's what level 999 mode is for.

[iconoclast]

I was mainly talking about the vanilla game (which doesn't have 999); I don't like the scoring system changes for MBL, so I don't play it.

[Ebbo]

25-45 minutes is a nice sweetspot for me, although I can stand game taking longer than that as long it stays fresh all the way through. A good ALL scorerun of S&P2 takes easily +2 hours - and I ain't even mad!