Top 20 Doujin/Indie Shmups OF ALL TIME (Discussion)

[Moniker]

Use this thread to discuss matters related to the voting of the top 20 doujin/indie shmups of all time. Questions/comments/complaints on matters such as rules, what qualifies as doujin/indie, overall mission, and miscellaneous thoughts belong here.

A few issues already raised:

Need a clear-cut definition of "indie" for this thread. Under my own, Cave would be indie.

Best current definition of doujin/indie:

developed by a small, not as commercial team, games not intended originally for arcades?

Unfortunately, the line b/w indie/doujin and commercial has become somewhat blurred. So sticking to the spirit is more important than sticking to the letter. CAVE/Seibu/Irem/Raizing/Psikyo/Treasure don't qualify, but a commercialized doujin like Trouble Witches does. Some releases from companies like G.Rev are borderline - I won't disqualify them unless someone gives a good argument why they should. I'm not going to be anal about it - the main point of this is to provide a distinct list from the top 25 of all time, which features mainly arcade games. As I said, use your best judgment.

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The problem is that your excuse for creating this thread and this thread's purpose are two entirely different things.

Unless people think Hellsinker or UFO are recommendable to newbies, in which case, welcome to the forum.

The main impetus for the thread is indeed providing newbies, who don't want to use MAME, with a decent list of doujin games to try out. As Zorator points out, doujin games are often free, and when not, are much easier to obtain legally than your average commercial arcade game (through Rancor's site, for example). Even if the top scores are held by the likes of Touhou 12 and Hellsinker, the list will remain valuable for everyone, IMO.

Judgment Silversword qualifies, as it was originally a homebrew game for the Wonderswan.

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All that said, I'm pretty surprised at how well Touhou 12: UFO is faring so far. In most of the discussions it has been derided as excessively complicated to the point where gameplay suffers. I may have to give it another look, myself.


Voting Thread

[BareKnuckleRoo]

The main impetus for the thread is indeed providing newbies, who don't want to use MAME, with a decent list of doujin games to try out.

My main concern is that there are some good doujin games I'd recommend to newbies due to their friendlier mechanics that I wouldn't say are the best "OF ALL TIME". For instance, I'm really liking Solid State SURVIVOR now that I'm getting back into it and getting decent at the DDP-style chaining, and the ability to enable autobomb makes it easier to get into, but it's got some issues (graphics certainly aren't the prettiest, several bosses have wonky hitboxes making it difficult to tell where it's safe to approach to pointblank without touching them and dying, music is good but seems to be only midi-quality?). That said, having a list of quality games means newbies don't have an excuse not to at least have stuff to try out.

UFO's not bad, but the difference between survival and scoring seems to be much greater than in the rest of the series. If you go for survival, you can nab tons of bombs and extends, but if you want to play for score you need to ignore red and green UFOs the entire game (outside of sections where it's more beneficial to spawn a flashing UFO for scoring reasons rather than a blue UFO). The strategy scoring both requires knowing what UFOs show up and when, avoiding the wrong color UFO, knowing which color (flashing early on apparently to boost point value, blue ones later on), making sure you max out the UFO before it disappears... From what I've read on scoring strategy, I'd say it's fairly complicated if you want to go for score.

[Barrakketh]

knowing which color (flashing early on apparently to boost point value, blue ones later on)

Flashing UFOs have the second highest multiplier, but have two other functions:

• Items collected by them change types. So power items turn into point items, and vice versa.
• They release a color-changing UFO when destroyed, and a second one for filling its gauge. This helps you summon the UFOs you want.

Point value is increased by:

• Grazing (the biggie)
• Collecting UFOs while a UFO is summoned (1,000 points per UFO, but this also means less UFOs you can summon)
• Cancelled bullets by a UFO being destroyed, bombs, or a boss attack ending.

[Moniker]

Since someone asked about this via PM, I figure I oughta clear it up for everyone:

It's perfectly fine to rework your list up until the deadline. There are tons of doujins out there, and it's easy to forget some of your favorites. I also expect that when the eXceed collection goes on steam, there'll be a few revisions.

[Aliquantic]

Technically, Stella Vanity isn't out either, guys

I think it's partly a vote for publicity, but mostly that the game is very solid already in its current stage... it may get improved later on, but I consider it a "full" game already that's among the best I've had the leisure to play. Waiting warmly for the 1.10 patch so the game is finally available for online purchase!

[TrevHead (TVR)]

Whats with all the votes for TH 12? I thought the general consensus was that the spin off shooters like Shoot the Bullet were cream of the series

Since someone asked about this via PM, I figure I oughta clear it up for everyone:

It's perfectly fine to rework your list up until the deadline. There are tons of doujins out there, and it's easy to forget some of your favorites. I also expect that when the eXceed collection goes on steam, there'll be a few revisions.

Good idea BTW it'll give me time to play a few doujins like ring and hellsinker that I expect ild be voting for them if only ild properlly played through them.

[Erppo]

Whats with all the votes for TH 12? I thought the general consensus was that the spin off shooters like Shoot the Bullet were cream of the series

Maybe if you prefer puzzle games.

[Aliquantic]

According to people in the know, Immaterial and Missing Power is clearly the best game in the series

[TrevHead (TVR)]

(Sorry I didnt express myself properly in my last post)

But I thought everyone hated 12, is it another case of changed opinions after all the nerdrage has died down like DFK?

[Erppo]

But I thought everyone hated 12, is it another case of changed opinions after all the nerdrage has died down like DFK?

I believe it's pretty much the same case of people whining because they got their asses kicked by the game so badly

E: you might also be confusing it with 13 which is (and has always been) somewhat disliked.

[Moniker]

May be a matter of the silent majority speaking out. Touhou fans do tend to get their toes stepped on a little around here.

[Moniker]

Two Important Announcements:

Deadline Revision: April 15 is the new deadline (partly because I don't want to wait that long, and partly because I don't want people to forget about it if they plan on voting later on.)

Minor rule elaboration: It occurs to me that it may be hard to differentiate your vote with a big list, so feel free to use (reasonable!) fractions if you want. Still limit yourself to 20 games, though.

EG:
Hydorah - 5.5
Kamui - 3.5
Ring^-27 - 3
Touhou 6 - 2
Touhou 7 - 1.5
Touhou 8 - 1.5
Reflex - 1
BWR+ - 1
Eden's Aegis 0.5
Patriot Dark - 0.5

I'll crosspost this to the discussion thread and update the OP.

[TrevHead (TVR)]

partly because I don't want people to forget about it if they plan on voting later on.)

If you include say "Deadline Soon" reminder in the title thread that should help getting attention from ppl who dont always read every thread (like me)

[Moniker]

partly because I don't want people to forget about it if they plan on voting later on.)

If you include say "Deadline Soon" reminder in the title thread that should help getting attention from ppl who dont always read every thread (like me)

Thanks for the tip - I'll make sure and do that. I'm gonna keep April 15 anyhow. Don't want to make any more basic changes unless really necessary.

[Marc]

Sorry, wrong thread.

[ChainsawGuitarSP]

According to people in the know, Immaterial and Missing Power is clearly the best game in the series

Whats with all the votes for TH 12? I thought the general consensus was that the spin off shooters like Shoot the Bullet were cream of the series

Replace UFO with IN and you have my exact confusion in regards to the polls.

... I've really got to stop being so pigheaded towards StB, it's easily ZUN's most creative work in the Windows era.

[Obscura]

I'm surprised to see BWR+ so well liked. It's not bad, it just has no personality whatsoever; it's like a second rate Dodonpachi, except without chaining and really, really easy.

Or am I just missing something?

[Chaos Phoenixma]

BWR/BWR+ are based more on Ketsui and Mushi series. It's about point blanking everything and also bullet cancels at time. There's no DDP influence at all.

[Obscura]

Well, I did say "with no chaining" because its score system is obviously totally unrelated to DDP. But its aesthetic is a total DDP tribute, and its bullet patterns are pretty similar to DDP, and nothing at all like Ketsui or Futari (I've never played the first Mushi, so maybe they're like that?)

Also, the first two ship selections are pretty blatantly DDP C and DDP A.

[Moniker]

You might prefer x.x's Eden games. I can't recall for certain on Eden's Edge, but Eden's Aegis is more like ESPrade crossed with Futari. You chain medals and can cancel bullets with the secondary shot. Your multiplier goes down if you either use the focus shot, or if you don't collect medals fast enough.

If you find the games too easy, you can always turn autobomb off. But I think them being sort of diet-Cave is part of the allure.

[hzt]

feel free to use (reasonable!) fractions if you want.

updated my list

[Moniker]

feel free to use (reasonable!) fractions if you want.

updated my list

lulz. Yeah I don't really care as long as it adds to 20. Please keep it to 2 decimal places, though, for my poor eyes.

[Ghegs]

How about NG:Dev.Team's stuff? I'm not sure if any arcade releases actually happened, but they at least tried that route with Fast Striker (and maybe Last Hope: Pink Bullets as well).

[Moniker]

How about NG:Dev.Team's stuff? I'm not sure if any arcade releases actually happened, but they at least tried that route with Fast Striker (and maybe Last Hope: Pink Bullets as well).

I'm inclined to say that they should count - I don't have the hardware to play any of their stuff, but as far as I know, they've only released niche games on dead platforms. If that isn't indie, it's bad enough business sense to qualify. I'll defer to anyone who knows the company better than I, but for now let's say they're good to go.

.. I've really got to stop being so pigheaded towards StB, it's easily ZUN's most creative work in the Windows era.

I'd go even further, and say Shoot the Bullet and Double Spoiler are some of the most innovative shmups to come to the genre in some time. I'm absolute rubbish at them, but even the major developers should take note. Ikaruga did its thing, but these were a much greater step forward. This is why I love doujins so much. They can go places that major devs dare not.

[Moniker]

Since a lot of people have voted for it, I wanted to check out Phantasm Romance, but can't get it to load.

So I downloaded the latest version of Danmakufu, downloaded Phantasm Romance and threw it in the scripts folder, but can't get danmakufu to recognize the script is present, or any scripts for that matter, including the ones bundled in. Tried putting it in Japanese locale with no effect. Am I missing something? Tried to access it through the "All," "Single," and "Directory" options on the DMF front screen. No effect...

[Naut]

The latest version of dnh wont run Phantasm Romance, you need version 0.12m.

[psoslayer]

Satazius - 10
Ether Vapor (Remaster) - 3
Alltynex Second - 3
Last Hope: Pink Bullets - 2
G-Type - 1
Hydorah - 1

Wow you take Pink Bullets over Hydorah? How come?

[Ghegs]

I'm a sucker for R-Type -esque games.

Hydorah is good, but some of its design decisions keep it from rising up higher in my list.

[Observer]

I just went and updated my post, Moniker, please let me know if it's ok now.

I put 1 point to 20 games, the more people try, the better.

[Moniker]

Looks good to me! Thanks!

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Finally got Phantasm Romance working. Never went through that much work to get a shmup playing before. Anywho, pretty good. Bullet patterns require more vertical dodging than your average ZUN game. That said, I'm not sure I prefer it over a regular TH game on lunatic, but I'll have to play it some more. Kind of annoying that the PC is just a white silhouette.