Shmup Related Questions That Don't Deserve a Thread

[Bassa-Bassa]

I wonder why they went with 4:3 for 1944 in the first place? Also it's weird how there are no credits and they left it a mystery who did the development. Wouldn't you want to flaunt the fact that you had developers like them involved? And you would never guess that bc they didn't work with Capcom or Raizing (except Uemura doing sound programming on Bakraid I think) Would be cool to hear more about the history of the game eventually if that all comes out.

I may be wrong, but 1944 being part of that STG genre revival Capcom wanted those years

I think I saw something about this as well, and I think Progear might have also been a part of the project. I don't remember where I saw this, though. Too bad Loop Master never got released on the Dreamcast or whatever, but it's on the MiSTer now, and that's good enough for me.

Progear was indeed part of the project. Gunspike and the DC version of Gunbird 2 from Psikyo also were. Other than Taito and Konami for obvious reasons, basically all the relevant STG developers still active took part in the silent campaign. A shame it was a bit too late for Seibu, it seems - we could have got yet another swang song from them.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

edit: there's no evidence of a 1UP in Giga Wing Generations, please disregard

Anyone have an idea where the 1UP in Giga Wing Generations is? I can't find any guidance online about it. Does it work like in the first game where the 1UP only appears if you're at 0 lives remaining (and therefore ideally shouldn't be seeing the 1UP)?

[Starfighter]

There's... there's a 1UP in Generations...?

[BareKnuckleRoo]

edit: disregard

I believe there might be one, on the basis that the instruction strip included mentions there's one and shows a picture of it, but doesn't mention how to obtain it. It might be impractical to get like the 1UP in the first game where a good run won't see it appear.

[third_strike]

I don't think there are any. I used to train with 9 lives in stock to reach TLB more often.

[AZA]

What do you guys think is the best shooter on the MVS? My unpopular opinion: Strikers 1945 Plus. That game just feels remarkably smooth & modern for what it is.

[XoPachi]

I'm not trying to set records, but what's the first thing I should learn to get comfortable with Battle Garegga? I have no clue how to play this game other than knowing I'll die if I play it casually.

[BulletMagnet]

I'm hardly an expert at Garegga (or anything, really ), but off the cuff I'm inclined to recommend starting off playing the game more or less as you would a "normal" shmup, just to familiarize yourself with it, find a plane you like, get a feel for medaling and seeing how far you can get "the old-fashioned way". Once you feel ready to take things a step further you'll want to start 1) Not hoarding bombs, but using them for scoring, and 2) Not powering yourself all the way up right away, only grabbing what you need to keep up with what's thrown at you. From there it's a matter of fancier scoring tricks and intentionally keeping your reserve lives low, neither of which I'm terribly adept at.

In a nutshell, ideally you'll want to gradually get used to playing Garegga "on the knife's edge", staying as close as you can comfortably get to a Game Over while scoring (and earning extends) well enough to always stay just ahead of the reaper; it's quite counterintuitive at first but also what makes the game so interesting and different to play, IMO.

[SavagePencil]

What do you guys think is the best shooter on the MVS? My unpopular opinion: Strikers 1945 Plus. That game just feels remarkably smooth & modern for what it is.

apologies but the title of this is "Shmup Related Questions That *DON'T* Deserve a Thread" and that question most certainly does

[To Far Away Times]

What do you guys think is the best shooter on the MVS? My unpopular opinion: Strikers 1945 Plus. That game just feels remarkably smooth & modern for what it is.

Blazing Star is awesome.

[Starfighter]

the instruction strip included mentions there's one and shows a picture of it

Do you have a photo of that? Very curious!

[cfx]

What do you guys think is the best shooter on the MVS? My unpopular opinion: Strikers 1945 Plus. That game just feels remarkably smooth & modern for what it is.

Last Resort and Viewpoint for me.

[BareKnuckleRoo]

Do you have a photo of that? Very curious!

Sorry, meant to post one earlier but never got the chance. So, first of all, there's almost certainly no 1UP in Giga Wing Generations. If nobody else has encountered it yet it's safe to say there isn't one. I was going based off the PC version that's floating around online where someone bundled it with the following image to serve as a background:

https://i.imgur.com/lHgkpuu.jpg

Foolishly, I assumed they'd use the actual arcade graphics for the game instead of, you know, graphics for a completely different game. Then I noticed the shape of the medals was wrong, and on the right hand side the ship looks suspiciously exactly like Sinnosuke fighting the airport stage boss. Turns out they just reused the graphics from GW1's move strip: http://ikotsu.blogspot.com/2013/02/giga ... -1999.html

So no, there's likely no 1UP in GWG if nobody's encountered it yet.

[wiNteR]

I'm not trying to set records, but what's the first thing I should learn to get comfortable with Battle Garegga? I have no clue how to play this game other than knowing I'll die if I play it casually.

I also don't have that much experience with game. I played full credits this of many years earlier (probably something like 16 years ago) for a somewhat limited time. And if I am not re-calling incorrectly, I only played single credit only (meaning no credit feeding). I also don't re-call watching any videos before-hand. At that time, they were much less common for all games basically (ofc I have watched a few videos of the game later on).

As I re-call, one of the reasons for me to play like that I think was that (at least for me at that time) in emulation save states led to graphical artifacts and sound/music going out of sync.

I think I reached stage-5 boss and remember the credit ending on its rhythmic pattern. Haven't played the game again after that. I wonder how much the information described in the port of the game (few years ago) changes things.

Anyway, here is few things that I would suggest (this is also similar to how I played). Nevertheless, probably an expert on the game could still give better or more nuanced advice.
(1) I think one of the first things is firing rate. You don't want to press the "hold" button all the time. The reason is rank management. For example, if you see few popcorn enemies coming your way you could just tap the fire button 3 or 4 times (whatever is necessary for destroying them) instead of holding the button. For somewhat stronger enemies you could hold the fire button for a second or so and then leave it when the enemy is destroyed.

(2) You probably want to try to keep your medal chain (perhaps unless it is too risky). Also, some information on the spawning of medals:
viewtopic.php?p=3509#p3509

(3) There are at least few places in the game where using bombs can give you quite a bit of extra points. For example, one is beginning of stage-2. Similarly in stage-3 there is a place where, if you use a bomb, medals hidden below the background are revealed (which obviously gives more points if your medal chain is at max value).

These are the only two I re-call. There might be some other places like that too in the game (and also possibly some other secrets). This is why watching a clear video (with a decent score) could be helpful I think.

(4) The game also has "option/pod formations". Watching some good videos could also help to give a few hints as to where the more "non-conventional" formations could be more useful or effective (for scoring/survival etc.).

[Lemnear]

What do you guys think is the best shooter on the MVS? My unpopular opinion: Strikers 1945 Plus. That game just feels remarkably smooth & modern for what it is.

VOTE:
1) Blazing Star
2) Aero Fighers 2
3) Last Resort//Twinkle Star Sprites

Funny that in a 157 games library, 50 are fighting games LOL...and only 15 SHMUPS.

[XoPachi]

I'm hardly an expert at Garegga (or anything, really :P), but off the cuff I'm inclined to recommend starting off playing the game more or less as you would a "normal" shmup, just to familiarize yourself with it, find a plane you like, get a feel for medaling and seeing how far you can get "the old-fashioned way". Once you feel ready to take things a step further you'll want to start 1) Not hoarding bombs, but using them for scoring, and 2) Not powering yourself all the way up right away, only grabbing what you need to keep up with what's thrown at you. From there it's a matter of fancier scoring tricks and intentionally keeping your reserve lives low, neither of which I'm terribly adept at.

In a nutshell, ideally you'll want to gradually get used to playing Garegga "on the knife's edge", staying as close as you can comfortably get to a Game Over while scoring (and earning extends) well enough to always stay just ahead of the reaper; it's quite counterintuitive at first but also what makes the game so interesting and different to play, IMO.

Thank you. There's something of an item loop in this game I'm aware of, is there a visual of that? Like a literal flow chart.

[Rastan78]

Remember to note that flying enemies drop these items, and that an item will appear every five flying enemies you destroy. Some tanks will drop these items too, but in most cases ground-based enemies will leave SMALL Weapon bullets instead. There is an appearance order as well, and it is:
1: small shot powerup
2: medal
3: small shot powerup
4: medal
5: option (the first five repeat 4 times, then...)
6: small shot powerup
7: medal
8: small shot powerup
9: medal
10: large shot powerup (then back to the top)

One other thing to note. This order carries on even through successive credits, so if you play a new credit, your item cycle starts where your last credit ended. The only way to reset the item order is to reset the arcade board (for PCB/MAME players) or to go to the Options screen (for Saturn players).

From the forum's Garegga ST

[Lemnear]

Double Question :

-Which games are neither Old School STG nor danmaku?
I need to get an idea about this grey zone.

-Who are the Best SHMUPS developers that are active nowadays?
the heirs of the big names of the past i mean.

[Steven]

Both of those questions are difficult to answer because first you have to define what you mean by old-school, bullet hell, and active.

What is an old-fashioned style shooting game? What is bullet hell? What is the difference? What even is a shooting game? Is Space Harrier an STG? How about Panzer Dragoon, or Xeno Crisis? According to the top 25 voting thing, Space Harrier and Panzer Dragoon are not, but Xeno Crisis is, and so is Out Zone. Why is Out Zone considered to be an STG but Space Harrier is not? Xeno Crisis is mostly procedurally generated, so scoring opportunities might not even be equal between runs of that same game, but Space Harrier is always the same, so why does Space Harrier not count? What about Zaxxon? If you think about it, Zaxxon and Space Harrier are more or less the same thing aside from the perspective, but apparently Zaxxon counts and Space Harrier doesn't for whatever reason. I say Space Harrier does indeed count as an STG, BTW. Same with After Burner and Panzer Dragoon.

Most people would probably tell you that Garegga, Batrider, Bakraid, and possibly Radiant Silvergun, Ikaruga, and maybe Gradius V count as being in that questionable zone, but then there is weird shit like Shippuu Mahou Daisakusen or Kaitei Daisensou or Acceleration of Suguri. Can I vote for Acceleration of Suguri for top 25 if I want to? What about V-V? What makes it different from Batsugun, and what does Batsugun count as? Kaitei Daisensou sure as hell probably isn't a bullet hell game, so what is it? The answer is that it is a really fucking cool game and that you should absolutely play it.

Ultimately, my answer is this: I don't know. It isn't really worth thinking about. Just play games and have fun.

As for active devs, what is active? Is CAVE active? They are supposedly on the verge of bankruptcy but they mostly just license their old games and hope that Gothic ha Mahou Otome is going to save them. They are making some Touhou phone game, but it's a phone game. Does it count? Same with MOSS or Qute, who have not made new games in 4 to 6 years, although Qute is primarily a consulting company that occasionally randomly makes video games for some reason, so they can simply not make games at all anymore and they'll theoretically be fine. Yeah, Qute is weird.

Treasure just craps out Ikaruga again every time there is a new console and calls it good. They don't even need to do that for PS5 because it's on PS4! Tatsujin is the old Toaplan guys, but they have released exactly zero new games and the last game that any of those guys made that I am aware of was released over 20 years ago, but they are working on a new game right now. Does that count? What about Taito? Taito just rereleases Dariusburst and Space Invaders six trillion times and I don't even know when their last new STG was.

So yeah. I don't know.

[Lemnear]

Both of those questions are difficult to answer because first you have to define what you mean by old-school, bullet hell, and active.

Oh right! Old-School, mmm isn't anything that is not danmaku?
Active as developer in new games, SHMUPS possibly.

What is an old-fashioned style shooting game? What is bullet hell? What is the difference? What even is a shooting game? Is Space Harrier an STG? How about Panzer Dragoon, or Xeno Crisis? According to the top 25 voting thing, Space Harrier and Panzer Dragoon are not, but Xeno Crisis is, and so is Out Zone. Why is Out Zone considered to be an STG but
Space Harrier is not? Xeno Crisis is mostly procedurally generated, so scoring opportunities might not even be equal between runs of that same game, but Space Harrier is always the same, so why does Space Harrier not count?

Isn't Space Harrier a rail shooter like Panzer Dragoon and After Burner? if i studied well

What about Zaxxon? If you think about it, Zaxxon and Space Harrier are more or less the same thing aside from the perspective, but apparently Zaxxon counts and Space Harrier doesn't for whatever reason. I say Space Harrier does indeed count as an STG, BTW. Same with After Burner and Panzer Dragoon.

Never played Zaxxon yet, the list is long, and i'm trying them 1by1 (yes exactly). I think that Zaxxon is one of the few isometric SHMUPS, like Viewpoint.

Most people would probably tell you that Garegga, Batrider, Bakraid, and possibly Radiant Silvergun, Ikaruga, and maybe Gradius V count as being in that questionable zone, but then there is weird shit like Shippuu Mahou Daisakusen or Kaitei Daisensou or Acceleration of Suguri. Can I vote for Acceleration of Suguri for top 25 if I want to? What about V-V? What makes it different from Batsugun, and what does Batsugun count as?

Isn't Batsugun considered an advent? Is like the first Proto-SHMUP, right? i don't know if there are other that share this particular spot.

Kaitei Daisensou sure as hell probably isn't a bullet hell game, so what is it? The answer is that it is a really fucking cool game and that you should absolutely play it.

Ultimately, my answer is this: I don't know. It isn't really worth thinking about. Just play games and have fun.

Yeh for sure! I thought about it while training for a 1CC in Blazing Star. And... can't classify it.

As for active devs, what is active? Is CAVE active? They are supposedly on the verge of bankruptcy but they mostly just license their old games and hope that Gothic ha Mahou Otome is going to save them. They are making some Touhou phone game, but it's a phone game. Does it count?

I don't know if they can count so much because their user base is elsewhere...like their financial situation should suggest.

Same with MOSS or Qute, who have not made new games in 4 to 6 years, although Qute is primarily a consulting company that occasionally randomly makes video games for some reason, so they can simply not make games at all anymore and they'll theoretically be fine. Yeah, Qute is weird.

about Qute...
I consider MOSS an Old-School style developer probably.

Treasure just craps out Ikaruga again every time there is a new console and calls it good. They don't even need to do that for PS5 because it's on PS4! Tatsujin is the old Toaplan guys, but they have released exactly zero new games and the last game that any of those guys made that I am aware of was released over 20 years ago, but they are working on a new game right now. Does that count? What about Taito? Taito just rereleases Dariusburst and Space Invaders six trillion times and I don't even know when their last new STG was.

Treasure doesn't have Ubusuna in the making with M2 ???
Tatsujin doesn't have Tatsujin Extreme in the making?

Well there are few, if they are "considerable" (idk about their general consensus) , like NG:DEV//HuCast, Stellar Circle, System Erasure, Doragon, Team Ladybug...Granzella...

[NuclearPotato]

Treasure doesn't have Ubusuna in the making with M2 ???

You are in fact correct; Treasure do not have Ubusuna in the making. Hiroshi Iuchi hasn't been a part of Treasure since 2013 (edit: actually even longer; he was freelance from 2007-2012); he's been with M2 since then.

[Starfighter]

To the ones using an arcade stick: what's your usual button layout and why?

[1][2][3][4]
[5][6][7][8]

Mine is:

1: Shot
2: Full auto
5: Bomb

As soon as a third button (like the mode switching in Espgaluda) comes in to play I don't really have a gameplan. I put it on 3, I put it on 6, I'm never really comfortable with it...

[Lemnear]

To the ones using an arcade stick: what's your usual button layout and why?

[1][2][3][4]
[5][6][7][8]

Mine is:

1: Shot
2: Full auto
5: Bomb

As soon as a third button (like the mode switching in Espgaluda) comes in to play I don't really have a gameplan. I put it on 3, I put it on 6, I'm never really comfortable with it...

I have a basic Hori with 6 button that i don't use so much, but i use a similary layout:
1)Auto
2)Shot/Charge
3)Bomb
5)Bomb .

While with pads, i use "O" to Auto-Shot, "Triangle" for Charge/Shot , "X" to Bomb, i feel it more comfortable.

PS: Can i use a Japan PSN Card with a Japanese account also if i'm not in Japan? Or it have some restriction?

[Steven]

Oh right! Old-School, mmm isn't anything that is not danmaku?

Basically what I was trying to say is that it's kind of impossible to define something that is somewhere in between two things that do not seem to have formal or official definitions themselves. Your definition here now basically includes all of the grey zone games as being not bullet hell, in which case you've essentially eliminated the category that you were looking to define anyway.

To the ones using an arcade stick: what's your usual button layout and why?

[1][2][3][4]
[5][6][7][8]

Mine is:

1: Shot
2: Full auto
5: Bomb

As soon as a third button (like the mode switching in Espgaluda) comes in to play I don't really have a gameplan. I put it on 3, I put it on 6, I'm never really comfortable with it...

I copy the local arcades, which usually means just using the regular button mapping plus autofire, so it's almost always

game's regular A button function/game's regular B button function/game's regular C button function or 30Hz if there is no C button function or A+B for things like RayStorm or Elevator Action returns or whatever
5, 10, or 15 Hz auto, or nothing, depending on game

So yeah just copy the normal controls and add autofire or button combinations wherever you want.

[Lemnear]

Oh right! Old-School, mmm isn't anything that is not danmaku?

Basically what I was trying to say is that it's kind of impossible to define something that is somewhere in between two things that do not seem to have formal or official definitions themselves. Your definition here now basically includes all of the grey zone games as being not bullet hell, in which case you've essentially eliminated the category that you were looking to define anyway.

mmm the grey zone that i can't define at all are the majority of Psikyo games, are like the most-Danmaku of the NON-Danmaku, the most Memorizer of the NON-Memorizer and the most Cute'Em Up of any NON-Cute'Em Up....all at once in the case of Gunbird 1/2 (and Aero Fighters // Sonic Wings 2/3 with some extent)
Blazing Star? seems a console SHMUPS with some slowdown-screen-filled pattern or....Ikaruga (official outsider-style group)...the more i play other SHMUPS, the more boring Ikaruga feels to me. Wasn't like this before o.0
Battle Garegga is it's own league probably.

[Steven]

The term bullet hell or whatever you want to call it was created by the players, not the developers. To the devs at the time, there was no such thing as bullet hell, just shooting games, with DoDonPachi, R-Type, Strikers, and everything else simply classified by the developers as shooting games. It's all the same shit if you really think about it.

[maximus_prime]

Hey y’all. I’m having a weird thing with a Mushihimesama PCB.

Trying to run it through a retrotink 5x pro and the background scrolls all…wavy? It’s weird.

I unfortunately don’t have a CRT to test it out on. Has anyone ever experienced something like this with a cv1000 board or have any idea what I could do about it?

Thanks

[XoPachi]

Who was the announcer in Ibara? He sounds cool as shit. Wonder if he did anything else.

[Lemnear]

Before embarking in the Aleste Collection, what exactly do the "Aleste Challenges" involve?

[Steven]

Before embarking in the Aleste Collection, what exactly do the "Aleste Challenges" involve?

It's just training mode.