Simple 2000 Series

[Nana]

Let's talk about this excellent series of terrible games. What have you played, how were they, what are your favorites? What are the worst? I'm interested in collecting and playing the entire series at some point.

Most recently I picked up Sengoku vs Gendai, of the Simple 2000 Ultimate series. It's a very simplistic beat em up, but I'll be damned if I'm not enjoying it way more than I should be. There's something just inherently satisfying about shooting samurai in the face while playing as a schoolgirl in a bikini.


Note: This was previously the Maid Uniform & Machine Guns thread, but I figured a far more general topic would be more interesting.

[Nana]

And in the event that anyone CAN help me with the Maid Uniform question I had, here was the original post:

I finished this game a while ago, but now I decided I should delve into the depths of its horrifically unintuitive score play. It's a pretty fun game when you play it how the game asks you not to (you're scored on CONSERVING bullets when the game has 'machine gun' in the title...), but there are so many guns and uniforms and possibly minigames to unlock that I want to see what I get with these A rankings.

The problem is I can't figure this shit out at all.

How are you supposed to chain machine gun attacks? Are these the ONLY chains that you get scored on for combos? Or is getting a good number of hits with the katana (stupidly impossible) good too? I get that you have to lead it off with a dodge into a machine gun (hand gun?) attack, but I can't continue the chain past one. A couple of times I was able to get it up to two by trying to press the dodge and machine gun buttons again, but I just can't pull it off.

Any other general advice for scoring well in this terrible game? I can take a picture of the manual where it describes the chains in japanese, if that helps. I can't read it.

And lastly, here's a trailer for anyone unfamiliar with the game. It demonstrates said chain attack at 2:00.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBmMFkafnIw

[qmish]

Oh, haven't played them yet, but it took my attention too
First of all, hope i have no need mentioning TEH BEST GAME, Global Defense Force...

So, back to topic. I'm looking towards checking following in the future:

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 91: The All*Star Kakutou Matsuri
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mj68ViqBWWI
Fighting with characters from different Simple releases

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 50: The Daibijin
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpbbqC4oSKA
Cute huge girl acts as Gojira

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 80: The Oneechamploo ~The Neechan Toketsuban~
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3-NIq7gWTzg
Bikini warriors slash zombies, classic

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 52: The Chikyuu Shinryakugun ~Space Raiders~
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRVXiqiVraA
Hey, it's good old Arkano... OOPS, thanks, i mean Space Invaders

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 112: The Tousou Highway 2 ~Road Warrior 2050~
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L97KKX4uhLo
Some Carmageddon-esque fan

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 106: The Block Kuzushi Quest ~DragonKingdom~
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3L2JADqZRc4
Brickout-like puzzle

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 33: The Jet Coaster: Yuuenchi wo Tsukurou!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuFWRFyfVcA
Rollercoast. Music is wonderful. And japanese cover art much better than euro release.

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 72: The Ninkyou
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RBTof-4MEw
River City Ransom, anyone?

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 100: The Otokotachi no Kijuuhouza
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LIzB184Vgw
Defending space base

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 113: The Overwhelming Hell
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-eZ9r6OcaA
Insectophobia horror starring cute girl or smth

Simple 2000 Series vol. 99: The Caveman
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-a9vazsy3nY
I heard it's a Pikmin clone

Simple 2000 Series vol. 49: The Dodgeball
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHUGXgVORB8
Dodgeball with real history characters

Simple 2000 Series Ultimate Vol. 17: Taisen! Bakudan Poi Poi
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SE1fBcE8d8k
Bomberman-esque game but with people

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 64 - The Splatter Action
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7OUMTUrQ9I
Nice tribute to Splatterhouse

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 95 The Zombie vs. Kyūkyūsha
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WivDg4oAXM8
Drive over zombies, that's it.

Simple 2500 Series Portable Vol. 13: The Akuma Hunters - Exorsister
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=glXTeNZE0QM
Just hunting game, but in occult mood

Simple DS Series Vol.18 - The Soukou Kihei Gun Ground
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Dx1mnyWaYk
Nice sidescroller a-la Assault Suit Leynos?

[Teufel_in_Blau]

Nice post, qmish. But I have to warn you about Excorsister. That game is a nightmare to play because of the lack of the second analog stick. I wish they would have released the game on the PS2 instead. Of course if you are a Monster Hunter junkie and "the claw" is your preferred way of playing you can happily ignore this comment.

Onechanbara is for me easily the best that came out of this series, but to be fair I haven't played most of them, lol.

[D]

I should check some of these out. Thanks for the tips.
They don't seem to have poor playability at all afaik.
I really like Space Raiders for the ps2 which seems similar in the style/art direction a bit. It looks like it could've been part of tie simple 2000 series.

[Nana]

Oh hey, thanks for the replies! I totally agree that EDF is of course the best. EDF2 with Pale Wing is fucking awesome.

The games I have so far (in chronological order) are...


Vol 50: The Daibijin/The Giant Beautiful Woman -- Horrible fucking game, but I must have finished it 5 times. It's just fun, no matter how hard Tamsoft tries to prevent me from having any. Great style, great music, and short enough to replayable on a whim. Know that the controls are so unresponsive that sometimes it can take a second+ to respond. Recommended.

Vol 54: The Daikaiju/The Giant Creature -- This one's a bit of a weird one. Imagine Monster Hunter meets Shadow of the Colossus, except you're on a boat. It's actually pretty cool in theory, and thankfully the controls are more responsive, but still far from good. You sail around, occasionally being assaulted by pirates and sharks, and accept missions to get the opportunity to explore more of the world and eventually fight huge sea monsters, where the game starts to get fun. The best part of the game is the incredible explosions of gore the sea monsters are felled to, which is worth playing the game for alone. Unfortunately there's a bit of a language barrier, and it takes far too long for the game to get interesting. Recommended if you can put up with some shitty grinding and want monster hunter on a boat.

Vol 81: The Chikyuu Boueigun 2/Earth Defense Force 2/Global Defense Force -- not much needs to be said about one of the greatest games ever made. Just perhaps that Pale Wing and her miniskirt are infinitely superior to Wing Diver in EDF4.

Vol 105: The Maid Uniform and Machine Guns - This game is awesome. Almost. It has lots of things I love, and lots of things I hate. It's a super fun and charming beat em up/action game, and it's just a blast to go through the levels unloading your machine gun on maid robots and mechs and stuff. There's a couple of poor on-rail segments too, but in context it just adds variety to the game, and the whole thing is pretty fun as a result. It's short and not exactly good, but it's definitely ALMOST there, and thanks to its pacing and variety, is definitely worth playing from start to finish. See my post above for my biggest problem with it though. Oh, And you can't slash your sword while moving, which is idiotic. Shooting works fine though. Recommended.

Vol 113: The Tairyou Jigoku/The Overwhelming Hell -- qmish has pretty much got it. This is a game about insects and cute girls. Except he forgot to mention that your choice of weaponry are based on school sports activities. There's something just incredibly satisfying about using a golf club to launch giant beetles into the atmosphere. Additionally, insectophobia might be pushing it since the game seems more catered to insect fetishists than those who would find bugs crawling up your skirt creepy. Lots of jiggling around in here.

All that aside, gameplay sucks (boss fights are fun), music's good, character's plastic, but the whole thing is charming and somehow works. I enjoyed it enough to finish it. I should also note that the game is also plain weird, and the story is a take on Alice in Wonderland. Recommended if you like cheesy horror games, and you'd be the kind of person to play through a horror game to unlock a bunny costume.

Simple 2000 Ultimate Volume 16: Sengoku vs Gendai -- I did mention this one before, but I guess it's worth some detail. It's a beat em up (with multiplayer) where you play one of six modern dudes (three guys, three gals) and you go back in time and beat the hell out of samurai, ninja, peasants, knights, dragons, all sorts of good stuff. It's just inherently fun for what it is, but the controls are unfortunately way too simple. There's basically only 4 or 5 different varieties of combo, and the controls are just about the same (though do different actions) for every character. Despite this, it manages to be fun for an entire playthrough, and there are multiple routes to make the game more interesting for a second/third go-through. There's some unlockable bikini outfits, some good music, and some cool boss designs to seal the deal. Recommended if you like bad beat em ups.

Simple 2000 Ultimate Volume 17: Taisen!! Bakudan Poi Poi! -- This game is fun as hell. Incredibly stupid, but it makes for a great multiplayer game, and I love the concept. Basically, you play as an assortment of businessmen, schoolgirls, nurses, robots, and just general wacky dudes, and you just run around throwing bombs at each other causing chain reactions and stuff. It is worth noting that single player isn't too fun after a playthrough or two though; it's short and pretty repetitive. Still worth a look.

If anyone wants to get me a good christmas present, feel free to unload any awful simple series games on me if I don't have them already. ;D

[drauch]

Simple 2000 Series Vol. 52: The Chikyuu Shinryakugun ~Space Raiders~
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRVXiqiVraA
Hey, it's good old Arkanoid!

I think you mean Space Invaders... Also got a Gamecube release which can be had for a measely 5 clams.