This is off-topic, but I wanted to comment seriously about the arcade experience/spoiled/save states comments, if anyone cares.
SuperPang wrote: ↑Mon Jan 22, 2024 6:21 pm
Ah, the ole shmup-incel mentality.
DMC wrote: ↑Mon Jan 22, 2024 6:01 pm
emphatic wrote: ↑Sun Jan 21, 2024 11:06 pm
SuperPang wrote: ↑Sun Jan 21, 2024 10:40 pm
Coming to Johnny Turbo’s arcade on Switch with 9 frames of lag. Thank goodness Exa didn’t get their hands on it.
But with save states and practice modes, just like the original arcade experience!
The absolutely best thing with an EXA release is that we get to see the collectors with Radiant Silvergun shirts--
who don't know that pointblanking is a thing and boasts about not using autofire--flail around the DDP champagne version and get a game over by stage 2.
(saw the video mentioned by CPS, and nothing against the Guru ofc!)
I know Emph was just joking around and likely you as well, but for me the essence of the "arcade experience" is going to a big center filled with people
playing (not owning) the games. You would have all kinds, including the casuals and the regulars who knew the games really well and who had crowds behind their shoulders watching how they play, even taking literal notes sometimes, sharing knowledge and strategies with each other--creating a meaningful social environment. You would have some friendly competition, people trying to get on top of the cabinet's scoreboard, and in general people learning and enjoying the games--without even owning them. From the Japanese arcade scene emerged world class players who got world records long before save states and practice modes were a thing, many of which remains world records today despite those "new" tools. These players tend to emphasize how much they love the games and that key ingredient to doing well is to play them a lot. Passion and common knowledge.
So the arcade centers are dead, it's sad. With that in mind,
what is closer to "the arcade experience" today?
I would say that events where people play the games together. Aktane's blind kumite's, Ultramania, STGT, Calice Cup, Shmup Slams, Stunfest, but also twitch streams where you can watch other people play and interact with them. For example, a bunch of people watching a passionate player like Jaimers streaming Radiant Silvergun from Steam is to me actually quite close to the arcade experience. People were socializing in the chat, cheering him on, talking about various game-related stuff, studying his strategies, etc. I took some notes of some sections he dealt with, I also watched and learned from videos of Emperoring, Mark_MSX, and Ben Shinobi*--players ranging from survival play to world class scoring--learned enough to beat it on a Switch within 20 hours (I hope those are not incel numbers!).
Each to their own, but I think those experiences are closer to the arcades than some basement being turned into an single person's arcade room that seems to be closed most of the time. The popular "Post a photo of your latest purchase threads" or "post a photo of your cab" have always struck me as quite ironic in that regard. Like it's more about materialism, owning these games, rather than playing them when originally arcade players enjoyed them without even owning them. Taito and SEGA cabinets are beautiful though, so I feel a little bit of both when I see those posts.
Then, about save states practicing and practice modes being cheating. A decade or two ago it was a sensible discussion. The good example from the 2012 fair competition thread here--is of one Japanese player getting a specialized Ketsui board with which he could practice Doom endlessly, while the other players didn't have that access. That's an example of unfair competition and his score was supposedly taken down. So when mame emulation became a thing and mame players got a suddent advantage over those playing in arcades or owning the games and who were active. Yeah, then it was a sensible discussion.
But technology and community evolve. People who play for score probably do that because they like learning the games (that is, improving the scores) so it makes sense that as technology and the scene changes, people will adapt and use new learning tools. Developers have realized this since long time ago, so standard well-made ports today typically have practice modes and similar tools. And whether you like it or not, since the arcade purists apparently seldom contribute scores, the current scoreboards are filled with mostly port and mame scores. So, the active shmup community today (those who participate in live events, streams, engage in game discussion threads, submit to scoreboards) are mostly people playing ports and mame, which is reasonable because arcades have been dead for about two decades in the west. Yet, people who contribute virtually nothing to these events come in here every once in a while and call these players "spoiled", "cheaters", "incels", etc. This thread is only missing the autism jokes. Maybe my long post will be used as the setup for that particular joke, but I'll take the risk.
Edit: *NOT Shapiro!