What Is harmful park!?

[BUHA]

I can't find any info on google for this game! All i know is that it's a shooter and people have said that it's good. Does anyone have any screenshot links? What do you guys think of the game? I'd go on google if I could find anything, but it won't bring up anything!

thanks

[captain ahar]

review on Twin Dreams here.

it really is excellent by the way. one of the most creative games i have witnessed. although it was difficult for me to "get into" at first. the weapon system and getting combos took awhile to understand.

[the2bears]

The screen shots look great. There's a copy on eBay now for 50 pounds... is it that rare? I'd buy it for 1/2 at the moment, but my kid needs a new pair of shoes

Bill

[captain ahar]

i bought my copy from a member of the forums for $80 shiped and as far as i have heard i got it cheap. the cheapest i've heard of lately is $70 (i can never remember who got for that much).

[the2bears]

I figured it was rare, given I hadn't seen mention or heard anything about it before this (not that I'm a repository of knowledge!)

I do think it looks great though, stylistically speaking. Another reason for me to get a Japanese PS1 or 2...

Bill

[BUHA]

wow, thanks for the quick replies!

and too bad it costs so much. it looks pretty cool anyway, though. i thought it was a vertical shooter. i'm itching for some new hori ones.

[captain ahar]

no problem at all! I have no life

didn't want to make another post for this so i edited:

lucky, lucky, Ghegs.

[Ghegs]

I got my Harmful Park from Play-Asia, $79.90

[professor ganson]

Thanks for the link. This game had been recommended to me, but I knew nothing about it. The screenshots look amazing. Too bad this game is nowhere to be found.

[captain ahar]

http://www.videogameimports.com has a few. haven't used them myself but i've heard good things. their cheapest copy (for those outside the EU (vat tax and all), would be around $80 if i recall).

[BulletMagnet]

...the cheapest i've heard of lately is $70 (i can never remember who got for that much).

Heh, that was me...as a "disclaimer" though, the game didn't have a spine card (though everything else was in excellent/near mint condition), and shipping was extra. I really do like the game though, too bad the bugger's so hard to get ahold of.

[GaijinPunch]

FYI --- the last complete one I saw on Ebay went for $130.

[BUHA]

Again, thanks for all the info. Too bad it costs a fortune though

[Turrican]

FYI --- the last complete one I saw on Ebay went for $130.

then that's probably the one I won pretty foolish of me, I admit.

it's a quite enjoyable game. However, difficulty is not so balanced. I reached the final stage without losing a life at normal, so I switched to hard and boy... it IS hard.

[MadSteelDarkness]

I got my Harmful Park from Play-Asia, $79.90

Me too, minus the $5 coupon, of course. I'd say that this could be my very favorite hori for the PS1. It's got great level design and beautiful graphics. Plus, the opening cinema could be one of the most insane game openings I've ever seen. The music's really nice, as well.

[Acid King]

Just hearing the words "Potato Vulcan", "Pie Spread" and "jelly boomerang" make me want to buy this game.

[BulletMagnet]

Tsk tsk, you forget your Engrish, my friend: the proper term is "jerry" boomerang.

[captain ahar]

Just hearing the words "Potato Vulcan", "Pie Spread" and "jelly boomerang" make me want to buy this game.

they just better. when i read that review and saw "comboing with pie spread" and heard about the Heart boss. i was commited to finding the game, and after having played it a bit, no regrets at all.

[brand1bil]

I paid around $35 for my copy of Harmful Park (w. spinecard) i Tokyo - I guess I was either lucky or that the game fetches those high prices outside japan?

[Shatterhand]

Hmm.. After so many people recommending this game.. I gave it a try.

The first thing I noticed is that the game is made by a company I had never heard before - Sky Think System - No wonder why the game is so rare, it was probably made and distributed by a small team, with little or no hype at all, just like dozens and dozens of games that are released every month. (Though this was even more common in the 8 bits times)

I just played my first game of it.. and I FINISHED IT (The ending sequence is playing while I type this). It's TOO DAMN easy... It's not just the easiest shmup I ever played (Yes, it's easier than anything from Compile), it's maybe the easiest game I ever played in my whole life (It's easier than McDonald's Treasure Land !!)

Yes, I'll try again with a harder difficult setting.

Now, why the game is so much recommended?

There's NOTHING of special on it. Maybe there's some scoring gimmick that I didn't get it, still I doubt it would make it any better.

(HA, now the game says "You cleared all stages without using continue mode")

The level design is boring most of the time (I think the game probably had only 2 inspired moments). Yes, the game is wacky, but it's not funny. Parodius is wacky, and makes me laugh. I didn't find anything funny in Harmful Park, just wacky and weird.

The game also has the IRRITATING feature of enemies attacking from behind without ANY warning. In Gradius at least you know that enemies from behind will only show at the floor or the ceiling. Here they can show up ANYWHERE, at ANY MOMENT without ANY WARNING.

I didn't find the game HORRIBLE (It's better than, say, Skull Fang) , but it's very far of being "excellent".

So.. can someone clear up to me why is this game supposedly to be good? Maybe because it's rare, people make it look better than it is... or maybe just the wackyness is good enough for people.. I dunno, maybe I should just crank up the difficulty settings

[BulletMagnet]

Well, you definitely ought to try playing for score, that makes things a good deal more interesting...as you might've noticed, collecting the green gems some enemies leave behind increases score, and the value of each gem you collect increases as long as you don't miss any, sort of like medaling in Raizing games.

The "main" score gimmick, though, involves finagling your weapons to destroy as many enemies as possible in one shot, which multiplies the enemies' values as more are destroyed at once (you'll see x2, x3, etc. appear onscreen as you destroy a bunch). While you can more or less get through almost the entire game using only the vulcan when playing for survival only, to score well you have to learn to use the other, less reliable weapons well. For example, the laser is best used to clear away horizontal "lines" of enemies, while the pie is best for closely-grouped "clumps" of enemies. You also get a bonus for the % of enemies you shoot down during a stage at the end: doing this while using the less reliable weapons when playing for score is usually tougher than just blasting everything with the vulcan. You might've also noticed some items which appear from nowhere when you shoot at them for awhile: you can learn to use the homing "jerry" bean to seek them out.

There are also those few simple minigames you can play with a friend, which can be a nice diversion, plus the extra score attack stage (a good deal harder than the regular game). Out of curiosity, did you play the game on full defaults? By default the game is set to "easy," so you've still got 3 more difficulty levels to conquer. "Normal" shouldn't be much of a problem for you either, with a little practice, but once you get to Hard and Very Hard things get a good deal more hectic. If you want the truth the first time I played through the game I wasn't particularly impressed, but once I got more into it it became one of my favorites. And yeah, the game's not really designed to make you laugh like Parodius is, but you've still got to give some credit to the design of the thing...don't tell me you weren't at least a bit impressed when you first saw the huge whale boss appear, and start belching sailors in boats at you.

[jp]

Hmm.. After so many people recommending this game.. I gave it a try.

The first thing I noticed is that the game is made by a company I had never heard before - Sky Think System - No wonder why the game is so rare, it was probably made and distributed by a small team, with little or no hype at all, just like dozens and dozens of games that are released every month. (Though this was even more common in the 8 bits times)

I just played my first game of it.. and I FINISHED IT (The ending sequence is playing while I type this). It's TOO DAMN easy... It's not just the easiest shmup I ever played (Yes, it's easier than anything from Compile), it's maybe the easiest game I ever played in my whole life (It's easier than McDonald's Treasure Land !!)

Yes, I'll try again with a harder difficult setting.

Now, why the game is so much recommended?

There's NOTHING of special on it. Maybe there's some scoring gimmick that I didn't get it, still I doubt it would make it any better.

(HA, now the game says "You cleared all stages without using continue mode")

The level design is boring most of the time (I think the game probably had only 2 inspired moments). Yes, the game is wacky, but it's not funny. Parodius is wacky, and makes me laugh. I didn't find anything funny in Harmful Park, just wacky and weird.

The game also has the IRRITATING feature of enemies attacking from behind without ANY warning. In Gradius at least you know that enemies from behind will only show at the floor or the ceiling. Here they can show up ANYWHERE, at ANY MOMENT without ANY WARNING.

I didn't find the game HORRIBLE (It's better than, say, Skull Fang) , but it's very far of being "excellent".

So.. can someone clear up to me why is this game supposedly to be good? Maybe because it's rare, people make it look better than it is... or maybe just the wackyness is good enough for people.. I dunno, maybe I should just crank up the difficulty settings

^^^

Thats about how I felt after spending an evening with the game (DC bootleg version anyways).

[tehkao]

It's one of the only few Parodius-esque shmups out there that isn't called Parodius. I think it's decent.

[Ghegs]

When it comes to parody-shmups I much prefer Harmful Park over Parodius. To me, Parodiuses have always been just...weird. There doesn't seem to be much consistency, it's just one weird thing after another that have little to do with each other. Harmful Park doesn't feel like that, though I can't really explain why.

As for the difficulties, Easy is easy, Normal is easy, Hard is normal and Very Hard is the way you should play it if you want a challenge. And Score Attack. I love that one.

[captain ahar]

eeeek! score attack!

i love this mode, but as i have can't clear the game on Normal, it humiliates me every time... and i love it.

[professor ganson]

Hmm.. After so many people recommending this game.. I gave it a try.

The first thing I noticed is that the game is made by a company I had never heard before - Sky Think System - No wonder why the game is so rare, it was probably made and distributed by a small team, with little or no hype at all, just like dozens and dozens of games that are released every month. (Though this was even more common in the 8 bits times)

I just played my first game of it.. and I FINISHED IT (The ending sequence is playing while I type this). It's TOO DAMN easy... It's not just the easiest shmup I ever played (Yes, it's easier than anything from Compile), it's maybe the easiest game I ever played in my whole life (It's easier than McDonald's Treasure Land !!)

Yes, I'll try again with a harder difficult setting.

Now, why the game is so much recommended?

There's NOTHING of special on it. Maybe there's some scoring gimmick that I didn't get it, still I doubt it would make it any better.

(HA, now the game says "You cleared all stages without using continue mode")

The level design is boring most of the time (I think the game probably had only 2 inspired moments). Yes, the game is wacky, but it's not funny. Parodius is wacky, and makes me laugh. I didn't find anything funny in Harmful Park, just wacky and weird.

The game also has the IRRITATING feature of enemies attacking from behind without ANY warning. In Gradius at least you know that enemies from behind will only show at the floor or the ceiling. Here they can show up ANYWHERE, at ANY MOMENT without ANY WARNING.

I didn't find the game HORRIBLE (It's better than, say, Skull Fang) , but it's very far of being "excellent".

So.. can someone clear up to me why is this game supposedly to be good? Maybe because it's rare, people make it look better than it is... or maybe just the wackyness is good enough for people.. I dunno, maybe I should just crank up the difficulty settings

After so many recommendations on this forum, I too was compelled to give Harmful Park a try recently, but I came to a very different conclusion. I think the game is pretty exceptional, though I'm still finding my way in it.

First, the look and sound of the game seems to me absolutely first rate. The music is IMO incredible and it always fits in with the scene so tightly. What amazes me the most is how nicely the developers have captured the feel of amusement parks in their various manifestations. Do they have amusement parks just like ours in Japan It's amazing to me that this game was NOT developed with American and European gamers in mind (I'm assuming it was not because it never got released here).

As for the difficulty level, you should think of the Easy level (which is the default level) as intended for kids. And I think it serves this purpose quite well. The normal level is perfect for me. I find it annoying if a game at normal difficulty keeps from reaching the third level on 1cc, in spite of much practice. I find it equally annoying if a game allows me to pass level 3 without much practice. And this game starts to kick my ass at level 3, just as I would hope.

I'm still a bit confused, I have to admit, by the weapon choices. I suspect that the variations in weapons are more of a concern when you are trying to maximize score.

On the whole, though, I would say that Harmful Park rivals Gradius Gaiden for best hori on the PS1 (granted I am not a huge R-type fan).

[Turrican]

My opinion could be biased by the fact that I spent too much on it. Really, the game is quite good. I mean, if one bought it in 1997 at its price or even used, I can't see him complain.

I think Shatterhand's concerns are partly because people is willing to shell out so much for the game. It's a nice shooter, but it's not worth all those money. And, after all, a Super Famicom port like oshaberi parodius is still more fun and varied.

About the difficulty issue

It's TOO DAMN easy... It's not just the easiest shmup I ever played (Yes, it's easier than anything from Compile), it's maybe the easiest game I ever played in my whole life

Yeah, but you like Compile games, don't you? If that's so, you see challenge is a secondary factor in liking a shmup. I mean, I don't see why I should rank the most difficult shmup out there as no°1.

and, have you completed the score attack mode? have you 1lifed the game at normal setting? Try the hard setting, I can assure it's not a cakewalk.

[Gozer]

I think Harmful Park is a pretty good game. As Ghegs said, you definitely need to turn up the difficulty to very hard in order to get decent challenge.

Does anyone know of any translations for Harmful Park? It's one of the few shmups that has a story heavy beginning and end.

[Shatterhand]

Yes, I don't judge the game by its difficulty (I also finished GG Aleste 2 in my first go but I consider it to be a good game)

I just wanted to point out how much the game felt so "unspectacular" by me. Yes, the GFX is cool, and the music is great, but the gameplay is too much "so-so".


But OK, I'll give the game another try on Normal Mode, and try to toy with the score gimmicks. I also found the weapon setup strange, I was pretty sure that it had something to do with scoring. (I finished the game using just the Ice-Cream weapon for more than 90% of the game, and found the Pie weapon to be completely worthless).

[BulletMagnet]

Does anyone know of any translations for Harmful Park? It's one of the few shmups that has a story heavy beginning and end.

Maybe we can pester poor Minzoku to have a crack at it once she's done with SNS2.