Incline Shoot'em up goodness (review and discuss)

[Great Deceiver]

I think the most important tip is to enjoy yourself and play for survival at first, not score. These games are all pretty much completable on 1 credit if you practice enough. I feel too many people get hung up on scores and watch countless replays trying to replicate them exactly, instead of enjoying themselves and trying to learn the game.

 

[Nutmeg]

If you have any tips for newcomers to hell please do tell

I still consider myself a noob, but not a complete noob like I used to be as I have some arcade clears under my belt and know how to generally approach the games.

There's a difficulty list here https://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59651

Play these: Sylphia, Winds of Thunder, Elemental Master.

Then try complete a loop in Slap Fight Special to get used to arcade style instead of console style.

Then it's up to you if you want to keep playing console style or arcade style. I prefer arcade style. A good first actual arcade clear is Batsugun Special's first loop.

Again, check the difficulty list here:

https://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59651

 

[Nutmeg]

tag-team, KoF-style, where you pick 3 different ships and each gets 1 life. There are 3 original teams and 3 teams from other Raizing games (Mahou team, Garegga team, etc.)

The best part is the game world responds to your team. If you have Mahou characters, you'll get Mahou bonus bosses, if you have Garegga ones, Garegga bosses. Only if you activate a special trigger as well for each boss is e.g. destroying the car dealership and the billboard on the first stage gets you Bashinet on stage 5.

Also the game encourages character switching. When you're about to hit an extend, you can switch (by suiciding lol) to your next character, which lowers the "rank" (dynamic difficulty), and then when you get the extend you'll be right where you started in terms of lives (and rank, since it goes up again), but you're using a different character. You can also switch up, by getting the extend first, then suiciding. If you're switching from 2nd character to 1st, there's a small rank penalty, 2nd to 3rd is neutral, IIRC. If you don't switch at all the game is going to max rank eventually and you'll get raped and forced to switch anyway. So, the net outcome is that the extend is really like a "switch" item.

Depending on your team, and your actions in the game you can make a run through advanced course take 25 mins, or 70 mins due to all the extra content you can get.

Or you can just play solo characters, but the same boss rules apply. Here's some of the Mahou bosses from a Miyamoto run:

Bashinet --- the token goofy returning Compile game villain from Mahou (as an aside, I especially liked Soldier Blade's take on this). Here he's in his stage 4 form from the first Mahou.



Tsumiji appearing as a mid boss. Fuck this guy in Mahou. I never got the clear because I'd get to him with 0 lives lost (so like 5) and then blow 3 of them on him and then get too shaky and nervous to beat Gigafacer, who's not a push over either.



Hayate from the second Mahou:

 

[Nutmeg]

From a different run, here's Gob-Robo. This guy's a push over in the original Mahou. Here, I don't know, never triggered him :D



Bashinet again (and in the Arena from Mahou no less! So cool they recreated this). The player complains about the RNG, which was a problem in the first Mahou for me as well (you can safe spot the two helpers, but sometimes they decide to fuck you over anyway), the behavior here is completely different though (there's more than just two of them), and the boss is much harder. Great take.



And a final Bashinet that doesn't look or play like any of his forms from the first game, so I assume it's from the 2nd:

 

[Great Deceiver]

If you have any tips for newcomers to hell please do tell

There's a difficulty list here https://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59651

Great list and probably took a lot of work to write. I was scratching my head a lot but then I realized the hardest games come first on that list.

 

[Great Deceiver]

So I've been playing some Under Defeat, but for some reason my Dreamcast cores on RA (Flycast, which is the most up-to-date one, but also some old ones I kept around like Reicast OIT) keep forcing 50hz mode on just this game. I can't think this is normal, but haven't found a fix.

So I've been playing Under Defeat HD instead, which runs flawlessly on RCPS3. It's a pretty cool game, very straightforward. I can definitely see the Fire Shark parallels.

 

[Nutmeg]

So I've been playing some Under Defeat, but for some reason my Dreamcast cores on RA (Flycast, which is the most up-to-date one, but also some old ones I kept around like Reicast OIT) keep forcing 50hz mode on just this game. I can't think this is normal, but haven't found a fix.

So I've been playing Under Defeat HD instead, which runs flawlessly on RCPS3. It's a pretty cool game, very straightforward. I can definitely see the Fire Shark parallels.

It's a mish mash between a lot of older classics; I can recognize Toplan, Taito, Namco all there. Spotting the homages is part of the fun.

Another thing you can try is the Naomi version. You probably lose practice mode and a few other features I'd imagine, but with save states it shouldn't matter too much.

IIRC HD has small graphical issues, audio issues (c.f. Boss 2 death), and also you can kill some things earlier than you should or you can't kill some things as early as you should. Something like this. Suffice to say it differs from the original in enough ways that e.g. people who play for score differentiate the two.

Nothing that matters much when beginning with the game.

I updated Flycast earlier this year and it broke saving in Under Defeat (it would corrupt saves on load). Luckily Retroarch has core backups now so I restored and locked Flycast to whatever version I had (probably from August 2020 or something).

 

[Falksi]

Spent some time with Sorcer Striker last night at the recommendation of The Great Deceiver, and what a curiously refreshing little beast this is. Combining usual vertical SHMUP style tropes & elements with fantasy roleplay ones, it's certainly one of the most unique shooters I've ever played. Right off the bat I was drawn in by all the bizarre fantasy mish-mashed enemies such as dragon ships & missile carrying harpies. The variety in selectable character ships offered enough to be worth playing as each one too, which is always a plus.

Outlandish enemies and interesting level design are it's main strengths. As GD has pointed out, backdrops usually get involved in the gameplay in some way or form. I particularly like how it has a load of little touches, such as the crowd throwing trinkets in the last level or certain sections having "tripwires", combine with the gameplay.

The first level I found an absolute cakewalk, but the second level ramped up that difficulty and the game's real challenge came into play. It is an an odd beast though because when it's on form it really works well, but that said I found various portions of the game to feel quite cramped, and maneuvering/surviving more successful if I just stood still or shifted from side to side than all around the screen. Also, I don't know if I'm just getting old, but the conflict of so many colours on screen at various points meant that I genuinely couldn't see what was occurring now & then, and a fair few deaths were proper "WTF hit me?" moments. The bosses were pretty easy too. So all in all the challenge fluctuates from next to nothing, to totally unfair at points. This kinda put a downer on it for me.

There weren't any hugely satisfying moments for me either. No one boss or level section which had me fist pumping the air when I'd beat them. The challenge is definitely there, but I just didn't get that sense of satisfaction which I have with other shooters.

Didn't grab me enough to become a fave, but definitely worth a blast.

 

[Great Deceiver]

Licorice that list is going to keep me busy for a long time. Going up on it giving preference to the stuff I never played or played little.

Tonight I played through Lords of Thunder for the Sega CD. I had played the Turbo Duo version before, and I didn't even realize at the time that this was ported to Sega's machine.

The port is less colourful than the TG-16 version, but I find that the music is mixed much, much better on the Sega CD. I love this game's soundtrack (80s instrumental guitar metal akin to Vinnie Moore's first album or early Malmsteen) and the Duo version is really grating because the recording sounds like the band plugged their guitars straight into the mixing board. Another difference is that some of the cutscenes are voiced.

However, a serious downside to the Sega CD version is that it's just too easy. I cleared it on my first try and it had been ages since I played the Duo version. If anyone hasn't played it yet I would recommend this version if you pump the difficulty up a notch or two in the options. I think there's an exclusive difficulty in this port called "super". It's worth playing for sure.

 

[Nutmeg]

the challenge fluctuates from next to nothing, to totally unfair at points.

Wait till you get to the last level. You basically have to play perfectly the whole rest of the game to stand a chance.

Fuck Tsumiji. Fuck him.

So satisfying when you make that ninja fuck commit seppuku.

 

[Great Deceiver]

the challenge fluctuates from next to nothing, to totally unfair at points.

Wait till you get to the last level. You basically have to play perfectly the whole rest of the game to stand a chance.

Fuck Tsumiji. Fuck him.

So satisfying when you make that ninja fuck commit seppuku.

I got the sense from his post that he credit fed through the game, so he must have seen him.

 

[Falksi]

the challenge fluctuates from next to nothing, to totally unfair at points.

Wait till you get to the last level. You basically have to play perfectly the whole rest of the game to stand a chance.

Fuck Tsumiji. Fuck him.

So satisfying when you make that ninja fuck commit seppuku.

I got the sense from his post that he credit fed through the game, so he must have seen him.

Yeah, I played it through once credit-fed, then re-ran it twice limiting to 5 credits each time.

It wasn't so much about challenge, just as odd fluctuation of it. Nothing major, and I still enjoyed it to some degree, I just didn't have any massively stand out moments.

Tbh I think a lot of circumstantial elements factor in to that too. Movies, games, music - when we experience a certain moment in conjunction with other things often emphasizes it all. I'll always remember being blown away by the fact my single R-9 spaceship took down a whole battleship, but once you've seen it once it's hard for other games to recreate that.

 

[Nutmeg]

IMO, it's not a stand out in terms of play (very few verticals in this format (i.e. lacking horizontal panning) did play well till the tail end of the 90s), but it is a stand out in terms of adventure. It's hard for shmups to capture adventure, but when they do, it's really cool, IMO. Everything feels as it should, defending the kingdom from invasion feels like defending a kingdom from invasion, taking down the airship feels like taking down an airship, crawling through the dungeon feels like crawling through a dungeon, fighting in a colosseum feels like fighting in a colosseum. Stages 4 and 5 are more difficult to interpret, but they feel great too.

It's an arcade Aleste - a fun roller coaster ride through a very interesting world with random challenges interspersed between time to soak in the atmosphere - and that's a good thing. Not something I'd want in every shmup, but glad they exist.

Also, the M2 shot triggers port has a cool mode where you control two characters at once. I would love to try that out, but alas, no PS4. I think if it's any good (and I heard it's great), that would definitely elevate the game to something super special by making the play as interesting as the rest of it.

 

[Hag]

If you have any tips for newcomers to hell please do tell

I still consider myself a noob, but not a complete noob like I used to be as I have some arcade clears under my belt and know how to generally approach the games.

There's a difficulty list here https://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59651

Play these: Sylphia, Winds of Thunder, Elemental Master.

Then try complete a loop in Slap Fight Special to get used to arcade style instead of console style.

Then it's up to you if you want to keep playing console style or arcade style. I prefer arcade style. A good first actual arcade clear is Batsugun Special's first loop.

Again, check the difficulty list here:

https://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=59651

What would you say is the difference between console and arcade style ? I am now playing with MAME so I haven't tried your console recommendations yet.

 

[Nutmeg]

console and arcade style

Console shmups tend to be longer and easier with most of the challenge being at the tail end. They're also generally sloppier both in design and what they expect from the player. 16-bit consoles had sprite flicker, so to compensate you're usually given a shield of some kind or a health bar, or simply lots of lives i.e. you can take more hits before game over one way or another.

Arcade shmups are far more aggressive. More killer, less filler. They can be overwhelming for new players, however.

An interesting case is 16-bit ports of arcade shmups. These usually sacrificed graphics heavily to try ensure gameplay remained somewhat faithful, and they usually had really good middle ground difficulties. I really love some 16-bit ports. Many fixed the flaws of rushed arcade releases (famous example is Konami's Salamander for PCE)

There are of course exceptions both ways, and the line blurs during and after 5th gen.

 

[Hag]

I'll keep the arcade ones for now then. Enough choice, and even if I am indeed overwhelmed when I enter second level (or even further sometimes - I play mostly on 1 credit) it's ok, and I love these old sprites. These are gorgeous games.

 

[Nutmeg]

Well, 16-bit console shmups can still be must plays, especially for aesthetic reasons. MUSHA is an aural master piece, with awesome enemy designs. Winds of Thunder likewise.

Others have super creative gameplay. Elemental Master lets you shoot backwards and forwards, and is a relatively rare pedestrian shmup. The final boss rush is a bit disappointing (you just fight all the same bosses, again) save for the final boss, who offers a great fight. Other than that, superb game. First four levels are some of the best in the genre.

On the harder end is Biometal, which we've talked about. I love these rare kind of paladin shmups where you shield bash things.

Many more. One I recently put a fair amount of credits in is Sega's Biohazard. 10/10 OST and art. Plays fine too.

So, don't write them off entirely.

 

[Nutmeg]

I play mostly on 1 credit

Eh feel free to credit feed every now and then, or give yourself e.g. 5 credits and see how far they take you.

If it's a checkpointer just credit feed the whole way through every time if you want. Or until you hit a tedious recovery.

If you notice you hit a brick wall, make a save state and practice it until you get an 80% success rate (it will drop during real runs due to nerves lol). If you still have trouble look up a survival run and learn the strats. Sometimes things that seem impossible are super easy when you know what you're doing. Don't look up score plays as they usually do things the hard way for score (e.g. milking bosses).

IMO, playing one credit at a time is unnatural until you're at the point you're getting to at least the last stage half the time.

Also use your resources e.g. bombs. Don't hoard. Better lose a bomb than a life because bombs replenish on death anyway usually. Naturally, this will make it so you will come across hard parts but not have any bombs left and think "wish I didn't bomb earlier", at that point pick the lowest hanging fruit to learn to get through without bombing and presto you have a bomb to shatter your new brick wall.

 

[Falksi]

Just to give you my POV on the shooters Hag, on return I personally have preferred the console SHMUPS now tbh. Arcade ones can get a bit too brutal too soon, and it does feel with some of them as if they're designed to coin munch (which they are).

Console shooters tend to be easier, sometimes contain a bit more depth (as they are designed to last longer) and once you've mastered them you can breeze through them, whereas the arcade ones still often offer a challenge even when mastered, but - baring in mind I play shooters for a quick high octane rush - I don't really want to spend hours on one. I like to play one for 20-60min, then move on to something else, and a lot of console shooters like Biometal offer a good challenge anyway.

I think the other viewpoints are valid too, it just depends why you're playing these games. But I certainly wouldn't restrict yourself to either.

As Licorice says, that extends to credits too. Personally I'll play through arcade shooters once with infinite credits, just to get a feel for things and spend time taking in the sights & sounds more than worrying too much about conquering it. Then I return with a 5 credit limit. I rarely drop to 1 credit, it just doesn't feel natural. It's certainly not something which I'd have done in the arcade, if I was playing a game in the 90's when most games where £1/go I'd still stick £5 in at least. I do reduce credits as I get to master the game, but most I give myself at least 3.

 

[Hag]

Thank you Licorice & Falksi for your inputs, much helpful to get some bearings. Still learning the basics, such as using bombs not to speed up through bosses but to save my ass when I'm getting overwhelmed. I'll give console shmups a try when I manage to set up a working emulation setup (trying with mednafen, if you have a better choice I'm all ears).

And I'll go easy on myself and indulge with some extra credits. Well, I found that there was much satisfaction in learning and clearing the first stages efficiently. Credit-powering through the levels is good for the sights, but it usually bring me to places where I don't last long enough to enjoy it.

 

[Nutmeg]

Credit-powering through the levels is good for the sights, but it usually bring me to places where I don't last long enough to enjoy it.

Yeah that's a good point to stop putting credits in.

And I'll go easy on myself and indulge with some extra credits

It's just another learning tool. Say one spot is super difficult on stage 2, but otherwise you can comfortably get up to stage 4. Well if you end your run 50% of the time due to that one difficult bit you only get half the practice pushing yourself on stage 4, but you should be practicing both equally.

Also shmups at some point started introducing rank (dynamic difficulty) and rank usually drops to 0 on continue. So a second credit is usually the only way to get easy modes of later stages (some games also have stage randomization or selection), and easy modes are crucial for learning if otherwise you're dying every few seconds.

It is infinitely more satisfying completing things on 1 credit. No question about it.

 

[Nutmeg]

and it does feel with some of them as if they're designed to coin munch (which they are).

In the case of the two hardest classic arcade shmups to 1CC (Same!^3 and Tatsujin Oh), according to a dev interview they were cleared far too quickly (some guy cleared them on his first credit) during location testing (basically arcade equivalent of an open beta) so they just upped the difficulty till the average Japanese player needed 10 credits worth of practice to 1CC. In the case of Same!^3, the original intended difficulty can be found on the MD port as "hard".

Which is insane to think that your average salaryman, half drunk at midnight in some smoky arcade would just need 10 credits to be able to 1CC Same! fucking Cubed but there you go.

On that note, I know Kyukyoku Tiger was specifically designed to be played while drunk, with puff breaks every couple of minutes lol.

 

[Falksi]

Spent most of yesterday playing Axelay, my thoughts......

Axelay - SNES

The screenshots of this game got my nob well hard back in the day, one similar to that featured above in particular, and I was really excited for it's release. It looked really fucking cool, and I grabbed it the second it was out. However, I remember very little about it after that, barely a sliver, other than folk in our gaming circles talking it up and me hardly ever playing it. Soon after it was gone from my collection to never be seen again. Let's see why.

Well if ever the term "mixed bag" defined a game, this is it. For every plus, the game seems to carry a negative. This is immediately apparent with it's alternative "top down" style in the first stage, which relies hugely on MODE 7. Presentation is in general excellent.....IF you can get past the weird as fuck stretchyness which comes with said MODE 7. For every awesomely drawn section and sprite, things also look flat, deformed, and out of place, and whilst half of you is thinking "wow", the other half is thinking "ugggh, that looks weird".

And this extends to the game in general. See it relies heavily on selecting the right weapon for the right job, and that has both it's pros and cons. On one hand it makes it a tad more "strategic" and adds a bit of depth & replay value, but on the other it also adds a level of trial and error which doesn't really sit great in a SHMUP, as there's already enough on with learning enemy & level patterns etc. For example, a big part of the fun I had with the early game was down to it's multi-directional "bendy" laser. It's quite a vital weapon to getting through certain sections, and the way they implement this to move with the length of the button press was quite novel, useful and fun all round. But then when I take a hit and I have to drop back on to a set of missile's, things become awkward and annoying at the drop of a hat. Normal shooters have the promise pf powers ups arriving to give you hope you can survive to pull yourself out the slump, but not Axelay. The only way you get that weapon back here it to die. From fun to frustrating in seconds. And, as there are no powers ups, speed ups, shields or extra lives throughout the stages too, it fails to satisfy on that front as well, as there's very rarely any feeling of reward for surviving a section either.

But most annoyingly for me, rarely do you feel like a bad motherfucker. I'm all about the kill, yet this is geared up to make you feel good in other ways. Instead of being satisfied you annihilated a wave of enemies, you feel glad that picked the right weapons & employed the right strategy so that you got through, which is a bit limp to me. The main weapon is also weedy as hell, and most other weapons feel like that anyway for that matter, even if they're suited to the situation. Quite often I'd attack an enemy from the second it entered the screen to the second it left, and if that was with the standard weapon it wouldn't touch them. Very unsatisfying, and a big part of how much you enjoy this game will stem from how much survival as opposed to destruction satisfies you. Personally I want to kill & destroy, and left most sessions with my kill-instinct still hungry.

And between different level types, new weapon types each level, different enemy types, different level hazards etc. the game probably throws too much at you at once, and personally I struggled to get into much of a rhythm with it too. The more you play, the less this becomes an issue obviously because you learn what works, but I just found myself thinking "I'm learning the game, it's getting easier, but where's that feeling of payoff, and where's my buzz?"

Axelay's a clever shooter with a lot of unique elements and more of a thinking man's SHMUP than for rush junkies like me. Some elements are really welcome & fresh, others drag the whole thing down. As a whole package it left me feeling as puzzled and unsatisfied as it did refreshed. If you're the type of person who likes to work towards a grade A in an exam, and gets a buzz out of that then this may be for you. If, like me, however you want to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women you're gonna be disappointed here.

 

[Nutmeg]

Woah super low rating. My biggest beef with Axelay is the hitbox in the "mode 7" levels (IIRC, it's not actually mode 7 but some custom Konami magic). The hori levels are much better. Oh and you can milk the final boss, but idk it's not a game I'd play for score anyway.

Still want to put more time into it.

Play Xexex Falksi. Jp version. I think you'll love it.

 

[Falksi]

Woah super low rating. My biggest beef with Axelay is the hitbox in the "mode 7" levels (IIRC, it's not actually mode 7 but some custom Konami magic). The hori levels are much better. Oh and you can milk the final boss, but idk it's not a game I'd play for score anyway.

Still want to put more time into it.

Play Xexex Falksi. Jp version. I think you'll love it.

I did consider giving it 3/5, but I ask myself the question "did I enjoy it?", and - apart from the odd moments here & there - on the whole I didn't really get anything from it. A big part of that is just my preference in what I like in my shooters - adrenaline & slaughter.

The more you play it, the more it think you'll recognize how unsatisfying and bad it is for someone with my tastes. If someone were to give it a 4/5, stating they enjoy it's more considered nature I'd totally get where they were coming from too. Some people like Alien for the suspense & tension, others prefer Aliens for the faster pace & destruction. I'm in the latter bracket and thought Axelay was in the former.