A Shooter/Shmup Thread (and small history)

[dog$]

First, I'd like to say I'm not particularly fond of the word "shmup" but it's become the defining term which seperates the genre from FPSs and the like.

Anyway, I'd like to see some shooter discussion here so let's talk about them. If you're not familiar with the major players in shooters, take a gander at the following. (PS: Due to a limit of 20 images per post, I needed to split this up)

Cave

A somewhat recent trend among most shooters is to have them be styled in one of two ways, usually designated as "old-school" and "bullet hell". After the early Donpachi, Cave has fundamentally initiated and established their company's existence upon such "bullet hell" shooters. Particularly with this generation, Cave has continuously produced quality shooters in rapid fashion; Dondonpachi Daiojou, Espgaluda, Mushihimesama, Ketsui, and Ibara are all shooters with unique twists but a common trend - to put more pixels of bullets on screen than anything else in the game. In a respect it can be said that Cave is the lone remaining shooter-only production house in Japan today. One footnote worth mentioning is that while arcade score competition remains heated among Japanese players, in Cave's case it became so contested that it caused major productions to be cancelled. A player named Clover-TAC was to compile a superplay for Ketsui and have it recorded for a DVD, and for this purpose, Arika (who was to publish the DVD) had Cave code a special version of the game specifically for score-attack purposes. However, Clover-TAC played this special version of the game and submitted the scores he earned to Arcadia Magazine, and the scores were published. This was a breach of agreement on Cave's part, resulting in the DVD movie being cancelled as well as a rumored home PS2 verison of the game. If anything, this episode shows how protective Cave is of their shooters.

Compile

Before resigning theirselves to whore out the Puyo Puyo franshise unto eternity and beyond, Compile was a respected developer of shooters that didn't focus as much on enemy congestion as it did a raw sense of speed in some or their games or perhaps just plain bizzare graphics in others. Zanac X Zanac remains a rather rare PS1 shooter and is the last of what could be considered their flasgship shooter series, but it's possible most American gamers most know Compile for their hybrid shooter/adventure game known as The Guardian Legend. Musha, Blazing Lazers, and Aleste are other popular Compile titles. Note: there is no relationship between Randar and Lolo.

Eighting/Raizing

Here is another company that has abandoned their shooter development and established franchises. 8ing has an impressive history of development, being responsible for titles such as Battle Garegga, Metal Black, Brave Blade, Layer Section, and Soukyugurentai (released elsewhere as Terra Diver). Unfortunately, their only videogame production as of this generation has been for the licenced Naruto fighters found on Gamecube and PS2.

G-Rev

A recent upstart in the Japanese videogame developer set is G-Rev. So far, they have focussed on making arcade oriented titles and their first two entries were well received shooters, both of which have home versions on the Sega Dreamcast; Border Down and Under Defeat. Under Defeat is the last non-dojinshi (fanmade) Sega Dreamcast game that will ever be made. I read somewhere that some of GRev's staff is formed from former Taito employees that helped make games for their Darius series, and there are certainly elements of Border Down that exhibit similar traits to Darius. Their latest game, Senko no Ronde, is more of a shooter-fighter hybrid that is only available on the XBox 360 at the moment. The impressions I've heard of this game are sparse and not entirely positive; here's hoping that whether their future titles are shooters or not, GRev continues to make positive and profitable titles.

Irem

Irem is a relatively moderate software developer that is responsible for many games beyond shooters, and their shooter catalog is no slouch either; they coded games like Moon Patrol, X-Multiply, Mr. Heli's Adventure / Battle Chopper, Image Fight, and Blade Master. However, the totality of their library is overshadowed by their flagship shooter franchise: R-Type. R-Type is one of the most renown shooters of the 80's, if not of all time, and remains a challenging play to this day. Most people consider the series to have reached its apex with the PS1 release of R-Type Delta; while I personally agree that overall, the game is in fact better than their last shooter, R-Type Final, I actually was not disappointed with RTF and rather enjoyed the game's design, music, as well as the sheer number of ships (and from these ships, further customization) that you could use.

Psikyo

It's probably most accurate to say that Psikyo is an arcade game development house - while their shooters have a distinct style, each series has a rather unique heritage and Psikyo relies just as much on mah-jongg games for income as they do their shooter franchies. Shooter fans are well familiar with their franchises, and among titles such as Sengoku Ace, Gunbird 2, Strikers 1945 II, or Zero Gunner 2, you can't go wrong with any of their offerings.

[dog$]

Takumi

After making their first shooter, Kyukyoku Tiger 2 (subsequently released on the Sega Saturn as Kyukyoku Tiger 2 Plus), Takumi exploded onto the scene by entering into a publishing agreement with Capcom. The result has left us with some of best shooters found on the Sega Dreamcast - unfortunately after this time period, Takumi seems to have fallen off of the map. Takumi combined bullet hell game mechanics with scoring algorithms that resulted in score competitions that are almost unequalled to the present day, and Giga Wing 2 remains as one of the very few 4-player shooters in existence. In the end, though, for Takumi's shooters it was all about the points - and let's face it; how is it not thrilling to play a shooter and earn 100 quadrillion points or more?

Tecnosoft

To say that Tecnosoft was a shooter company wouldn't be entirely accurate - while it is certainly true that, with the possible exception of Herzog Zwei, the Thunder Force series is Tecnosoft's most renown series, it was also their only shooter series. Tecnosoft's other works were RPGs and other games, so it is inaccurate to say that making shooters was their primary focus. Despite this, the Thunder Force series is a remarkable shooter franchise that has always provided great challenge and graphics, neat weapons, excellent music, and perhaps most surprisingly - a good storyline. There was going to be a Thunder Force VI for the Sega Dreamcast, but it was cancelled a few months before Tecnosoft folded and faded away. Fans of the series, such as myself, still strongly lament the cancellation and absence of Tecnosoft today.

SNK

Despite the fact that the last SNK shooter came with Blazing Star, which was released nearly a decade ago, the few contributions they have made to the genre are noteworthy. Their very first game, Ozma Wars, may well be the first videogame with a boss. Pulstar is a specific example of a game that has stunning graphics and a very rough challenge, and still stands as a great horizontal shooter today.

Success

This is a relatively small-time development and publishing house (for instance, they did in fact publish the Japanese verion of the PS1 brawler Wu-Tang: Enter the Wu) but they have had a few shooter series of merit, namely Psyvariar and Cotton. The first two Cotton games are charming horizontal shooters with rich graphics and neat gameplay tricks involving freezing enemies and tossing them around; the series all but faded to obscurity with the fumbled Cotton Boomerang for Dreamcast. The Psyvariar series possibly introduced the "buzz" gameplay concept in which letting the bullets graze your ship as closely as possible translates to bonuses.

Taito

Space Invaders remains an iconic entity of Taito, but until the end of the 32bit generation they were still producing shooters on a regular basis. Everyone in the world knows about Space Invaders, but the Darius series is probably their best shooter property. My personal favorite of all their shooters is G-Darius; I thought being able to 1CC the PS1 version was a nice accomplishment - that is, until I got to play the version on the recent Taito Memories 2 collection on PS2. Suffice to say, G-Darius running at the proper speed makes a world of difference (and the PS1 port obsolete). While they presently aren't producing any new shooters, they have published a few of Cave's PS2 ports of their arcade shooters.

Treasure

From Axelay to Gradius V, there are very many ardent fans of Treasure's shooters. While I personally find Radiant Silvergun to be overrated and boring, I will concede that it is a well-made game with good production values. (Personally, I did own RS at one time but I became so infuriated with it I ended up trading mine for a working Intellivision. Yes, an Intellivision.) Ikaruga continues to receieve accolades from various journalist pieces, and Gradius V is arguably the best new shooter for the PS2.

Many Others...

There are some companies that have numerous shooter franchises in their history or being further developed. However, the above list of such companies merely scratches the surface of the totality of shooters that are out there. Moss has recently released Raiden III, reviving Seibu Kaihatsu's venerable Raiden franchise; a US release is upcoming as well as Raiden IV in the arcades. Alfa System's lone franchise is the Shikigami no Shiro series; the third title in the series was released this year and continues to enjoy some popularity in Japan. Then there is Namco, a company that is not entirely known for its shooter franchises but has definite mainstays in the Galaga and Xevious franchises. Then there are other companies that are starting to develop shooter catalogs, such as Triangle Service (XII Stag, Trizeal) and Milestone (Chaos Field, Radilgy), as well as single-title titles from current and previous generations like Gaiares, Blaze On, Phalanx, Shienryu, Homura ... it's a challenge just to list them all.



So! Tell us about your favorite shooters, or stories about them - good runs you've had, One Credit Clears, anything. Let's hear it.

[Patashu]

Giga Wing is cool. No, awesome.

Do Don Pachi is also awesome.

Even though I can't beat either, bullet-wading is the most ever.

[ANGRY ABOUT ENGLISH]

I'm already one of those people who doesn't really get affected by most games. Didn't cry at the dead Aeris, nothing for any RPGs really (and I play more than a few), etc.

R-Type Final, to me, is quite possibly the saddest game I've ever played. Between the nostalgia as one of the oldest and most memorable series I've ever played came to an end, and the variety OF those endings, I actually managed to tear up as the finale's credits began to roll on each ending. And the worst part is, no matter how I look at it, every last ending is bittersweet (at best).

F-A: Sure, you killed the Bydo core, and might (I'm not sure if it was ever confirmed or not) have killed the creatures themselves for good... but you're now trapped in a crippled craft floating through an unknown dimension until you're dead. That's... wow. At least the R-13 pilot in Delta got an epilogue.
F-B: You doomed humankind. Um. Okay, this ending rather blew.
F-C: To this day, I've got the text from the opening of F-C memorized. Flying through space-time to basically erase the future, your own life moot just to save all of humanity in a desperate gamble (assuming this isn't some alternate story to F-A, that is... so come to think of it, the guy in F-A probably didn't even succeed, damn), I'm getting weepy just remembering it.

I grew up with R-Type. To this day, I still miss it, years later.

[I AM THE PROPHECY.]

Obligatory Kenta Cho mention. I just picked up this week Under Defeat and Radirgy -Generic- so I'm looking forward to laying them when I get home in a couple weeks. Sometime I'll get around to picking up a Saturn so I can expand what I have access to a bit.

[Patashu]

Hm; anyone here played Mars Matrix? What's it like?

Oh, and has anyone played the levels after the 3rd for Perfect Cherry Blossom?

[DELICIOUS HOT COCK]

Originally Posted by Patashu

Oh, and has anyone played the levels after the 3rd for Perfect Cherry Blossom?

Yes, although Imperishable Night is a much better game.

[Patashu]

Got a link handy?

[DELICIOUS HOT COCK]

For... the demo, or the game for sale? Can't post the full version here ^_-

http://mirror12.fuzzy2.com/zun/eiya_tr003.lzh - Demo.
http://www.paletweb.com/selectpage.asp?code=00051 - Buy.

It's worth buying. I did it.

[Monster in a box]

Hey wait, is it confirmed that there won't be any more DC games? I want a link.

As for Shooters...GigaWing 2 ftw. I'm serious.

[Geschpooklichkeit]

This thread should be closed immediately because it makes no mention of the first Gradius and Salamander games.

Also, it's a big shame that ESP Ra.De., Dangun Feveron and Ketsui were never ported.

[dog$]

Originally Posted by Patashu

Hm; anyone here played Mars Matrix? What's it like?

It's like Takumi's other games, but the feel of it isn't as fantasy-like compared to Giga Wing. Good music and game setup, too. Sorta a pain that the auto-piercing happens way faster than one could normally use it (which takes a small bit away from the "one button shooter" concept) but oh well, good game regardless.

Originally Posted by calwell

This thread should be closed immediately because it makes no mention of the first Gradius and Salamander games.

Well it's a good thing you just did, then.

[Altoid27]

No Twinkle Star Sprites love...?

And I actually picked up Gradius V the other day. It schooled me like it should but damn, level six is good times. The whole shifting liquid of death theme was really cool.

[Geschpooklichkeit]

Thanks for reminding me that ADK has a name too, Altoid27.

I once saw a signature advertising a Till fansite. I had no idea.

[dieKatze88]

Gradius (original) FTW.