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Shmups (Shoot 'Em Ups) |OT| THE FULL EXTENT OF THE JAM
- Thread starter Nya
- Start date
I find trying to improve at shumps is like trying to get at fighting games. The best thing is to is to looks for small incremental improvements. Try to record yourself to see how you died and then improve upon it. Build good habits. And play lots.
This video might help too.
Check this video out:
Ignore the fact that it's a superplay, the strategy used to kill those turret planes is very simple and effective.
I have been using it since, and this section just stopped being a problem. No crazy dodging, just some positioning.
Just keep playing and remind yourself of the route you want to take.
Garegga is a peculiar game as it allows a much more freeform approach than other titles in the genre. It's going to be harder to stick to a route and have it play out exactly the same everytime, since for that to happen, you would need to pay very close attention to what items you are picking up; only pick up the same amount every time at the same place, only suicide at roughly the same spots, etc, etc...
When your rank is not at the same value in the same spots in each run, enemies\bosses can behave differently, making it harder for you to be prepared.
If say we were talking about most Cave shmups, if you know a good route, everything is going to be behaving the same way every single time you play.
With this in mind you can either stick with Garegga, look at a low score clear of the game and try to understand and mimmick said route, or try another shmup you enjoy that's more traditional.
Oh, if you do stick with Garegga, ask all the questions that come to mind.
I spent a lot of time looking at videos not knowing why a player was doing something i thought looked weird or out of place.
When i got some answers from the top players is when everything in the game started making much more sense.
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Friendly reminder we have a AGDQ runthrough of Mushihimesama Futari this Wed. Will be interesting to see how it goes. I believe hes running on Ultra on the 360.
Been enjoying Trouble Witches Episode 1 on steam these past couple of days. Still hoping Studio Siesta is currently working on the next one.
In the follow-up tweet is a link to the Devil Blade prototype. I just played a round and am now more than ready to see the final version-
it's GUS! he was the superplayer for the recent stunfest runs.
he's doing ultra in 1.01 which is the absolute hardest mode available on the home port (was tied to first print runs of the game on a dlc card) and it's similar (with a few changes) compared to the pcb version 1.0.
in 1.01 you can't suck in gems, bombs do basically no damage (act as bullet cancelling) and bullets are much faster. the base xbox 360 game is 1.5 which has a lot of changes that make it more accessible/easier.
I have the 1.01 dlc card and have tried the mode out a few times and completely wrote it off after struggling compared to other modes.
The best Gus moment is when he was giving an interview for his counterstop of Futari and his mom[?] started yelling at him.
Good luck tomorrow, and schedule your fucking tutoring, Gus!
Also Inspirational Speech (Give it a sec)
If you're going to try
Go all the way
Good luck tomorrow, and schedule your fucking tutoring, Gus!
Also Inspirational Speech (Give it a sec)
If you're going to try
Go all the way
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Thanks this is great to know. I was luckly to get the DLC card with my import on my 360 and I never understand the difference between all of them. Arrange, Ultra, God, and then 1.5 Arrange, Ultra, and God.
What the one where the gems are blue for a set period when they first drop and are worth more and then just turn normal after they stay out for 1-2 seconds on the screen?
gets even a little bit more confusing once you start including pcb versions. with your blue gems question - that could be a couple of versions. I think what you might be referring to is black label, but it could even be referring to ver 1.5 maniac mode.
strictly speaking of the home port, the simple way for me to think of the differences is..
- ver 1.01 is the bonus dlc mode that came with first print runs that most closely resembles the original pcb 1.0 version which is the most difficult/not as popular
- ver 1.5 is the "base game" for the port which is much more polished
- black label introduced a lot of quality of life changes for both beginners and score chasers to make it more fun. it changes bullet patterns, speeds, scoring rules etc
- arrange is a completely different style of play than ver 1.5 and black label which is a "fun" mode. these are usually created exclusively for home ports.
and then then for the difficulties per each version
- ver 1.01: original, maniac, ultra
- ver 1.5: original, maniac, ultra
- black label: original, maniac, god (god has a new unlockable true last boss)
- arrange: original, maniac, ultra (even tho arrange modes usually have 1 difficulty)
a lot of people prefer the futari black label modes > other versions. in black label on the original difficulty the guns are more powerful than in 1.5 so it makes it easier for beginners to get the clear. for score chasers the score is heavily based on proximity to the kill (e.g blue gem pickup window) and the higher the mulitplier achieved the higher the rank, and the faster the bullets/enemies become. once you crank it up to 100,000 overall multiplier the speed is insane.
this will give more detail between 1.5 and black label
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And lest we forget, there's an easier variant of the Black Label PCB entitled "Another Ver.".
yeaaaa I was avoiding listing that one lol
it's the only version of the game I own on pcb, and but apparently god mode doesn't have easier bosses like the other modes (not that I can make it to stage 3 very often anyway).
I have both Black Label versions but like a fool sold off 1.5. Argh..
So for the first time in my life I'm trying to actually "git gud" at shmups. I've always been a casual fan of the genre, dabbling here and there while watching videos of talented players 1CC'ing bullet hell games and the like. But after getting a Flip Grip for my Switch I'm trying to get to the point where I can clear some of these hard shmups on the default difficulty settings.
I recently cleared and unlocked nearly everything in Jamestown+, which was a very accessible entry point for my new obsession. That game was made to be on the easier side compared to other classics in the genre (especially ones originally released in arcades), and I was well aware of that while playing.
Now I'm moving on to more traditionally hard shmups like Dragon Blaze and Ikaruga, and I'm finding myself hitting a wall in terms of progression. Dragon Blaze is what I'm focusing on right now, and I can't even clear it with the default three-lives, two-continues setting on normal difficulty. I know that these games were designed to suck quarters, but damn it I feel like I should be able to do this.
Are there any general tips or pieces of advice that veterans of the genre in here could offer me to help me improve? I don't expect there to be any shortcuts to greatness, so to speak, but maybe there are some factors or general approaches that I'm not considering.
I recently cleared and unlocked nearly everything in Jamestown+, which was a very accessible entry point for my new obsession. That game was made to be on the easier side compared to other classics in the genre (especially ones originally released in arcades), and I was well aware of that while playing.
Now I'm moving on to more traditionally hard shmups like Dragon Blaze and Ikaruga, and I'm finding myself hitting a wall in terms of progression. Dragon Blaze is what I'm focusing on right now, and I can't even clear it with the default three-lives, two-continues setting on normal difficulty. I know that these games were designed to suck quarters, but damn it I feel like I should be able to do this.
Are there any general tips or pieces of advice that veterans of the genre in here could offer me to help me improve? I don't expect there to be any shortcuts to greatness, so to speak, but maybe there are some factors or general approaches that I'm not considering.
I personally love black label much more than 1.5 tbh, but I get the feeling
when hurting for cash I sold off esp ra.de., armed police batrider korean b, dimahoo, and strikers 1999 :(
Lots of words. Hope it helps..
One thing to keep in mind that isn't really stated enough is there are kind of two major approaches. Score and Survival. A lot of the random videos you come across are going to be players focused on scoring which can give a little bit of a false sense of how to approach the game as a whole and your own abilities. Watching someone chain 100% of the game isn't going to offer much in the way of how to approach it when you are just trying to survive. So with that in mind here are a few general survival tips. This is just what works for me, disregard anything that isn't working or doesn't sound like it fits for you.
- If you die and you have bombs left to use you screwed up. Many games give you 3 lives and 3 bombs each life which effectively gives you 9 lives total [I just realized my math here is bad but you get the idea] (not to mention additional bombs and lives you can pick up along the way.) This is huge to surviving. If you die and look and see you are sitting on 2 bombs then face palm because that death shouldn't have happened.
- Try to play every single day. I like to do sessions in threes. Playing three times back-to-back, one immediately after the other. You'll be dying a lot so three in a row will probably take like 20-30 mins tops so pretty easy to squeeze into even the busiest schedule. You can always do more if you feel like it or do multiple sessions throughout the day but keeping something limited and focused like this is easier to keep an honest schedule, imo. As you learn the game more and each run gets longer (or if it is a particularly long game) it might make sense to drop it down to 2 or 1 depending.
- If you make a daily habit of it like the above then it is probably going to take around 1 to 2 months of steady play to knock out your first 1CC of something in the bullet hell range of difficulty. Subsequent games are likely to be shorter as a lot of what you have learned and muscle memory will carry over, just don't be surprised if a few days or weeks in you experience a lull where you feel like you are not really getting better or worse. Just playing to roughly the same area and dying, repeat.
The LULL - Some things you can try to get over the feeling like you hit a ceiling.
- If the game has a practice mode or save states USE THEM. Playing through the first 3 stages just to die at the same midboss is only delaying learning how to fight that midboss each session. If you know that midboss is a rough spot for you spend your session focusing strictly on that boss/section.
- If the game doesn't have a way to practice then improvise the best you can. Credit feed and bomb your way back, whatever you can to practice the stuff that is actually challenging you. You are going to play through stage 1 a hundred times, you will practice it more than anything in the game just by virtue of repetition. Skipping it a few times to work out some rough spots is just a time save. This is also where watching videos can be useful. If there is a pattern that is just kicking your ass and you can't seem to find a way through watch some videos of specifically that boss/section and see what people do.
- Enjoy the little discoveries. It may sound a bit daft and obvious but this doesn't have to be a painful rote process. The hundreds of little things you learn along the way is what adds up. Despite what people often think these are not exercises in rote memorization. Yes, there is a certain amount of familiarity that comes with repetition, but it isn't strictly mechanical. You are not learning to become a Player Piano. Finding out you can just sit in a spot can be a huge revelation. Learning that if you kill an enemy immediately (or on the other hand let them live) can entirely change how difficult the route you need to traverse and can make a section that previously seemed impossible totally easy. This is the stuff that is most difficult to communicate because unless you are talking to someone deep into a specific game trying to tell someone that killing the third enemy that spawns on the left in stage 4 by mashing autoshot is the key to it all just sounds like noise.
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Yeah. That's the first thing I thought about when seeing this. I don't know if it even has a price yet. I'd get one if I didn't already have decent TVs and computer monitors already.
Thanks for the lengthy reply. I'm doing something similar to what you described, playing three runs or so at a time usually twice a day when I have some free time. The game I'm trying to clear at the moment is Dragon Blaze. On the default two continues, three lives setting with Normal 5/7 difficulty it feels borderline impossible.
I just recently decided to knock the difficulty down to three to see the later areas of the game so I'll be more familiar with them by the time I can reach them in Normal.
But like... damn. Is this considered to be a particularly difficult game by genre standards? It's got some legitimate bullet hell moments, but the bullet speeds are much faster than what you see in most danmaku games in the style of Cave. Seems nearly impossible to react to some of them, even when I know they're coming.
I don't really like Psikyo's games so I'm not the best to advise on them. In particular their rank systems range from annoying to complete bullshit from what I have tried. No idea where Dragon Blaze ranks on that scale but generally it will be stuff like the longer you stay alive the faster the bullets get until it is impossible to force a death and a credit to be dropped. Usually the way to get around this is intentionally dying at strategic parts to keep the rank in check long enough that a 1CC is feasibly possible at higher difficulties. To be clear, lots of games have systems like this, I just find Psikyo's particularly egregious so I just avoid their games in general as I have plenty of stuff I want to play ahead of their stuff. So from my perspective as a hater I personally have no issue with anyone who notches their games down in difficulty though don't let my grumpiness around their games sway you, I know plenty of people love their games.
I would definitely recommend giving the strategy guide on shmups forum a read. In particular read up carefully on how the rank system works as it is likely the source of any big difficulty spikes you are running into.
edit: taking a glance at that looks like all the images are broken so the wayback version might be a better help at understanding things:
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Thank you for that post SoH! really good stuff, makes me want to get back into actually trying to finish shmups rather than just dabbling in them for a few hours over a couple weeks and moving on.
watching high-rank Ikaruga videos totally killed my interest in that game for a long time because I assumed that that was the 'correct' way to play and it didn't look fun at all, but there is absolutely a huge difference between playing for score and playing for a clear... I think I'll try to dive back into that or Rolling Gunner sometime this week
watching high-rank Ikaruga videos totally killed my interest in that game for a long time because I assumed that that was the 'correct' way to play and it didn't look fun at all, but there is absolutely a huge difference between playing for score and playing for a clear... I think I'll try to dive back into that or Rolling Gunner sometime this week
I just assume people know this shit and I have a real difficult time judging between what is stupidly obvious so not worth mentioning and what is opaque as fuck. I also have a god awful memory so I try to avoid giving specific gameplay tips unless it is something I am heavily into in that exact moment.
So if you didn't already know just throw [game name] shmup strategy into google and the top link will probably be the ST: on the shmup's forum.
Failing that the strategy index is pinned at the top of the forum and fairly well maintained: https://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1896
So if you didn't already know just throw [game name] shmup strategy into google and the top link will probably be the ST: on the shmup's forum.
Failing that the strategy index is pinned at the top of the forum and fairly well maintained: https://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1896
MMMM....
That spoiler cuts deep. I did the same.
No longer have pretty much anything on PCB apart from Progear and TGM.
Does AGDQ put the runs up on youtube after the fact? I'm not going to be anywhere I can catch Gus' stream when it happens live.
youtube can take a few days or weeks but here will be updated with a timestamp link relatively quickly
not exactly shmup related, but shortly before the futari run, Aquas (avid shmup player) is racing another player in ghouls 'n ghosts. He's a great muchi muchi pork player (among other games) that I've had fun trying to compare scores to in 1.0 and 1.01.
edit: actually it's going to be on next :o
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Can't wait.
My dream is that the 1CC marathon integrates into AGDQ somehow.
It was seriously down to the wire, I wasn't sure if he was going to make it. StarCreator pointed out in the AGDQ thread that they set it to allow more lives, but I forget what the defaults are so hoping they might elaborate here. Is it that you normally only get 2 from score and they unlocked it? In any case that last life was clutch.
There are probably literally impossible to 1CC shmups out there that I guess would technically be harder just by virtue of being impossible unless someone figures something crazy out. And I suppose the games that loop forever have a sort of difficulty by endurance depending on how you look at it. I think the high score for marathoning Galaga goes on for like 11 hours or something nuts and you are required to stand at the cabinet for it to count.
Futari Ultra is up there though.
I feel validated reading this post, I really don't like Psikyo games that much except for maybe Gunbird 2.
Both videos were of great help, thanks
I guess it'd rely on someone working on a TAS run to see if it's possible. Would require some time though, I'd imagine.
I'm really late to the party on this, but I just got Danmaku Unlimited 3 for my Switch and it's so good!
I'm bouncing between various games in my Switch shmup library right now, but this one is gonna have its hooks in me for sure. The audiovisual style and kinetic energy of the game really do it for me, and hitting that Trance Break and showering my ship with gold gems feels amazing.
I'm bouncing between various games in my Switch shmup library right now, but this one is gonna have its hooks in me for sure. The audiovisual style and kinetic energy of the game really do it for me, and hitting that Trance Break and showering my ship with gold gems feels amazing.
In comparison to Ver 1.0 (arcade-only, unfortunately), Ver 1.01 adds two more bombs, more slowdown, and a smaller hitbox (only in Ultra mode). Still extremely difficult, of course, and still a lot harder than Ver 1.5.
There is more discussion in the original CAVE-STG thread: http://cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=61.0
Also check out the Ver 1.5 strategy guide: http://cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=3.0
It was set to extends at every 70mil, which can give you near 20 lives to play with if you score well (as Gus does). On default extends you only get two score-based extends and one fixed 1UP (so 5 total lives).
Thanks hongcha I may go back and count the deaths to find where he died "for real." I'd guess somewhere in stage 5 which is still impressive considering 1.01 and he was also trying to break a billion live.
I'm also curious if he technically made it to the stage 1UP or if he'd gone through his lives by then. Not to diminish it, was a hell of a run no doubts. Just for science.
I'm also curious if he technically made it to the stage 1UP or if he'd gone through his lives by then. Not to diminish it, was a hell of a run no doubts. Just for science.
I think he only died twice before stage 5. I don't remember how many lives he lost in Stage 5 (pretty sure it was at least one), but he lost 7-8 on the final boss. The extra extends are the most important on the final boss, as they make it significantly easier to get through. It should be noted Gus has cleared 1.01 Ultra on default extends, to his great credit -- one of only two known people (IIRC) on the planet to have accomplished this monumental feat.