Got a little over 24 million in Maniac Mode on Mushi tonight, decent improvement over my previous 17 million score. Still having trouble getting past stage 3 boss with one credit (man I love that stage!)
1 Like
Stage 3 on Mushi is the best in the series. Love how serene the music in stage 4 is, it fits quite well after 3. Man I really need to get me a board of that.
1 Like
Our long national nightmare is finally over, Raiden will be out on ACA on Switch and PS4 next week:
So momentous an occasion it even got a full page ad in the latest Famitsu:
5 Likes
So I picked up R-Type Final 2 along with a shiny new Xbox Series X! But I do have some questions about the game itself.
So far a lot of the difficulty seems to present itself as an exercise in trial and error because the visibility of appearing enemies, bullets and the collision detection in the scenery aren’t all that clear and need to be learned in specific circumstances. But it does have that ‘one more go’ appeal because certain strategies work best in certain situations. But it does frustrate me how little comes naturally when starting a new level. I’ve only gotten to the stage 3 boss so far on hard.
I’m really just wondering if I should quit while I’m ahead…because I am coming back to it every evening but I can’t say I’m enjoying it much. What do you folk say - and if I should keep at it, do you have any tips in general? I dread battling the second boss each playthrough if I’m honest.
2 Likes
Played some RF2 tonight. Man I’m having trouble with the Stage 3 boss, Flying Ray hit box is a bit large and I’m not dodging efficiently. Have improved my medal game though.
1 Like
The 2nd boss is the hardest for me, i think because you spend so long waiting, get impatient and make stupid mistakes.
Drop the difficulty and keep playing though, there’s some good stages later on!
2 Likes
Cheers, I’ll keep at it! I’m happy doing a round a day, I’m sure it’ll eventually click with me…I hope!
I had read somewhere that there were different teams doing stage design for R-Type Final 2, which is why it feels kind of inconsistent. The AI stage in particular stands out to me, as it doesn’t really feel like R-Type. I feel like some of the boss designs were handled by different teams as well, but I can’t confirm that.
Either way, you should still stick with the game, its decent overall. I definitely think its more enjoyable than Final 1, just not as good as Delta or Leo (my personal favorite)
Yeah I played it a lot on 360, I think default settings in the US version is much easier than the Japanese PCB.
That’s interesting. The credits list was surprisingly huge so it does make a lot of sense. I quite like how distinctive the levels and locations are from each other, very memorable.
I played another hour tonight and I don’t think it’s clicking with me. It’s a very messy game - there’s all these different ships you can unlock to make things easier but I can’t say I really understand it. It’s very puzzle-y in the sense that you can’t just pick up the game and understand how it works, it seems half of your success comes down to observing each level, coming up with strategies and knowing which ships and ship parts excel, and then pulling it off.
In other words - I’m not sure I’d be able to pick up the controller in 5 years and immediately know what I’m meant to be doing. It doesn’t quite have that arcade immediacy to it, if that makes sense.
Or maybe I’m also just rubbish!
1 Like
Did you play the first R-Type Final by chance? This one has the exact same museum and ship list as that one. I feel that these games are the Gran Turismos of shmups. Not exactly something I’d strive for a 1cc, but a fun pick up and play game where I can try out a new ship with different weapons and see how it performs on the course.
Precisely. There’s a lot of memorization required in the RF series, and lots of it doesn’t come naturally by just observation: miclus locations, fairy reveal conditions, rules for medal value increase and optimal routes for it, bullet patterns and the best way to graze the; there’s lots of memorization involved, but also skill is required to pull all that off in a single run. I just love how overly complex and hard it is.
1 Like
Thanks for the replies both, I’ve got a good idea of what the game is trying to do now! I also reread Martin Robinson’s review at Eurogamer and he brought up Gran Turismo as a comparison point as well, it does seem fairly apt based on how overwhelming the options seem right now to me (I went and purchased five new ships last night)
I think I need to just take things slowly and experiment as much as I can, it’s a good thing the game really does have that ‘one more go’ appeal to it even though it’s highly frustrating at the moment.
Maybe I’ll come back to it when I can give it more of my attention, at the moment I’m only squeezing in a small amount each day because I’m hooked playing the surprisingly good Scarlet Nexus!
I want to like this game because it really is unique in how it plays and how it’s designed.
1 Like
Just a little over 24 more hours…
Really nice little collection from this person:
2 Likes
Raiden is already out on the Japanese eShop, I couldn’t wait any longer so I bought a 1,000 yen code and downloaded it. It installed to my Switch NA account in English and includes both the International/U.S. and Japanese versions for those wondering. Great to finally have this game on current systems!
2 Likes
The full list of Taito Egret II Mini titles has been announced with multiple shmups including a couple we should have gotten from M2 by now:
1 Like
Mushi on the Switch is very nice. They did a good job with the graphics. Window is a bit small though. The PS2 port scales all the way vertically.
1 Like
I think I caught the Shmup bug. I downloaded Mushihimesama on Switch and am enjoying how crazy the bullet patterns are on the harder modes.
Also got Battle Garegga on PS4 and am starting to see why people like it. It’s hard to put my finger on why, but it feels different from a lot of other shmups. The rank system is nuts too. It’s great to have this game on PS4 but part of me wishes I had the Saturn version to play on a proper CRT.
Also been playing a bunch of Layer Section on Saturn. I still think this is my favorite example of the genre. It’s so balanced, the bosses have tons of variety and the parallax graphics are some of the best I’ve seen in any video game full stop. Taito was at the height of their powers here. I never get bored of this one.
And I just ordered the physical version of ESP Ra De on Switch. Can’t wait for that to arrive. Going to play it for the first time next week.
I own a few other games I don’t rate as highly like Raiden Project (ps1), R-Type, DonPachi (Saturn - I think the port is bad but the game is good), Gunbird (Saturn), Ikaruga, and a few others… but I’m wondering what should be next.
Any good cheap common games I should look into that would be good on a CRT? Looking to grab my next shmup on a budget.
4 Likes