What's up with shmups?
Oddly enough one of my biggest takeaways from Nier: Automata was that I needed to play some shmups. Queue the beginning of an odyssey that takes me into... bullet hell. List will be in order of playing.
List items
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This was supposed to be a good casual intro and it was exactly the right one. It seems like it's got a bit of classic shmup feel with the enemy patterns and stuff, but with plenty of currency, upgrading, grinding and so on. Yet the game is just so polished, graphically and gameplay-wise, that I found it genuinely fun to grind stages, level up and come back later to tackle new difficulty levels and challenges. I have yet to beat it but I'm almost through what appears to be the final boss.
Funnily enough, I found this one to be so good that I was a bit disappointed by the euroshmups I found after. Of course I had to look up what the term euroshmup means, which is generally console-oriented shmups predominantly made in the West. As opposed to arcade style Japanese games, euroshmups tend to have longer play times, upgrading, and less tight gameplay in terms of enemy and bullet patterns.
When I first learned that euroshmup was often used as a pejorative, I rolled my eyes at the typical hardcore gamer snobbishness that would call something like Sky Force a bad game. Little did I know, I think I've come to start agreeing with the sentiment. Sky Force so far has been unusual in its design, possibly because I think it's a game that's been remade and remastered several times to become incredibly polished and tight as an experience, unlike some other Euros I would play.
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It says something that I almost forgot I played this at all when I put this list together. Which is weird, because it is definitely a unique experience. I only played this second because it happened to be on sale for $3, otherwise it's not exactly highly recommended, for beginners or otherwise.
It's got an unusually fleshed out story and world for a shmup, and some of the voice acting was genuinely good. Mixed with some... not so good. It's also harder for me to take seriously when the characters are anthropomorphic animals, but sometimes that's just an anime thing, I guess. But damn, the story is dark. War, genocide, slavery, rape, blackmail, revenge, it's all stuffed in here, which is ludicrous when you think about it. It's about going to the right and shooting stuff.
Unfortunately I think there's too much story for a genre where I just want instant action. Perhaps they expect you to play over and over and unravel the often vague story, and there's time travel of course, but I wasn't really drawn to do that. Why? Because the gameplay isn't that great.
One problem is stages are broken up between lots of pilots and time periods so you don't really get used to one. Some stages have weird momentum that pulls your ship which is super annoying. There's a slow down time button with limited energy, and sometimes certain attacks by bosses almost seemed to require it. When you don't have it anymore, get fucked. Perhaps the worst part for me was the time extension mechanic, since your life bar is basically a timer ticking down, replenished by shooting stuff. What often happened was a sloppy loop of getting hit, losing powerups and time with very little invincibility frames, going for the powerups, getting hit, losing time, etc. etc.... Even when I didn't die from this it felt shoddy as hell, like a newgrounds flash game or something. I just didn't feel like replaying this when it was done.
Which is a shame, because like I said it had an interesting setting, and graphically it's great. Some of the boss encounters are pretty cool. Maybe I'll try it again sometime.
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This was up there as euroshmups considered classics. I will say that playing it instantly made me understand the negative sentiment towards the euro games. Obviously this is a much older game that feels more indie than Sky Force, but that's not the only thing that feels rough. Enemies, projectiles and levels feel very thrown together with the kitchen sink approach. Sloppy is the word that comes to mind, and while I tried to overcome my initial lukewarm reaction, I came to a weird enemy that kept killing me without it being very clear. I haven't returned for a few days. Yes I may return, but I just don't feel it drawing me back. Instead, I'm looking for a better initial experience.
It's not that I don't think this game is the worst thing ever, but I was just surprised at being so negative about what I was really excited to try out. Another Sky Force-like! Instead, my excitement towards exploring euroshmups came crashing down rather quickly.
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This was the other big recommendation for beginner shmups. And meh. Co-op is definitely supposed to be a big draw, so I'm missing out on that. But yeah, it just feels a bit sloppy. Despite the fact that I think the pixel art is good, I just don't love the aesthetic. The play area is also wider than the screen which is just... weird. It does the Sky Force thing of having to repeat stages on higher difficulties to progress, but I didn't feel drawn to do so. Also it's got the story thing again, which just feels extraneous and boring to me despite a good effort in making story art.
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I was looking for classics to get into and tried this on MAME. It's not bad for 1984 but it definitely feels sluggish. I do like the military theme though. Which lead me to...
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Now we're talking. I am definitely into the WW2 theme and saw this series on steam. Word around the arcade was this one wasn't too hard as well. Perfect.
And yeah I was right. I think this hit the sweet spot in being a cool aesthetic, being hard but not punishing, and having some cool options for planes and weapons. After about an hour of play I could clear the first stage without getting hit, and get about 5 stages in on 2 continues. And I found myself dodging some genuinely butt clenching bullet storms. But I want to play more and get better. Perhaps go for the 1CC? First I need to be able to beat the game at all so I won't get ahead of myself. Maybe on easy, though.
This sort of feels like the step towards becoming an obnoxious shmup supremacist, so that's cool.
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Again, on sale for 6 bucks, why not. It's got some classics on there: twin bee, gradius one and two, and lifeforce. Played a bit of those and I found it alright, but they feel just a bit too old for my current tastes. Lifeforce definitely stood out as a bizarre thing. Reminds me of the Magic Schoolbus episode where they explore inside someone's body. Not sure if I'm supposed to be in a giant alien or something, but it's hilarious. Getting a powered up weapon which I could call a frame slow-down beam is also hilarious. I might play more of that just out of morbid curiosity as to where the hell my ship will go next. Anyway, haven't tried Gradius 2 yet, but perhaps I will. There's some other arcade stuff on there too. But uh... fuck Konami? I dunno, that's not why I'm here.
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This was where I realized that hardcore shmups were probably not really my thing. This is supposed to be an excellent and cheap intro to real japanese bullet hell shooters, but I'm just not into it. The difficulty wasn't even that high, I'm just not into the frenetic pace over the more deliberate euroshmups.
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Kind of a shmup-adjacent game, has a bit of asteroids feel to it with gravity. Didn't really do it for me either. Decided that I was good with shmups for a while. I'm glad I tried some stuff, even if it was to find that I only really loved Sky Force Reloaded. But sometimes it's fun to narrow down your likes and dislikes.
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