One Credit Completion

Within the circles of those who continually test their mettle against the forces of constantly scrolling antagonistic affiliates (relatively speaking), there at one point or another comes into discussion a mention of the one credit completion, the 1CC, the accomplishment for which there is no reward other than the drive to keep pushing forward to gain another (conditions permitting). The 1CC is the friend of the challenge-seeker, the foe of the casualite, and a distant cousin of the credits screen.

I've mentioned this little thing before, but for those who enjoy caressing their eyes over its description, a one credit completion, in shmups, is the art of playing an entire game from start to finish without ever losing all lives, thereby not using any continues. Yummy. It gets a bit more complicated when you break down how to accomplish this in any given shmup, but the general strategy is the same: Get a lot of points, earn a lot of lives, abuse systems to maintain a possibility of survival, and fail... over and over.

Failure Is Only An Option At First
There are of course variations to the methods for gaining such a title, which include playing for survival (dodge everything), or using tool-assisted software (a demonstration of a different caliber altogether). The real treat that we've all come to see is to witness a human putting his all into one joystick, a set of buttons, and doing what countless others before him could only hope to accomplish.

The issue I have with the lore surrounding this skill is the slew of misconceptions surrounding its existence. I've read many attempts to cleanse the reputation of the 1CC and its achievers. They all do a good job of clearing up some air, but it's hard to convince someone from the other side that something once thought to be a waste of time is actually something worth fighting for. Opinions are just opinions I suppose.

There are people out there who buy/try a shmup, play it in its entirety one time, credit-feed the countdown whenever necessary (sometimes dozens of times by the final levels), beat it, and walk away with a cheap sense of thrills from various arrays of bullets and boss designs, never desiring to understand what greater accomplishment lies just beneath the surface. Something was lost along the way.

The 1CC and Me
What's my personal drive for attaining the 1CC? Pulling off a 1CC means that I fully understood the rules by which a game is bound. It means I have control over what was designed to be impossible at first glace. It means I overcame the obstacles that stopped me countless times before. It means I understood something fully and could actually perform the necessary skills when the time came for it.

Is this not the same feeling that people get when they build a car from scratch by themselves? The same feeling of building a house from the ground up? The same feeling of winning the final round of Hold Em on national television? All of these people worked hard to get where they got. They learned from their mistakes, from others like them, pushed passed the point where others gave up, and went the distance.

Other kinds of people would have just given the car-in-progress to a mechanic, or the second floor's completion to a group of construction workers. A shmupper would have pressed start to continue. There's nothing wrong with this. The car gets to drive; the house gets to be lived in. But what do you tell the kids to teach them about motivation, personal drive, and self-worth?

Okay, those may be a bit dramatic, but the ideals behind these accomplishments are the same. People want to do things entirely on their own, without the help of a continue option, to prove to the world that they are not spineless drones to challenges that give up and never try again.

Never gaining a 1CC is fine, too. It's even okay to stop trying on one particular game. The point is that you should always be pushing yourself to learn, to grow, to gain something from your experiences that you can take with you. Sure, you could live in that house that you built, but you could also take what you've learned from 1CCing a shmup and apply it to managing your personal business more efficiently, to driving on the highway both more efficiently and safely, or to composing that concerto the world's been waiting for (the one that looks easy, is difficult to play, is fun to listen to, and takes generations for people to dissect and fully appreciate).

I know there are various Achievements and Trophies given out for 1CCing a game, but those aren't worthy of representing the blood, sweat, and blisters associated with going those extra 100 miles. The real reward comes from within. It can't even be shared with friends who don't know about its roots without sounding like a cheap brag. Those friends need to experience it for themselves, and I don't mean having them only play one credit to see how challenging the game really is. They need to experience the thrill of gaining a title few in the world have ever held in their hands.

Everyone needs to 1CC something in their life.

A Plumber's Dance
Take this guy for example. He beat Super Mario Bros. by playing on a dance pad. Granted, it took only a week of practice, but he has a sense of accomplishment that no one else in the world can feel. The best part of all is that his joy is shared in raw form on camera, especially during the final level where we hear his yearning to touch that axe and solidify his journey to that point. And what does he do after the credits? He asks the community what game he should beat on a dance pad next.

He's taking what he gained, what he earned from pushing himself to achieve this goal, and applying it to something new. Personally, I think he just enjoys the thrill of that final moment, where it all comes together and he knows that he pulled off what he set out to do.

On the subject of shmups, it's fun to know that there are people on the other side of the spectrum that are not satisfied with the 1CC alone. They yearn for an even greater accomplishment: to both 1CC a game and to hold the highest score in the world for said game. Granted, a higher score implies more bonus lives which in turn implies an "easier" time 1CCing a game, but the added dangers and challenges of going for those higher scores is more than enough to warrant the quest for such an endeavor.

Rocky Said It Best
My point is, the 1CC is not a worthless art and a sign of someone having no life. Everybody does something in this world. Everybody is striving for something. However, not everyone will be able to continue after having failed. It's those that can push themselves to their limits and keep moving forward that are deserving of what they've earned. Some of those people play shmups. But this way of thinking goes for anyone and everyone.

I respect anyone who doesn't give up, and I look up to anyone who can get up after having fallen down. Whether or not any of them are trying to 1CC is irrelevant. I just wanted to let some open minds understand why the 1CC is not a goal exclusively for the elite; it's a waypoint for anyone desiring better things, a stronger being, and something onto which to grasp in order to find value and meaning in this chaotic world.

You and I both know it would be tough to have a dedicated post to the 1CC and not end with a video of courage and strength. Below is part 1 of an 8 part video of someone recently 1CCing Gradius III on Very Difficult mode. This game is one of the hardest of them all to 1CC, especially on the highest difficulty. Has it been done before? Yeah. Has it been recorded before? Probably. Does this guy feel any less accomplished? Will he continue pushing himself to accomplish great things in life? I think actions here speak louder than words.



[Full YouTube playlist here]

Additional Links:
- The 1CCers of the Shmups Forum
- Shmups Forum discussion on how to practice shmups
- SuperPlay! A database of videos of people being really good at shmups.

[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

Treasure: The Thrill of The Chase

Patterns in gameplay have existed since... well, since the first two videogames were released. They both had visuals and most likely interactivity as well. However, I'm talking about a pattern much more specific. In fact, I've only seen it done three times, and from the same company at that. Oh, Treasure (♥), how I unceasingly find intrigue in your existence. Read below to learn (and hopefully relive) "The Thrill of The Chase!"

The chase to which I refer can be found in Radiant Silvergun, Sin & Punishment, and Ikaruga. Though these games contain dozens of bosses, midbosses, subbosses, and minibosses, this chase occurs but once in each. Over the course of the three games, it has changed shape to accommodate both the mechanics of the game it's within and the undying thirst we have for a knowingly-conquerable challenge.

The basic recipe for this thrill chase is that you are either chasing or being chased by a subboss while avoiding both enemy fire and environmental hazards at a brisk pace. It's a workout for both the brain and the fingers, forcing the player to utilize all the mechanics of the game to not only win the chase, but to survive in general.

Radiant Silvergun: Stage 2 Midboss
Silvergun's is the most complex of the three, though it's probably the most manageable after a few go-arounds. There are sometimes split paths offered that are a win-lose situation: You may have an easier time surviving for the next 3 seconds, but the boss isn't losing health any faster. Consider this the pit-stop to give your rubber some time to cool off. This is also the only boss of the three games that attacks from both behind and in front of the player. I'm not counting Ikaruga (below) because the boss just sits down there, though you can still collide with it (and probably will the first few times).



Sin and Punishment: Stage 2-1 Midboss
S&P's version of the chase is the easiest to complete, though it's still no walk in the park. Besides the fact that there are split paths to follow in order to kill the boss quickly (time limit here this time), the game has bonuses littered throughout the chase to coax players into going for the major points at the risk of falling indefinitely. On the plus side, this boss doesn't fire back at you; he's kind of just concerned with running away from you, which makes you look like the killer. Regardless, the boss's actions give the player just enough split seconds to follow en route for a quick finish. This is the only chase of the three to also employ gravity as a mechanic, so timing [double] jumps is combined with strafing left and right, while of course collecting bonus points, firing a gun, and slashing floating bombs into the boss's rear end.



Ikaruga: Chapter 3 Midboss
This one is the killer. By this point, this is Treasure's third pass at making a chase that can really make the sweat drops glisten. Not only does this boss sway back and forth, but it constantly vomits out sprays from four companions as well as its own ugly mouth. On top of that, the sprays are alternating in polarity, so when one is crossing your path, you have to be ready to cut through the center stream and survive against an oncoming stream of the opposite polarity. I apologize for the skill level of the player in the video below. He actually does so well, you don't have much of a chance to appreciate anything (other than his dedication to turning a chase into t-ball practice).

This boss is known as one of the hardest sections in the game, which makes it all the more enjoyable to know that of all the changes Treasure made to the game for its XBox Live Arcade port, this boss had the most significant change. That change is that its companions spin in the opposite direction than they did in the arcade, Dreamcast, and Gamecube versions. Nothing too complicated for the pros, but you almost have to relearn this section from scratch, creating all new digital nightmares for your scoreboard to be plagued with when the console is turned off.



I hope I haven't missed other chase sequences in Treasure games of past. I'm relying on memory for Mischief Makers and Gunstar Heroes (which had a close call with the underground mine level), so if anyone can think of others, do share!

[Update: It's been brought to my attention that this chase can be found in two additional newer games: Gradius V and Sin & Punishment 2, both of which were also made by Treasure. Awesome. However, I can't offer too much insight on these, despite being able to easily find them on YouTube. I have this thing where I like to play Treasure games firsthand before spoiling anything online. I haven't gotten that far in Gradius V and S&P2 hasn't been released in the states yet, so I'll just have to assume that both of these chases are nothing short of thrilling. Thanks Evil_Toaster!]

[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

Novice Ultra Mode: An Oxymoron For Us All

Too Easy, Or Too Fun?
It's a well-established notion nowadays that the shmup - particularly the vertically-scrolling danmaku shooter from overseas - is a genre of gaming best reserved for those with determined hearts and as many quarters as they have reasons not to go easy on themselves. With that in mind, it's a breath of fresh air to see that Cave, the head honcho in professional modern shmup releases, has introduced a Novice difficulty into their home port of (deep breath here) Mushihimesama Futari 1.5. For a game that's popular on YouTube based solely upon its difficulty, it's wonderful to learn that the developer didn't want to shy away those who would otherwise use this game's existence as a reason to stick to their Mario RPGs (don't hate) and actually have a chance at completing a game. But then they made an Ultra version of Novice mode. Yes, this is where it gets fun.

Novice Original mode by itself is the tamest out of... thirteen possible modes there are in the game. It features very few slow-moving bullets and plenty of ways to milk your lives out. Auto-bomb is included here, granting you another chance to live in exchange for one bomb. This is a step up from Ketsui for DS, which would clear your entire bomb stock upon being poked by a pink dot. Take into account that the beginning of each boss will net you a bonus two bombs and you effectively have dozens of lives at your disposal (and no need to even hover over the bomb button).

Don't be fooled, though. The tweaked mechanics of the game don't hold your hand the entire way. If someone is playing a Novice mode, it's likely that he or she feels that it's the appropriate difficulty at which to play. Novice Original is great for people to get into the jive of playing a bullet hell shooter altogether. For those who have some shred of confidence, but not enough to be on bomb duty the entire time, Novice Ultra is the way to go (I am ignoring Novice Maniac, the in-betweener, as it's pretty much the average between my two points of interest).

Novice Ultra also spews few bullets at the player, also at a slow pace, but these comparisons are in relation to the original arcade release, found elsewhere on the disc. There's plenty of bullet weaving to be had, and even less hand-holding present (perhaps only a few fingers are gripped at this point).

Suddenly You're Amazing
The thing that makes this mode so thrilling is the illusion of you being awesome. The developer went through a lot of trouble to revise every single bullet pattern to create immediate dotted chaos on the screen, only to have it fall into a recognizable pattern with wide gaps for escape. There are very few moments of overlapping patterns, some of which come from the same enemy, effectively keeping your focus at maximum (and your sweat glands dry). On top of this, larger enemies' bullets disappear upon destruction, giving you a break just before your eyes dilate to their maximum. Once you get used to this little feature, you'll quickly go from Marty to Doc in expecting immediate danger to just disappear.

Just to prove how helpful this mode is, I 1CC'd Novice Ultra on my second try, having gotten to the final form of the final boss my first try. And the best part of all? It was a complete joy to play through from beginning to epic end. Though I didn't have too much difficulty lasting the entirety of the game, I had my mind gears churning out some finely-tuned calculations. This accomplishment is one of my two legitimate 1CCs, the other being a full 2nd loop clear in Star Prince in Retro Game Challenge (that counts, right?).


This Is Not A Review
So, the real question is, "Does Novice Mode really allow beginners/novices to get into the shmup club?" The short answer is yes. The long answer is no (I know, that's actually one letter shorter). It's definitely a step in the right direction, but I'm sure more can be done to help out those who aren't accustomed to bullet herding, max chaining, multiplier maximization, etc. Just what those things are, I am uncertain. I guess we'll just have to wait and see what evolutions of an old genre will pop up in the future.

I tried to keep this post away from becoming a review, but in all honesty, this is a fantastic port of the original. And the fact that it's region-free means that anyone with an NTSC Xbox360 can join in on the fun... for about 70 smackers. If you're interested in learning more about the game, BulletMagnet from Dtoid has a ridiculously detailed article covering every single aspect of the game.

Below is part 1 of a 4-part run in Novice Ultra. The rest can be found from related videos, but I suggest you discover the rest of the game with your own two thumbs.



[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

The Anatomy of a Shmup

If I haven't made it clear yet, I'm working on another shmup. This time, since I'm not restricted by a competition deadline, I've been paying close attention to the art behind creating shmups, both commercially and online. The big boys appear to be doing everything right. I only ever have a few nitpicks about them. If I ever feel like I don't like one, it's because of personal preference, not something that I can point out as being done poorly.

As for the indie shmups available for free or for a few bucks, they are hit or miss. Sometimes the design is ingenious, but the presentation is lacking. Sometimes the visuals are spectacular, but the gameplay is uninspired. Sometimes the game is pretty good, but could have been pushed further in various areas. There's a different reason for each game, but the importance here is that I'm taking notes on all of it.

Below I've gathered together a list of what I've observed over the months and years of playing. The ideas are in no particular order and only represent a fraction of my records. I thought I'd share them so you, too, can pinpoint a reason for any given game not being quite what you had hoped.

Keep in mind that not everything I say is required for every shmup. They each have their own place. Most of these notes are for scrolling and arena shooters, while some apply to any game or piece of art.

• Enemy bullets should always be visible. The bullets shot by enemies should be visible on top of explosions, power-ups, other enemies, etc. The point here is that those bullets are your primary reason for not beating the game. Any time not spent being able to see them is time not spent preparing to engage them. If a foreground object is going to obscure the view of play, it's a good idea to make sure no bullets are on-screen. The only exception for hiding bullets is the HUD; for this reason, the HUD should be kept to a visual minimum.


• Off-screen enemies should not be able to shoot. If the enemies aren't visible to the player, then how can a player even have a chance at feeling good about himself when dying from one of these bullets? This causes too much confusion, anger, and force quitting.


• All bullets should have a ricochet/splash effect when hitting something. Without some sort of "splash" or "pop" effect to show contact, it makes it feel like either the bullets have no effect or they're passing under the enemy/obstacle in question.


• Bullet collision should be accurate. This goes for any game where you can shoot and be shot at, but it's just a shame to be shooting something and having your bullets pass right by, or meeting the all-too-familiar death from a bullet that wasn't even in your area code.


• If the player's ship has a small hitbox, make it obvious. I seemed to miss this point with my last shmup. The key here is to let the player quickly know his boundaries of death when in a crunch. Sometimes only a few frames of opportunity are available, during which time it's essential to be able to see where your sweet spot is.


• The contrast between bullets and backgrounds should be high. This is something that's very important for survival, let alone for aesthetically pleasing visuals. An indie game for Dreamcast, Last Hope, had a special edition released that featured a higher bullet contrast. When Cave releases black label editions of their shmups, they oftentimes feature "darker background palettes". Also of note is that Cave has stuck with pink and bright blue colors for the bullets in all of their games. I guess they found the magic palette to make identifying bullets easiest.


• Enemies should show some sign of being hit. If an enemy doesn't flicker or shake or shoot sparks when being shot, I can only assume that it is invulnerable to attack. The whole thing doesn't need to flash white (it really hurts the eyes with bosses), but there needs to be some indication of it taking damage. On that note, if an enemy is invulnerable (shields are up, boss hasn't settled yet, etc.), don't change a thing about it. Some games let your bullets pass through during these times, which is also fine.


• Everything that is destroyed should explode. I'm almost completely serious when I say explode. As in fire and smoke. It doesn't seem to matter what the enemy is made out of; humans by nature love to see explosions and there's nothing more satisfying than watching something dangerous go up in flames. The Mushihimesama series gets around its insect/prehistoric theme by coloring its explosions blue, which in turn makes it look like a release of natural gas... or something. The point is, if you spend all that time pumping an enemy full of bullets, all of Newton's Laws say that it should explode into a fiery ball of satisfying pixelated splendor. And as far as boss explosions go, they better be a spectacular light show of gaseous fulfillment, including a screen-flooding flash of brightness that slows down gameplay.


• There should be a sense of flow to each level. If you fast-forward through superplays of various commercial shmups, it becomes very clear that the design of each level is structured to force you to want to zig and zag all over the place. It not only keeps your wrists happy, but it never leaves you waiting in boredom. Radiant Silvergun and Ikaruga both reward quick killers with additional enemies to shoot while waiting for the next section to arrive. It's okay to have nothing to do while being warned about a boss. For one, this gives your eyes a chance to focus on the text. Second, it allows you to build up whatever fear/confidence that its presence concocts in your body. Even arena shmups like Geometry Wars and Echoes provide a flow in where the enemies spawn.


• The visual style should be consistent through all levels, enemies, effects, menus, etc. The fact that this is something that every artist ever in history should be considering, it's sad to see it ignored so often. It's as if every 14-year-old with a wicked idea and limited freetime has used the same animated GIF of an explosion in his game. I was one of them. It's great as a placeholder, but if the rest of your game is composed of clean vector gradient fills, your explosion will not only look out of place; it will break gameplay. This happens a lot with uninspired menus as well, where a generic font is used without proper formatting. The end result can only make a player frown, no matter how spectacular the rest of the game looks.


• There should be "popcorn" enemies in every level. These are enemies that blow up (with an explosion) after being hit once (or very seldom). The key here is quantity. Popcorn enemies not only fill in empty holes of time between waves of more viable forces, but they also make the player feel like he's the coolest kid on his block (and if he's playing a shmup, he automatically is).


• There should be a way to save yourself in times of need. The most obvious method of saving one's life is the bomb. DoDonPachi also has a super/hyper beam. Ikaruga has homing lasers. Radiant Silvergun has a sword that slices everything in its path. The key here is that the player should be able to get out of a sticky situation. Most of these moves make the player invincible for a short amount of time, which in turn allows him to get out of physical obstacles as well as enemy fire.


• If an enemy appears out of thin air on-screen, allow time for the player to ready himself. Never have an enemy appear in the middle of the screen and fly off at full speed shooting everything its mother taught it. It's okay for it to accelerate to its destined speed, or wait a second before firing. There can even be an indication of its arrival before it even appears. Geometry Wars does this with particle splashes. Works wonders. Believe me.


• Enemy health should be either shown or predictable. Ikaruga shows the health of every enemy you start shooting at via a thin bar on the HUD. For games that show you nothing, you should be able to tell how long you need to be firing at an enemy before it's destroyed. Things like relative size or the presence of armor are usually good indications. If an enemy takes way too long to die, or if it explodes rather quickly, it will feel off, break gameplay, and your bewilderment over the developer's choosing of its health will put you into a stumper just long enough to be swallowed by an oncoming sea of bullets.


• The coming of a boss should be made clear. This can be done through a large warning sign, the sound of a siren, the sound of nothing at all, or simply a lull in enemies, signifying the coming of something large. If you don't know that you're fighting a boss, then you won't try as hard, and you also won't be as enraged when you come close to defeating it and ultimately die. Think of it this way: If you told Mr. Magoo that he just walked through a construction zone that failed its last safety and security inspections, he probably wouldn't be as emotionally struck as Lando Calrissian would feel if you told him that he just blew up the second Death Star and narrowly avoided being engulfed by its own flames (see? everything explodes). If you think that's a silly argument to make because Lando would have already known what just happened, you're right. That's the point. He knew the whole time that he was escaping certain death. The stakes were high and his adrenaline was pumping in return. The whole experience was a ride. And that's what a player needs to feel before the boss even shows its ugly mug.


• An unwanted sound should be heard when the player is hit/destroyed. The thought of losing a life and having to insert another quarter is enough to make a player avoid death, but the more that enforces that feeling of dread, the better. I think Squares 2 does this the best. The sound of that buzzer is the last thing I'd want to resonate in my ears, especially after having heard a looping sample from Daft Punk. Daft Punk!


• There should always be a way out of every situation. Here, I'm talking about designing the enemies and bullet formations such that there is definitely a way to get through, at least by the developer. I know players can lose focus and corner themselves into a tight circle of pain, but that's going to happen in any game. If you dodge the wrong way, you're only setting yourself up for failure. Half the "fun" of bullet hell games is learning how to manipulate the enemies into shooting such that you will have a measely crevice through which to escape failure. This is sometimes called bullet herding, which is kind of awesome. Even Space Invaders had this in the form of being able to hide behind your bases. That counts, right?


• Separate simultaneous bullet patterns should have different-looking bullets. The human brain is a beautiful thing, capable of recognizing complex patterns faster than any super computer today could ever hope to match (note: computers do not yet have hope). However, given the added sensations of stress, danger, and really fast bullets in large numbers, it would be such a great help if separate patterns had varied bullets. This can be achieved through color, shape, animation, and even rotation. The Touhou games are especially known for having hundreds of bullets on screen, each pattern distintively careening towards you at varying paces of fear induction.


• Camera-shake is a privelage, not a right. The effect always looks cool. Let's get that out of the way. The problem is when camera-shake is used when every enemy is destroyed, every piece of gold is collected, and every bullet is fired. Not only does this make for too much visual noise for the player's eyes (Cloverfield was under an hour for a reason), but it also dampens the effect. The less it appears, the more it'll mean for the player when it does happen. Trust me - less is more.

As I've said before, all of these suggestions are optional and in my opinion. They're all things that I've seen implemented beautifully in console/arcade releases and miserably emulated in free online Flash games. Since I'm making a free online Flash game, I'm going to do my best to maintain a level of polish and attention to detail that allows the game to stay together as a whole. Even a single out-of-place sound effect can ruin the entire experience.

To kind of drive these points home, I'd like to use the same identifying features from the screenshot of Ikaruga above and apply them to Space Invaders. Ya know, for fun.

It would be mean to point out the games that I feel could have been more successful, even by just following my suggestions above, so I'll just talk about the free shmups that did a lot of things right.

- Arcanacra: Excellent flow of gameplay, superb use of sound (The enemies/attacks are synchronized with the music), enemy bullets stay visible, enemies show signs of taking damage, there are popcorn enemies, and the boss explosion is worth the trouble. This is the best free shmup that I've seen do so many things so well.

- Cube Colossus: Excellent visual style (nice explosions), unique and useful control mechanic, bullet contrast against backgrounds, engaging sound design (especially when buying upgrades), ample warning before bosses and spawning enemies, and enemies have visible health and show signs of taking damage.

- Death vs. Monstars: visually and audibly unique explosions, a simple control mechanic that allows for quick and accurate aiming, popcorn enemies, a spectacular boss explosion, and enemy bullets that stay visible.

- Heavy Weapons: Great use of sound (especially of enemies spawning nearby), effects and menus match visual style of the game, and of course there are many popcorn enemies.

[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

Ikaruga: The Art of Chaining

Chaining. I've touched on this before, but I've wanted to do a video version for a long time. And, as it just so happens to be the one year anniversary of SHMUPtheory (Happy BDay, little guy), I felt like celebrating with something special. Below you'll find a 10+ minute video guide on how to chain the first chapter of Ikaruga, or at least how I do it. I spent quite a bit of time putting this thing together, especially when compared with how long it takes to type a regular post, so I hope you guys enjoy. Also, I realized it would probably be helpful to see the entire run without interruptions, so an additional uncut version is provided even further down.

Enjoy and happy chaining!



Below is the uncut version, since I realized it would make things a lot easier if the gameplay didn't pause every two seconds. This way it's much easier to learn timings (and sound cues).


[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

Lag, Control, and You

Talking about control isn't something that should be new to you. It's not some aspect of game design that slipped by your critical radar all these years and suddenly has been given new light. I'm sure you can still remember your thoughts when the Wii's controller was first unveiled; how impressed you were (and still are) at the SNES controller's simple, yet refined curves; how weird it was to see the Virtual Boy's double D-pad; how happy-yet-disappointed it was to see the Playstation controller evolve only under the hood - rather than on the outside - as each successive console was revealed. This is something that doesn't need to be said at all, as you should already know all of this. All of it. Still, though, I have things to say about control in relation to shmups. I'll try my best to stay on target.

First off, let's define something here: "control". Control is comprised of any and all aspects in games that allow you, the player, to interact with the game. The most prominent factors are some sort of input apparatus (e.g. a controller) and a monitor/television/Tiger Electronics LCD screen for viewing the status of a game. The factor I'm most concerned about is lag, which is no stranger to almost all other genres of games, especially fighters, racers, and FPSs.

Lag in itself means different things. We have:

• 1. Lag from human response time - This is how long it takes you to see something, calculate what you want to do, convert that to controller inputs, and make your body carry out those actions. This takes longer for more complex inputs (such as the infamous "The Mohawk").
• 2. Lag from controller-to-console-to-monitor - This is easily the shortest lag of all, yet it tends to gain the most hatred for ever existing. This also includes the online gaming route of controller-to-console-to-server-to-console-to-monitor.
  
• 3. Lag from game-related issues - Intentional slowdown, intense calculations, etc. This technically takes place during lag #2, but it deserves its own recognition.
  
• 4. Lag from Light - The time it takes for light to reflect off the monitor, travel through space, and into your retinas. I think I'll ignore this one.

And since we're all so visual nowadays, here are those same 4 kinds of lag, presented in one cohesive diagram:

Human Response Time Lag
In regards to response time, I don't have too much to say. This is the easiest lag to alleviate, though it takes the longest to achieve. The only way to make this lag go away is to keep on practicing until pressing buttons becomes second-nature. Luckily, practice in one game usually rolls over to other games, and even to other consoles. It varies from person to person. Some people are super quick at reacting, but aren't too accurate. Other people may take a few extra milliseconds to realize what's going on, but usually pull through. And of course there are people who are unfamiliar with their input device and have to look down at their hands more often than they look at the monitor.

Electronic Limitations Lag
Lag from the controller to the monitor is some kind of new-found beast in this generation. Back when we all had wired controllers and CRTs, no one even mentioned this. Now we've got Street Fighter IV vets who talk down upon wireless controllers' inferior speeds for sending input signals. There are forums dedicated to finding the right HDTV so as to minimalize the time it takes to process a composite signal into a digital format. Many HDTVs come with an option to switch to "Game Mode", which sacrifices cleaner visuals for less processing time.

As an avid fan and tournament-goer for Super Smash Bros. Melee, I can confirm for those out of the loop that pros will only play serious matches on CRTs. This is a fact across the United States and in international countries (I know you're there, Sweden, France, and Japan). Any HDTVs at a tourny are often used as the "just messin' around" TVs, the ones that are ignored during serious gameplay. Almost all players choose not to use the wireless Wavebird, despite its high review marks, to avoid any channel-switching shenanigans / battery-related tragedies. Does all of this attention to the saving of milliseconds make that much of a difference?

Yes. This is why MadCatz's billion-selling fight sticks have wires. They don't want any potential customer to doubt for a second that he or she will witness electric lag before purchasing one of these bad boys... especially when he or she will be dropping 150 big ones (i.e. dollars). Using HD cables on an HD console with a newer HDTV has become less of a problem. It's still there, but I feel technology is closing this short-lived chapter soon enough.

Intentionally Programmed / Intense Calculations Lag
When we press a button, we expect to see a result on the screen immediately (or rather, in such a quick manner that it feels instantaneous. Can't ignore physics after all.) If we press a button, wait, and then see the result appear on the screen, there had better be a good reason for it. Going back to Melee: if you try to jump, your character will first duck down and prepare for jumping, a Principle of Animation known as "anticipation". It makes the jump more believable, and only takes a few frames to accomplish. The game runs at 60 frames/second, so we're talking about a very short amount of time it takes to finally see your character leap into the air. This kind of lag is short enough to be ignored (...well maybe that's a poor example, as pros love to exploit this moment to wavedash all up and down their opponents' grills. It's hardly ignored at all and many players love to count frames to calculate how to achieve an added boost in--

Oh... right, shmups.

Intentional Lag in Shmups
The kind of input lag without immediate result that can really mess up gameplay can be found in many shmups. Let's look at Irukandji by Charlies Games. I hate to use this as an example, as I just love Charlie's other shmups to death, including the so-well-done (and 100% nsfw) Space Phallus, but I have a point to make here. The game takes place underwater. When you try to move, your ship takes a few frames to get up to speed, to simulate the water friction that would be found in such an environment. When you let go of movement inputs, the ship takes a few frames to slow down. This means if you want to move in a completely opposite direction than you currently are moving, then it takes about twice as long as usual to come to a stop, then start from rest and build that momentum back up to go the other way. The bullet patterns never get too complex to require intense weaving, and I totally understand that it's underwater and should feel like we're under water. But come on... this is a shmup.

I guess it makes little sense for a ship to be able to stop on a dime in any direction, but sometimes it's just needed. In shmups, it's almost always needed. And they're still tough as nails without any momentum lag. Plus, ya know, we have far more important things to complain about...

Here's a quick and dirty graph of the time it takes to reach full speed as compared with how much we should be tolerating it. I picked these games off the top of my head, so I can't exactly say they're accurately placed (especially since there are no numerical values for the axes). This graph is based simply off of my personal experience with them. Also note that the red bar exponentially reaches intolerability very rapidly.

Faster than Fast
It makes even less sense that most shmups allow your ship to move at full horizontal and vertical speeds when moving diagonally. The X and Y-axis movements are separate forces, so if you move diagonally, you actually end up combining their forces. Following Pythagoras, this means you'd technically be moving at ~1.414 times your normal movement speed. Ever wonder why speedrunners in FPSs move diagonally through worlds? Ever wonder why bunny hopping works so gosh darn well? Now you know.


That's all fine and dandy, but why don't more shmups force you to only move at your maximum speed? Many arena shmups impose this limitation, such as in Geometry Wars, but it's unheard of in vert and hori shmups. Why? Well, just think about it: As you wiggle through a swarm of pink death candy, you continuously hold [up] and sometimes press [right] to sneak through when an opening arises. If you could only move at maximum speed when moving in both directions, your vertical speed would slow down momentarily until you let go of [right]. This can very quickly become annoying and ultimately spell both your doom and a non-braggable NO RANK status at the leaderboard. It's cool with me to find this in arena shmups, especially when using analog sticks, since both your ship and the input device move in similar circular fashions.

Compensating for Something Small
It's possible to get used to sudden bursts and halts in speed as you weave in and out of certain death. It's possible to compensate for your ship's inability to change direction faster than in 0.2 seconds. It's possible for the mind to calculate everything happening on screen, tacking on an additional 0.2 seconds of leeway knowing that this one game was designed to feel more believable.

Back in the 56k modem days (33.3 for moi), we had to know when to let go of our sniper rifles' triggers in TFC, assuming the intended target would continue his trajectory and land under that big red spot just as the lag caught up and registered a hit. That was unnecessary skill, but we compensated. My point is, we shouldn't have to make that compensation, especially if the reasoning is because the developer(s) decided to make things not as responsive as they could have been.

True, there are plenty of instances where a little bit of intentional lag is passable, but when input-results become too delayed, the game isn't even worth getting good at. An exceptional exception is found in Mushihimesama Futari 1.5 (gazuntite) for Xbox360. The game intentionally creates gamespeed lag when too many bullets/killer insects are on screen (so as to emulate the arcade version). Your beetle-ship still responds faster than Lassie at an unsupervised well, but the whole game is slowed momentarily, allowing you to make even Neo a bit jealous.

Shameless Plug
And for those of you who were patiently waiting this whole time to make a comment about my own shmup's ship taking a little too long to move back and forth, I know. Trust me, I know. I obviously had my reasons, but I don't think they really make a difference at this point (especially after having rambled for much longer than was needed for something you already knew). If I ever make another shmup, rest assured you'll be stopping on dimes and moving at ~1.414 times your maximum speed all day.

[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

How My Grandfather Won The War: Designing for One

Movies =/= Games
You can spend your whole life enjoying something made by others, but it's not until you try to make one yourself that you realize how much effort needs to go into it. This goes for any craft, job, or project. My main focus here will be on games, though all forms of entertainment are within acceptable bounds for my thoughts. I mean, it would be so cool to only have movie directors write reviews of their peers' works, but then they'd be talking about aspects that we, as an audience, wouldn't really appreciate/understand. That's why I will accept Rotten Tomatoes and my local newspaper for what they have to say, since they represent the common movie-goer. Though as with anyone's opinion, it's just an opinion.

There are a lot of factors that go into enjoying a movie or not. The experience of movie-watching has enough to do with the surrounding environment, people, and events leading up to that 2-hour moment as the movie itself. Personally, I thoroughly enjoy the Super Mario Bros. movie each and every time I see it, despite the horrible reviews from critics and Bob Hoskins himself. I was a kid and anything magical that had to do with my Nintendo was a winner in my book.

But that's movies. One needs only a comfy seat and attentiveness to let the magic happen. At the very least, every person that watches a given movie is (more or less) watching the exact same thing (there are matters of screen size and audio fidelity, though insignificant at best). Such is not the case for games. Games are designed to follow a certain guideline of events and plots and adrenaline moments, but no two players are going to have identical experiences (or rather see the same series of events). That is precisely why a review of a game is more like one account of an experience out of many. I suppose you could count the different experiences that individuals would get out of a single movie, but at least they all watched the same thing. A novice to racing sims who constantly crashes into walls will dislike the game for entirely different reasons than a veteran who looks down upon the lack of tune-up features and varying strengths of snow tires.

The Competition
Thus we have finally arrived at what you came here to read: a brief peek into my mind when creating my recent entry for JayIsGames.com's CGDC6, How My Grandfather Won The War. I had been meaning to enter the prior competitions but had too much schoolwork on my lap to convince me I could complete whatever I designed. This time, school was summed up into a diploma on my wall, and my 9-5 job had yet to show its menacing cubicle-shaped face. The time was now (i.e. then).

The steps toward creating the game out of thin air were a matter of balancing two factors: the theme of the competition and what I could actually make. The theme was "explore" and I was in the mood to make a shmup (shocker, I know). I figured that the idea for scrolling across a plane wouldn't cut it for exploration, and an arena shooter would firmly leave the player in one area, so I decided to create a mechanic that would reveal an alternate vision of the world through which the player would travel. To simplify that thought: The player shoots something that opens up paths to survive. In essence, the player would both be exploring how to get past each obstacle, and would be uncovering some visual piece of information to make sense of the world.

I wanted this mechanic to not only be in the spotlight, but to also be one of the few things to even worry about. That's why I chose to not have the player be able to move horizontally, so that more brain power could be used to focus on shooting. I also removed many of the standard conventions of shmups, including bombs, scores, and upgrades. The only HUD in the game is a single bar that decreases as the player rapidly shoots. Otherwise, the gameplay itself is the star of the show. In essence, this shmup was more of a dodge-em-up, in that you cannot destroy obstacles directly with your shots. You can only evade.

This made for some very fun brainstorming. Each of the obstacles in the game were specifically designed to cater to a different type of necessity of avoidance: the spikes are static and only appear at the edges, the flames create a vertical wall, the swinging tentacles create sudden and immediate danger to their left and right, etc.


Stream of Consciousness
The story itself was loosely based after the emotions I felt as a kid when hearing stories from my grandfather. They were outlandish, unpredictable, and quite enjoyable. The build-up of the story was so fun that it oftentimes made the ending lackluster in comparison, perhaps because I knew it was over at that point. This retelling of my childhood emotions through stream-of-consciousness is why nothing in the game really belongs together: orange spiky bursts followed by ambiguous tentacles, followed by a wave of shurikens. It's also why I chose to go with a cardboard theme, to solidify the child-like feeling of the game, and to hopefully endorse an exploration. That, and I tried the style before and really enjoyed it.

There was just one problem: the game was really hard. And even worse, I had designed it exactly as I had envisioned, leaving me at those dreaded crossroads of changing the gameplay to find something of equal merit that would satisfy a more acceptable difficulty. Now, this type of dilemma is no stranger to me, as I spent 18 months revising my Computer Animation thesis at Ringling until enough people were satisfied with it (basically, just the faculty, as friends always "loved" it and my partner and I were concerned enough with meeting deadlines while making changes and maintaining our original pitch as much as possible). The point is, change is good, and it's especially good when you have more and more people test out your game before it gets sent out to the masses for rapid-fire rating and [dis]approval. My game most certainly succumbed to a lack of playtesting before submission, resulting in me taking the easier, less effective route: build around the difficulty and cater to the skilled.

I realized that eventually, the player would run out of "juice" for shooting and inevitably be forced to dodge the oncoming obstacles manually until the meter refilled enough. Since I had no way of knowing where this would occur for each player, I made sure to design the entire game so that it could be flown through without shooting once. That's where I got the idea to reward the player for beating the entire game without shooting (a feat that, one month after submission, has been achieved publicly by less than a dozen people).

The majority of players were getting stuck in the first few seconds of the game. The reason? A life system that starts at 3, cannot be replenished, and forces the player to start at the beginning of the game after 3 deaths. Couple this with a foreign shooting mechanic (new to me, too) and it was a recipe for limited progress. I at first found this "within acceptable bounds" since the game takes less than 6 minutes to play from start to finish. The community at JIG was overwhelmingly verbal about this issue, so I submitted an update that would only set players back to the latest checkpoint upon game over. On top of that, the first two deaths became freebies, as the player would continue from the point immediately after the obstacle that caused his or her death (sans the boss battles).

My Personal Bruce Willis
I immediately saw improved results from players who persistently attempted to get through it, and I appreciated their efforts that much more. I knew from the beginning that this game would not be enjoyable by all, playable by even less, beatable by less than that, and only "truly" beaten by a select few. For some reason, I liked it this way. It reminded me a bit of Mr. Glass from Unbreakable, a villain who would ceaselessly create national tragedies to find the one man who was his opposite, a man that could not be broken (oh, right... spoiler alert back there). Though I really shouldn't gloat about feeling like an antagonist, especially in a medium where people come to get away from the stresses of life. I did get hooked on the feeling. I even designed the music and sound effects to promote simple, enjoyable gameplay in order to lure in the masses until I would find my Bruce Willis.

I did eventually find my Bruce Willis, though he exists in any player who completed the game without shooting once. One JIG member even went so far as to make an entire walkthrough of the game, explaining the tricks to getting around every obstacle, by both shooting and by purely dodging. This intentional difficulty was a risky move by me, especially for a competition where you want to receive the best judgment possible, by both the community and the judges. I did end up winning 3rd place though, and almost every person was impressed with my visuals (thank you, BFA ♥), but very few could say kind words about the gameplay, which is the most important aspect of any game.

The good news is that I agree with them. One member pointed me to a fantastic post at RetroRemakes that basically says, "There is no such thing as too easy." Some games are intentionally designed to be as difficult as possible(nsfw). Others do it unwittingly. And then some games want it to be difficult, but not immediately apparent. I do know that there is a small niche of players who crave masochistic gameplay, but I probably had no business trying to find them at a casual games website.

Oh, and the bad news? It's actually good news for me, but bad for "fans" of my game (you do exist, you do exist...). I'm not going to make the necessary changes to this game, not going to make it more for the masses and ultimately enjoyable by many. It was a competition entry, it served its purpose, I finished it, and I have other games I'd like to create. The good news is that I've learned my lesson on catering to varied skill levels, and am more than happy to (and looking forward to) allow the casual player to jump in and enjoy my work as much as those few dedicated individuals who would not stop at "Try Again".

Feedback Is Everything
The positive, constructive feedback from the JIG community (and partially from ArmorGames, many of whom were from JIG anyway) has been a wonderful help in pushing me in the right direction for my future work. I've had some people applaud my efforts, many more explain why it needed much improvement, and some who are absolutely convinced that it does not follow the theme of "explore" one bit. They all have valid points, and I thank them all for voicing their meaningful opinions, but no comments have as deep an impact on my future work as the collective bunch of 13-17 year olds (I checked; a few are older) that have such helpful words to share as:

• "3 words, I... hate it"
• "terrible game. one of the worst I have encountered on this site"
• "Did your grandfather program this too? 0,5/10"
• "Sometimes 'original' doesn't mean much. Take this game for instance, sure, it's unique. A beautiful unique turd. 2/10"
  
• "-99999999999999999999999999/10"
  

Seriously, if I can win over people like this, then I've gotten everyone else as well. Besides, If I can't look back and laugh at stuff like this, then no one will end up having enjoyed the game. ;]

Also, here's a review from JIG. Now, to work on something new.

[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

Ikaruga Pumpkin Carving: Halloween Harmony

I know this isn't exactly a post that breaks apart the inner workings of gameplay and interprets them while comparing against similar games in a category, but I figure since it has everything to do with shmups (more importantly Ikaruga), and because I spent over 6 hours from gutting to cutting - roughly the amount of time spent writing a decent-sized SHMUPtheory blogpost - then this is more than acceptable to share with everyone. Afterall, it's Halloween. Full video and images after the jump!



It was a pleasure to work on this pumpkin, doing my best to balance the blacks with the whites (or rather the bright oranges with the dark oranges), much in the way that Ikaruga is best remembered. Not only was this project a challenge, but I had an added challenge of trying to stay away from my new TE Fight Stick I got this week, which would have gone to use in the playing of... well, Ikaruga (and maybe some SFIV when I muster up the confidence in Focus-attack-dash-cancelling). However, it's all done and I'm happy with the results.

And to answer the question that didn't just come to your mind: No, none of the roughly 100 kids that came to my door had any clue what they were staring at when they saw this... other than the fact that it was a pumpkin. Enjoy the rest of your Halloween and remember not to eat that candy too quickly!







[continue]...

Ikaruga: Line Graphs Don't Lie

Graph definitely not to scale.
I suppose this whole fascination came about when I checked the Xbox360 leaderboards for all players in the world who completed Chapter 5 on Hard Mode with a rank of Dot Eater. There is only one. Even on Normal Mode, there are about 14. Chapter 4 has just over a dozen people who have even completed the chapter as a Dot Eater. Don't even worry about score at that point; completion appears to be enough of a reward. Combine this with my curiosity from why I rank so highly in Normal Mode without even touching the last 40% of the game, and the question comes to me: Just how many people play Ikaruga?

The only method I could think of was to scroll through the leaderboards manually. You can't just press UP from the top of the list, so I had to take the long route, 100 scores per screen, for 832 screens. My wireless controller went into sleep mode three times, once every 24,000 players, while I passed the time watching this fantastic tool-assisted speedrun of Mario 3. Naturally, I jotted down some data along the way, as the path to finding the worst-ranked player also reveals all players' scores at the same time.

For the sake of being fair in my analysis, this leaderboard is not a comprehensive list of every Ikaruga player in the world. Obviously, we have people who only played it in arcades (the lucky ones), on GameCube, on Dreamcast, or on an emulator (missing the point altogether). Then, for the people who have the Xbox version, there are those who downloaded it and never logged back in to Xbox LIVE (thereby never uploading a score for the board), those who changed settings from default, or those who only played on Easy Mode, Hard Mode, or a 2-Player equivalent. There are also guest profiles on those 360s that cannot have their scores uploaded to the online boards. Bummer. The point is: Normal Mode through all Chapters using default settings is what most people will play, as it's what happens if you keep pressing the A button at the title screen.

Knowing all of this, with what little merit this list has anymore, we can safely assume this is a good ballpark figure for the community as a whole. After over 30 minutes of rubberbanding the controller (Thank you, Gran Turismo), I can say that there have been 83,279 unique active players in Ikaruga. And the curve for those scores was fairly predictable (see image above). Knowing how brutally the learning curve treats players, the top score of 34.4 million points is quickly cut in thirds to 10.3 million by the 500th player. At 10,000 players, the score is at 1.3 million. From there, it has a steady decline in scores until around the 83,000th player, who has 11,100 points. The dead last player clearly had one goal in mind - to be the very last player on the list - with only 10 points. It appears others have tried to get the lowest score on the board, but many failed with 20 points. So far, only two people know the secret to getting a game over with only 10 points (something I can't figure out myself).

And speaking of low scores, I understand that the game is a tough cookie to play, let alone master, but many of these scores are just horrible. I'm trying my best not to be cocky about this, but if you just shoot at everything that comes at you without switching polarities or using homing lasers, you'll have about 200,000 points in your pocket by the end of Chapter 1, a score that about 20,000 people failed to acquire. If you just hold the fire button down and stare at the screen, you get a game over with 40,000 points, a score that over 4,000 people failed to acquire.

The only reasoning I can think of for these lower scores is that Ikaruga just wasn't the game these people thought it would be. Hype or word of mouth made them get the purchase, but the game was too intimidating, or some kind of Tom Clancy game came out that weekend and swept them off their feet. Everyone dies very early upon first playthrough. And for the next 50 to 500 playthroughs. But the more you play it, the more adept you'll become at simply surviving. These people may have tried, but they didn't continue trying, which is really the key here. Again, not their cup of tea.

An interesting trend I found in the scores is that duplicate scores never really appeared on the list until around the 70,000 player mark. I suppose this is just probability, as there are fewer digits available at this point (five, actually), allowing for fewer possible point totals.

So what have I gathered from all of this? Well, I now know I'm in the top 1% of the leaderboards, but I still have a few hundred hours of practice left until I beat the game. I'd say I've put in somewhere over 100 hours so far in my life. And I'm enjoying every moment of it. There appear to be tens of thousands of people who are no doubt trying their best to get the hang of the game, learning how to chain, how to survive, etc. In perusing forums for the game, I've seen that many beginner/intermediate players are still a little curious just how to go about chaining in the game. I'd be more than willing to put a video together explaining it, so do let me know if you're interested.

I also learned that if you want to be one of the few proud Dot Eaters in the world, give it a go in Hard Mode. I just tackled Chapter 2 last night, successfully pinning my name up alongside 40-some other brave souls in the world. I dare not venture into Chapters 4 and 5, as I'd hate to be the guy that undid the current guy's sole achievement in the world (though we all know it wouldn't happen even if I tried).

And to finish off the night, here's a wonderful little piece of information from the former top-ranking Ikaruga player in the world (now at a discomforting 4th place), who claimed that the game "is a joke," due in part because of how the port of the game to 360 saw the change in direction of the rotation of lasers that spin around a miniboss in Chapter 3. Kind of specific to be upset at the whole game, but I suppose few others deserve to say it than him. I, too, have been plagued by this minor change, yet it remains in the same collection of unreachable hurdles that the rest of the game has been known to present.

So anyway, let me know if a chaining tutorial would be up your alley.

[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

The Blame Game: It's Not Me, It's You

So you're playing Raiden III, and you're just beasting it. You haven't lost a life, your bombs are out the wazoo, and that upcoming boss doesn't stand a chance against your maxed-out Crest toothpaste shooter. You're on top of the world, and then BAM-- You lost a life from some side-swiping peashooter, whose mere existence was dwarfed by your perfect run and blinding onslaught of explosions, medals, and hidden fairies. Was that really the way you thought it would all go down? You know you can't possibly continue this run knowing that you just let that happen to you. Your whole mindzone was destroyed by that one blind shot that snuck up from the rear, just when you thought the world was your bonus point.

I've come across very few shmups out there that result in both me seeing the pitiful end of a beautiful run and also have me blaming myself for the problem. I suppose there are people out there who, in all scenarios, will take a deep breath and say to themselves, "I will do better next time." For the rest of us, I think we've heard the phrase "Oh come on! That's just bullsh--" etc. time and time again.

Let's look at Raiden III. There's enemy ships designed specifically to shoot only horizontal bullets at you. In a game that's a vertical scroller, those familiar can attest that such a move is sneaky and grounds for punishment (to the game, controller, television, etc). It's hard for the eyes to judge whether collisions are going to happen horizontally (maybe one of the reasons the vertical line test in mathematics triumphs largely over any such horizontal equivalents). That's also why horizontal shmups have a pace that is slowed down, for more intricate observations that are much-needed in order to survive. This is also probably why Defender is so difficult. For anyone. And then there are those slow vertical shmups that suffer the opposite: unchallenging patterns in bullets and enemies that make you wish you had a reason to input your initials prematurely. I'm looking at you, Truxton II (but still, ♥).

So let's get to the games where I oftentimes keep blaming myself for a death. We have Ikaruga and R-Type. Both games are largely based upon memorization. Both of them definitely have unfair enemies that shoot horizontally. It's not like I'm warned any better about them coming. It's more about how predictable those enemies are. In Raiden (the series), I have a good grasp over how an enemy will shoot. The variable here is when that shot will be fired. That's really the key. Let's get Ikaruga out of the way and mention that everything is set to a rhythm that never disappoints, allowing you to know exactly when and why a bullet is coming your way. And even if you accidentally use your homing lasers, switch polarities, absorb all of the wrong color, die, and input your initials, whose fault was that? Well, you (okay, me. And it's always during Chapter 2-3). I've died hundreds (probably thousands) of times in that game, and not once have I blamed the game for a death.

R-Type follows loosely along the same lines. Scenarios are predictable enough such that you'll have a steady handle on what's going on around you. I suppose Gradius does some of the same, though sometimes the screen can become hectic enough for me to feel overwhelmed (dev's note: That was the point). I know these are supposed to vaguely simulate futuristic intergalactic space-travel against evil legions of badly-armored spacecraft, where randomness is the norm and dirty tricks are in. But seriously, twitch-based gameplay can really only go so far. If you've 1CC'd any of these unfair shmups, give yourself a pat on the back and go back to acing Death Smiles. I'll continue getting more than enough twitches with a game I have memorized from start to finish, but which I have yet to beat.

Perhaps it's personal preference, or maybe that I'm not fast enough for what those games demand. Whatever the case, I can only take so many doses of it until I've OD'd on failure. But then again, Michael Jordan missed over 9000 shots in his life. Which is why I get back on those horses, once enough time has passed to the point where I forget whose fault it was, of course.

[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...

Ikaruga: Practicing Faith

For those of us who've gotten "A"s and "S"s at the end of each chapter of Ikaruga, this one is for you. For those who don't quite understand how to get past that ridiculous symmetrical bullet-dodging section of Chapter 2, this one is for you. For those who haven't gotten into Ikaruga (shame on you and your friends for not getting you into it), this one is especially for you. There's a quality in this game and few others that we've taken for granted. I haven't come across too many games in my time where varying levels of challenge, skill sets, and excitement can all be experienced from the same game without even changing the difficulty or settings. For the sake of simplicity found in Chapter 3: Faith, I'll use the entire chapter as an example of what you may have already forgotten (or soon will be learning).

Chapter 3 contains the longest intro of any chapter, which accounts for it being the most difficult to chain perfectly (Chapter 2 coming in a very close second). There are several pinpoint shots that must be timed accordingly with your position on screen in order to not get crunched by the oncoming enemies... but I think I'm getting ahead of myself. The real joy and pleasure of this game - at least for me - comes from three very distinct moments in realization and accomplishments.

First is becoming aware of polarities and consciously switching to anticipate a future action, whether it be for dodging debris, to absorb bullet fire, or to drain an enemy's health faster. Regardless of your reasons for fine-tuning this ability into the hard-wirings of your brain, there's a moment where you step outside of your body, take a look at yourself, and see how much you've grown adept at switching polarities without having to be told why. You're a shining star in the world - if only for that one moment. This one really only applies to the earlier chapters, as this skill naturally carries over into later levels. The other two are on a chapter-to-chapter basis.

The second moment in memorable Ikaruga milestones is in the feeling of taking down a boss. That doesn't just mean you took down a boss. That means you also successfully understood the majority of what was going on throughout the entire chapter, which is something that does not come on the first try. Even Chapter 1 has its hardships towards the end when two lanes of little guys fall from the middle while two large pods do a ballet about the screen's perimeter, with helpless little you trying to survive the crisscrossing of enemy bullet fire streams. Then there's of course, you know, all of Chapter 4...

The third and most important moment you can possibly have in Treasure's (♥) masterpiece is chaining a level from start to finish. This arrives in varying degrees, from knowing of the chains that should be tackled and how, to actually doing a full chain without losing a life. I don't know about some of you (okay, none of you, so keep in touch), but I never really understood chaining even after being shown the art by a friend. It wasn't until I watched a couple superplays that it at least made sense on paper. It's not until you go in and do it yourself that it'll really click and you'll begin to appreciate the work that was put into this game.

Many other shmups out there have a chaining system of some sort. While they, too, have a strict script of actors that appear on screen, strategically placed for the sake of a specific methodology for chaining, it's never more apparent and satisfying than in Ikaruga. Perhaps it's the simplicity of your firing that allows you to know for sure what it was you just blew up and what's left on screen. Maybe it's your ability to count to three in your head rather than space out your shots hoping that your meter doesn't run low (my fist remains clenched for DoDonPachi).

So let's get back to Chapter 3. Right off the bat, you're presented with a whole screen of dancing foes and these guys that run down the side and turn when at your position in y-coordination notation. Eventually I learned to do some backtracking on the screen in order to fake them out, but the superplay spoke of a different method. Watch the clip below and pay attention to how the double sets of three spinning enemies open up a hole just wide enough for a bullet to get through and destroy all three of the inside ones in a single shot. Also pay attention to how the side guys are tricked into coming for your ship as you lure them in prematurely. Pause at 0:17 and continue reading. We'll take a look at other sections soon enough.



And that's just how you start the intro. The whole screen was cleared, not an enemy was spared, and the chain is unbroken. Gorgeous. Keep in mind that this player is quite flashy with his movements and switches polarity for the sake of collecting a few extra pieces of enemy debris, making his final score a few thousand points higher than the rest of the handful of shmup gods out there who also go for the small details in life. Let's move on.

Below you'll see a section that comes up halfway in the chapter wherein the walls close in, making your area for movement quite tight. As if that isn't enough, gates start closing in on you at staggered positions, requiring you to watch your spacing even further. A series of enemies are found within these tight spaces, not really posing a threat as long as you're constantly firing. Upon the first few playthroughs, they're nothing more than an afterthought. Eventually, once you learn the method for chaining them, the whole sequence is seen in a new light. The formations of their arrival is no mistake, as you must fire a rapid shot at one column, then the other, for shooting straight-on will immediately break the chain. A few spherical stragglers break up the rhythm (our player here releases his homing shot as it yields more points in the long run. That and it's a lot safer than going past the destination hole to single-shot those guys). As for the second set of enemy columns, they may appear similar, but this time they need to be rapidly shot down the middle, as they're now approaching in even-odd formation. Take a look below and then pause at 2:30.



It goes by so quickly, doesn't it? That's probably a good reason why people have such a hard time getting into shmups, but I'll save that thought for another week. In the meantime, let's focus on the next segment. A miniboss appears behind you, rendering your past strategy of hugging the back wall useless (and putting all of your practice in dodgeball down the gutter. Well, at least I hugged the back wall). This forces you up a little bit and closer to a series of closing gates that each have a spherical friend (i.e. foe) waiting in place. Of course we all had enough to worry about, what with the closing gates and big metal thing chasing on our tails, so we just held down the fire button and didn't even worry about those bystanders. Little did we know that we needed to single-shot them all, in order, to achieve a full chain. The genius design of this section is that if you shoot rapidly, your line of fire will skip ahead to an enemy above the closest one, breaking the chain. This requires you to utilize the ability to change rhythms on the fly, weave through gates, stay above the miniboss (which really isn't that daunting. The fear factor is what makes him worth mentioning), and single-shot those suckers right before you have a head-on collision and have to tell Guinness to come back another day to see you hit that world record. Watch below. Then pause at 2:42.



As if that strict set of movements wasn't enough, you also need to remember to move out of the way because that thing that was chasing you before suddenly feels the need to scoot ahead and take control of the situation. Yes, memorization is key in this game, though there's a point at which you stop thinking about what's coming and your mind simply knows. It's hard to explain, but your fingers eventually do all of the thinking, allowing your brain to focus on other things happening on screen. Seriously, I can't be the only one who has a spectator ask, "How did you know to dodge that?" and my only response is, "I'm not too sure... I just knew."

Continuing along, once the miniboss is kaput, a series of seemingly randomly-spawned enemies appear on the screen. And when you shoot one, it only multiplies into two, until the entire screen is filled with a chaotic nonsense of bouncing sphere guys. Well, at least it was random to us at first. There's a very definitive pattern here, and our player below exploits it for all it's worth. He doesn't finish killing them off as this section is just a filler until the boss (or rather, a bonus section as a reward for killing the miniboss earlier than expected. Afterall, the entire game is synced to the soundtrack). Go ahead and watch to the end. We'll discuss the boss battle in a hot second.



Yes, so... a phenomenal performance on the final boss of Chapter 3. Our player's strategy was to weaken the outer units each to the brink of blowing up, then summoning a homing laser that destroys the bulk of them simultaneously. The remainder of them is finished off amongst some mighty angry laser action coming from the core, which is strikingly similar to one of the bosses in Chapter 3 of Treasure's previous shmup, Radiant Silvergun. And speaking of bringing back battles, that miniboss hearkens of another battle from Silvergun wherein you were chasing / being chased by a miniboss. That same battle seemed to evolve yet again in Sin & Punishment. One can only hope these foes make their spiritual reappearance in Project RS3 (or Sin & Punishment 2).

As you've seen (and hopefully experienced), there are quite a few layers of play packed into Ikaruga's deceptively simple design. Strategies change quite a bit once you play on the different difficulties, though the harder it gets, the more you have to achieve. It's design like this that really keeps me entertained, excited, and glad to be a part of the shmup community. Indie developers are constantly finding fresh ways to keep an old genre alive, while a few larger-scale companies out there are still dedicated to providing high-quality adventures in the skies (and seas!) that we've come to love.

And for those of you wondering why I never mentioned the fourth Ikaruga milestone - achieving a one credit full-game completion - I'm still working on that one. I've only been able to get halfway through Chapter 5 on one credit, so some of you may agree that I have a long road ahead :]

[cross-posted on Gamasutra] [continue]...