Recent Obsessions Part 3
Friday December 6, 2024
It’s a slow day at work, so it’s the perfect time to write another one of these.
More Shmups
I’ve been swapping between a bunch of shmups. It’s only fair that I mention them all. I’ll go in order of play time.
Espgaluda
I was sold on Espgaluda as soon as I saw the bullet cancelling mechanic. Gigantic chunks of gold filling the screen before getting sucked into you with a satisfying little sound effect makes average gameplay look impressive to the uninformed spectator. The page on Shmup Wiki is pretty hard to understand, especially if you haven’t seen the game before. I’ll briefly try to summarize:
- Kill enemies to get gems
- Gems act as a meter for “Kakusei” mode
- When in Kakusei mode, killing enemies makes their on-screen bullets turn to gold.
- The more gold you have, the bigger and better the bullet-cancelled gold becomes. Bigger bullet cancels also get you more points.
That’s an extremely dumbed down explanation, so I suggest trying the game, then reading the wiki. It’ll make more sense.
This game is considered easy by Cave standards, but I’ve been struggling to get through level 4. Perhaps I am entirely too stubborn, because I hardly ever bomb. It’s hard to override the practice mode “never bomb” mentality during a “real run”, where survival is more important than getting through a bullet pattern flawlessly. Also, something throws me off about bombing in this game (and in ESP. Ra. De.) being on the third button and having it tied to a meter. I can never get a feel for how many more times I can get out of jail. I found this ranking of difficulty in Cave games, and I think his picks are interesting.
The music in this game is my favorite of all Cave game. The level 1 music would fit perfectly on a DDR machine. The only song that gets on my nerves is the boss music, but that’s because I’ve replayed bosses 100 times in a row.
I would love to own a real PCB of this game, but Cave games are crazy expensive, and I only have one cab with a vertical monitor.
Ketsui: Kizuna Jigoku Tachi
This game is hard. If you clicked that link above, you may have noticed Ketsui is ranked as one of the hardest. Despite the difficulty, I keep coming back to it. I think I usually make it to stage 3. Only recently have I started to “get” the scoring system, which mostly boils down to “kill everything point-blank.” The closer you are to an enemy when it dies, the higher value “chip” you get. The chips range from 1-5. After killing something point-blank, use the lock on shot to get showered in 5s for as long as you can keep the combo going. It’s fast, chaotic, the music is awesome, and I don’t even care that I may never beat it.
Blue Revolver
I saw this on sale for $7 with native Linux support, so I bought it instantly. This one is only last on the list because I haven’t had it for very long. I don’t have any other modern shmups to compare it too, but this game is a really sweet package that provides plenty of content to nudge you forward. Little video guides showing the best way to kill bosses in game and a Kirby Air Ride style unlock system keep me saying “ight one more run.” Of these 3 games, I am the least familiar with this one, so I’m hesitant to try to explain how scoring works. All that matters is that I’m hooked. I got an achievement for restarting on level 1 three times. “The mark of a gamer with willpower exceeding their current ability level.” Damn.
nelward
Enough about shmups. I’ve been listening to nelward for a few years now, but recently I’ve been listening to him on repeat. Older songs that didn’t really click with me before are really clicking with me now. Music is weird like that, or maybe it’s people that are weird about music. I saw him live at MAGFest a few years ago and it was awesome. It really set the bar high for the “music” part of the “Music and Games Festival”, but sadly he hasn’t been back.
Drawing
Yeah, the “hobby” section of this post is lacking. I already made a post about drawing, so I don’t want to repeat myself too much. I’ve been working on two new sticker designs since I’m running low on the current ones. Here is a sneak preview of both:
Stay tuned. Once I’m done with these, I’ll work on some general arcade related stickers that aren’t specific to maerk.xyz/Naomi. I don’t care if nobody buys them. I’m just having a good time.