O man, that really sucks :-(
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The Mega-Cave Shooter Post, because they're totally awesome and sweet
- Thread starter Victrix
- Start date
O man, that really sucks :-(
sixteen-bit
Member
Did they mention how Under Defeat performed?
Dash Kappei
Not actually that important
Considering he totally skimped about the possibility to bring over other non-CAVE region locked shmups like Raiden IV or RFvAces I'd say not too good but I'll try to ask him.
Does that leave the chance of any other publisher coming in? What about a digital-only release? I've managed to get around region locking on every major Cave release thus far, but will this be the one that finally makes me just buy a Japanese 360? I'd have to replace Resurrection and Akai Katana, both of which I'm very thankful RSG brought over.
Oi, now I'm antsy about getting the limited edition for its nice boxart, but then again it could still be brought over, in which case I'd be wasting money on it. Will a Japanese 360 still be easily obtainable next year? Can I use my US HDD with it? So many questions! Haven't had to deal with region anxieties in ages...it's strange >_>.
I guess I could go crazy and get a J360, a new HDD, and the ~$300 Cave collection, but that seems like going off the deep end on short notice.
Edit: Actually, that doesn't sound like a bad idea... /deep end
Edit 2: Done, fancy new J360, Shooting Collection, and SDOJ limited. Good lord, I feel like I have a hangover. On the bright side: color discs!
SOME-MIST
Member
yes, as long as it's the same model (because slim HDDs won't fit in fat 360s and vice versa).
Dr Zhivago
Member
;_;
Rising Star did an excellent job in what they did release, interesting there was such a fall off from DS. How many people waited for them to hit bargain prices, though?
Rising Star did an excellent job in what they did release, interesting there was such a fall off from DS. How many people waited for them to hit bargain prices, though?
SOME-MIST
Member
I did, because I already owned a copy for my J360 and I wanted a disc for my US360 and different leaderboards - but wasn't about to go and blow more money than I had to on a release I already had.
I think a lot of westerners just won't pay much for what they deem an "XBLA" level game. Sad, I know. I personally always buy shooters at launch, and never take them for granted. Thanks Rising Star for bringing over what you did though!
Maybe Aksys will give it another shot in the US?
Muchi Muchi Pink
Member
There goes the chance of getting mushihimesama HD, ketsui or sdoj in the near future.
also, shooters just straight up aren't all that popular. Strania was a inexpensive, xbla game and it didn't light up the charts all that well. Better to get more money from the few that are interested in buying in the first place than try to lure in hypothetical fence-sitters.
To be brutally honest, I think they made a BIG mistake when they chose to skip Deathsmiles 2 in favor of DFK and especially Akai Katana. Even if they couldn't hammer out a deal for DS2, they should have skipped AK in favor of Mushihime-sama, or just waited it out until SDOJ. It's pretty clear that RSG had very little understanding of the shoot'em up market (and not just for this reason), so it's both tragic and unsurprising that it's ended like this.
Aksys is unlikely to take up the mantle again due to their supposed falling-out with Cave, so it's all up to some other publisher now.
Why? If anything, Akai Katana should've worked better because it's a hori game and it makes full use of a 16:9 screen. Mushi 1 is an old game that already has a port (though it's a bad one) and most shooter fans probably own it. I don't see how RSG has "poor understanding of the shooter market". Shmup fans should've bought all of those games, unless they hate the bullet hell genre, because they're excellent. The problem is, there aren't many fans of the genre, and the few extra gamers who bought Death Smiles out of curiosity already had their fix and don't need more.
Darn.
Perhaps, XSeed will want to jump into the the "shmup" market.
Or maybe Valcon or UFO?
Danny Dudekisser
I paid good money for this Dynex!
Deathsmiles 2? I mean, the Deathsmiles name is established somewhat due to the original coming stateside, but bringing over a game that appears like it's more of the same, except with bad, sub-Dreamcast graphics? That sounds like a worse idea than what they actually ended up bringing Stateside. Daifukkatsu at least had the Dodonpachi name going for it, which I'd think is probably more recognizable to shmup fans.
I don't think RSG misunderstood the shmup market in the West, the problem is that there is no shmup market in the US, especially for games costing more than $5.
Deathsmiles 2X is also a hori and makes full use of a 16:9 screen, and most important of all, it's the direct sequel to Cave's most successful shooter of this generation and itself is their 2nd best-selling 360 port of this generation. There is also no way for owners of EU 360's to play it. This would have been a far better choice than any other Cave game.
Mushihime-sama is the prequel to Cave's 3rd best-selling console port of this generation (possibly tied with Espgaluda 2), and both the 360 and PS2 releases were region-locked (and as you mentioned, the PS2 port wasn't very good). It was also received quite favorably in arcades. It's true the 360 port didn't do that well in Japan, but I would place most of the blame on the availability of the PS2 port lowering the total demand in Japan. Though in retrospect, it probably would have been a good idea to skip this one too in favor of SDOJ.
Akai Katana bombed both in the arcades and on consoles. Its performance in the arcades at least should have been a red flag for any potential publisher. RSG had probably licensed it before seeing the port's initial sales numbers. After playing Akai Katana for myself, I think I got a good idea as to why it wasn't so popular; the scoring system is extremely arcane and loaded with micromanagement, and I strongly believe that's something that turned away a lot of not-so-hardcore shooter fans.
Not all shmups are created equal. The more hardcore fans, those who have a tendency of buying just about any shooter that gets released no matter what, are for the most part out of touch with the more casual fans who make up the majority of the overall fanbase. The shmup fanbase as a whole favors some shooters over others, and usually for good reason. We aren't running a charity here, nor should we. It is up to companies like Cave to release shooters that the market desires. If they choose to ignore sales trends and proper analysis of what sold how much and for what reasons, they should not expect to turn much of a profit. This goes for overseas publishers as well.
Look at all of Cave's best selling shooters lately and you should notice that nearly all of them have many things in common: colorful fantasy settings, "moe" characters, mostly intuitive/straight-forward scoring systems that are relatively easy to understand, multiple game modes to choose from, and in the case of the top 2 games; stage select and per-stage rank select. Perhaps Akai Katana wouldn't have done quite as badly if it had all of those things from the very beginning. Deathsmiles 2, Mushihime-sama Futari, Espgaluda 2, and the DDP series demonstrate that there's still a sustainable market for "good" high-budget shooters post-Deathsmiles 1, but it's up to developers like Cave to make them. I guess we'll know for sure once the SDOJ port gets released, but it seems to be doing quite well in arcades from what I saw, and that's usually a very good sign.
And if you want to more directly see RSG's "poor understanding" in action, go to the shmups forum and read the posts by a certain RSG employee, one who joined the forum and then asked the forum members to help him understand how to play DFK and Akai Katana, and this was after RSG had already released both games, and long after Cave sent RSG gameplay guides and superplays in English...
http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=43792
No real argument regarding DFK. It's just not as good a choice as DS2X in my honest opinion. I also think you're downplaying the strength of the Deathsmiles brand.
For what it's worth, Cave stated that they were happy with the sales they got from the NA digital release of Deathsmiles 2X.
And in terms of gameplay, Deathsmiles 2X is actually more accessible than Deathsmiles 1, and has a more intuitive scoring system. I doubt there are very many shmup fans, casual or otherwise, who buy shooters mainly based on how good they look from a technical standpoint. I will agree that the artsyle isn't as good though.
From what I've heard, Deathsmiles 1 managed to sell over 25k copies in North America, and a similar number in Europe (more certain of the former than the latter). Part of the problem here is that Microsoft has a "50k units minimum for 1st print run" rule for retail 360 games sold in the US. This is extremely discouraging to publishers of niche games, especially to ones as niche as shmups. Their rules about that aren't nearly as strict in Japan or Europe. There are at least 25k people in North America who are willing to spend much more than $5 on a "good" retail shooter, but with the rules MS has in place in NA, ~25k just isn't enough to satisfy publishers, who then have to pay certain retailers (like Gamestop) a penalty in order to keep unsold copies in stock, on top of having to pay MS for more copies than the publisher can reliably sell.
StarCreator
Member
On aesthetics maybe, but Deathsmiles is the deeper game. Akai Katana was a flop in Japan too.
SOME-MIST
Member
it was a lot more fun to 1CC, that's for sure.
Until now, I've been using my 360 with a CRT monitor via RGB. It looks great, but the interlacing flicker from 480i and lack of widescreen has always gotten to me. If I could hack a 360 to natively output 240p I'd be fine, but with the flicker I get sick after staring at the screen for ~45 minutes. I'm thinking of switching over to an LCD, how to 2D games look on them?
Likely a silly question, as chances are the games were ported with the 360 in mind, but I wanted to make sure, since in my experience 2d games do look a lot better on CRTs. I won't be home for a few days to try it for myself, and I figure I may as well get a few cables early if I can.
Ideally I'm thinking of using a computer monitor, or something small that I can easily turn for TATE mode. I've noticed that several Cave games feature 'redone' graphics, so does this mean I'm good to go?
Likely a silly question, as chances are the games were ported with the 360 in mind, but I wanted to make sure, since in my experience 2d games do look a lot better on CRTs. I won't be home for a few days to try it for myself, and I figure I may as well get a few cables early if I can.
Ideally I'm thinking of using a computer monitor, or something small that I can easily turn for TATE mode. I've noticed that several Cave games feature 'redone' graphics, so does this mean I'm good to go?
shit
sixteen-bit
Member
pretty much.
even with the filtering options, it'll be a hard pill to swallow after being used to the CRT
A shame, but thanks you two. I was hoping 2D games specifically made for the 360 would've fixed the problems that my older consoles share, but I guess not.
Suppose I better look into a fancy deinterlacer then. I tried the Extron 580xi and it didn't make enough of a difference; I guess there's no concrete way to truly turn 480i into 240p. Ah well, Cave games look arcade quality on it, and I can't even notice the flicker when playing, but I know it's what causes the queasiness. The price you pay for a good picture!
StarCreator
Member
At the very least you should be outputting 480p, not 480i, to an LCD. Even better if a given game has assets designed for higher resolutions, or have super-customizable display options that scale to any output resolution like Mushihimesama Futari.
You could also get yourself a SLG-3000 or similar device that blanks out every other line of a VGA signal, effectively giving you 240p with simulated scan lines given a 480p source. The quality of scaler in the LCD will still matter though unless somehow you get an LCD that has 640x480 as its native resolution.
Ban Puncher
Member
Hey, I wonder what's new on AmiAmi today.
Oh, DoDonPachi Saidaioujo Super Limited Edition w/ AmiAmi bookcard pre-orders are available?
CLICKCLICKCLICKCLICKCLICK
Oh, DoDonPachi Saidaioujo Super Limited Edition w/ AmiAmi bookcard pre-orders are available?
CLICKCLICKCLICKCLICKCLICK
StarCreator
Member
Thanks for the heads up! It's only a tentative preorder though, meaning they have to confirm they will receive stock of it and will get back to you if they don't have the allocation to fit your order in.
http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/detail?gcode=TVG-X36-1305
Outputting 480p would definitely solve everything, but unfortunately my CRT only supports 240p and 480i. I do have an LCD that I can hook the 360 to, but apparently the quality will be much less than the CRT. I also can't turn it for TATE mode, since it's bolted into a mount. To boot, the scaler isn't very good, so 2d sprite games may look even worse; it's really only worth it for native 1080p content.
So long as it's in motion, the CRT looks fantastic, and the lack of ghosting is nice too. Queasy as the interlacing might make me, the sheer image quality is what's made me stick it out for so long; it's really like I'm playing the PCB in an arcade. It even has a deinterlacer for scan lines, but the console itself doesn't follow it, so the displayed lines will flicker. Guess I better buy a cable while I'm out here; I'll hook it up to the LCD and compare for myself when I get home!
sixteen-bit
Member
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEwPGfC6ieM
SDOJ promo clip
SDOJ promo clip
Barkley's Justice
Member
Just got my copy of Muchi Muchi Pork.
Man, Pink Sweets was a chore to finish. I pretty much hate everything about it. What's the consenus here on that one?
Man, Pink Sweets was a chore to finish. I pretty much hate everything about it. What's the consenus here on that one?
It's a Yagawa game, so you should see it as another sequel to Battle Garegga (with a bit of Recca), not your typical Cave fare. It's hard as hell and rank management is essential. Actually, it's so hard that for a while it was believed to be impossible to clear without triggering the infinite lives bug. Now, thanks to the port, we know there's a way to lower the rank and clear it, but anyway I think Yagawa went too far with PS.
I don't think many thought that because Japanese dudes beat the arcade game without the infinite lives thing years ago and such videos have been online for a long time. Harder and Extended seem to be impossible to 1CC without the infinite lives trick, though. (Arcade version, not the port's 1.01)
You mean 1CC or a high scoring run? I remember a video of a low-rank run (avoiding all medals and all power-ups), but nothing else on youtube. I've never seen anyone clearing the game AND chaining all medals to get an high score before the 360 port. I've never searched much on NicoNico, though. Thanks for clearing this up!
SOME-MIST
Member
arrange mode is the best - which makes it my absolute favorite cave arrange mode
That's actually the opening animation for the home port. Looks nice, and the song was decent. I approve. But I did laugh pretty hard at the shakey-cam gameplay footage.
Also, for those keeping score, P-A has Ketsui PS3 up for pre-order.
Regular:
http://www.play-asia.com/Ketsui_Kiz...ular_Edition/paOS-13-71-bp-49-en-70-6aap.html
LE:
http://www.play-asia.com/Ketsui_Kiz...ited_Edition/paOS-13-71-bp-49-en-70-6aav.html
No mention of what's included in the LE, and the home page linked is the one for the Xbox version, which hasn't been updated in three years.
RoryDropkick
Member
For those of you in the Austin/San Antonio area, we are doing a vert shooter night at Game Over Videogames in SATX, I'm bringing a lot of my collection and we'll have a few more, it starts at 5:30 and goes on until 8:30.
Well, you just said "clear" in your previous post, now you're changing it to "clear and high score". The "high scoring" runs on xbox live you refer to are mainly in ver 1.01 which is much easier and in any case they are far from the scores gotten with the infinite lives thing.
Ketsui PS3 is up on AmiAmi. So many good imports in the next few months with Caladrius, new Triangle, SDOJ, Umihara Kawase, Ketsui.
LE:
http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/detail?gcode=TVG-PS3-1776&page=top
SE:
http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/detail?gcode=TVG-PS3-1777&page=top
LE:
http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/detail?gcode=TVG-PS3-1776&page=top
SE:
http://www.amiami.com/top/detail/detail?gcode=TVG-PS3-1777&page=top
WORLDWIDEWII
Member
getting mushi futari soon. and i have a ps3 arcade stick.
anyway to use it on x360? converter? dont wanna purchase an separate stick for =(
anyway to use it on x360? converter? dont wanna purchase an separate stick for =(
PepsimanVsJoe
Member
Yeah Pink Sweets is pretty crap.
HOWEVER, you have to play the Arrange mode. It is amazing, one of the best things Cave has ever done.
Just one last update on my video situation, then I'll stop whining about it
Learned stuff this week! Trying to fix my flicker problem, I went to an AV store downtown that had everything I needed. Here's what I tried:
1. Lugged in my 360 and a VGA cable, connected it to a 480p flat screen CRT. Somehow, the flickering was even worse than the 480i on my PVM. Moreover, no scanlines whatsoever. I realize the build quality is less than my monitor, but I wasn't expecting it to be so much worse 0_o.
2. Somehow, they even had an Extron Emotia Super GX (not a II, and with original PSU!), which is the best model I could hope for to turn 480i to 240p. I know the owners from all the equipment I've bought over the years, so they let me take it home to try it out. I hooked it up and...not much of a difference. Up very close the scanlines were more defined and the flicker contrast was less, but sitting at my normal distance, I couldn't see any improvement. If I were sitting as close as you would to a monitor in an arcade, I may have pursued it, but I sit ~4 ft away, and it wasn't helping. Saved me a boatload of money and time finding one and cobbling a PSU together. This isn't a discredit to Fudoh, who's been very helpful in pointing everything out to me.
3. Just for kicks, I hooked up my 360 to a HDTV in 1080p (which I haven't done in years, and never with a 2D sprite game). System menus and 3d games looked fine, but MAN, you guys were NOT kidding when you said 2d games took a hit. Holy crap, it's going to be a dark day when my monitor dies; Daifukkatsu looked like a bad iPad port. No flicker, so that was nice, but the picture itself was dreadful. Definitely not worth the trade off.
So, in a nutshell: apparently nothing on Earth makes 480i into perfect 240p, which makes sense. I also learned that, versus other monitors, my PVM handles 480i exceptionally well. Really, I didn't know how good I had it. If only I'd left everything as it was, I could've saved a lot of time
So, whenever I get to play SDOJ, I can take heart knowing that, barring the arcade PCB, I'm playing in the best way possible. Yay!
Learned stuff this week! Trying to fix my flicker problem, I went to an AV store downtown that had everything I needed. Here's what I tried:
1. Lugged in my 360 and a VGA cable, connected it to a 480p flat screen CRT. Somehow, the flickering was even worse than the 480i on my PVM. Moreover, no scanlines whatsoever. I realize the build quality is less than my monitor, but I wasn't expecting it to be so much worse 0_o.
2. Somehow, they even had an Extron Emotia Super GX (not a II, and with original PSU!), which is the best model I could hope for to turn 480i to 240p. I know the owners from all the equipment I've bought over the years, so they let me take it home to try it out. I hooked it up and...not much of a difference. Up very close the scanlines were more defined and the flicker contrast was less, but sitting at my normal distance, I couldn't see any improvement. If I were sitting as close as you would to a monitor in an arcade, I may have pursued it, but I sit ~4 ft away, and it wasn't helping. Saved me a boatload of money and time finding one and cobbling a PSU together. This isn't a discredit to Fudoh, who's been very helpful in pointing everything out to me.
3. Just for kicks, I hooked up my 360 to a HDTV in 1080p (which I haven't done in years, and never with a 2D sprite game). System menus and 3d games looked fine, but MAN, you guys were NOT kidding when you said 2d games took a hit. Holy crap, it's going to be a dark day when my monitor dies; Daifukkatsu looked like a bad iPad port. No flicker, so that was nice, but the picture itself was dreadful. Definitely not worth the trade off.
So, in a nutshell: apparently nothing on Earth makes 480i into perfect 240p, which makes sense. I also learned that, versus other monitors, my PVM handles 480i exceptionally well. Really, I didn't know how good I had it. If only I'd left everything as it was, I could've saved a lot of time
So, whenever I get to play SDOJ, I can take heart knowing that, barring the arcade PCB, I'm playing in the best way possible. Yay!
good lord that is a lot of money for yet another dodonpachi.
where's the next mushihimesama? or ketsui?
PSA
Amazon japan now has the Cave box in stock.
http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/B00AE12R1K/
I'm guessing some info will start surfacing tomorrow. Seems pretty cut and dry but still curious about photos and how everything is organized.
Amazon japan now has the Cave box in stock.
http://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/B00AE12R1K/
I'm guessing some info will start surfacing tomorrow. Seems pretty cut and dry but still curious about photos and how everything is organized.
Now the preorder bonus of 10 soundtrack CDs (that's a pretty amazing preorder bonus) is no longer included. Yikes. Hope anyone that wanted that got their order in earlier.
I have all their games and all the accompanying DLC, so I couldn't bring myself to dish out the cash for this, but I'm looking forward to impressions from those who did take the plunge.