Eschatos is also on Steam which is nice
Been playing a new shooter that came out on Steam a few days back called Raging Blasters, kinda a love letter to games like Star Soldier and Aleste - it's real good especially at the higher difficulties.
Been going through a STG binge lately and after playing the Chronicle Saviors mode of Dariusburst which is fantastic @tomjonjon message has made me decide I'm going to finally pick up Garegga tomorrow with a prepaid card on the US PStore or whatever other nonse I have to do.
Cyvern and Dimahoo have some of the coolest intros ever
Also, Super XYX is an awesome recent indie STG that people should play. It's very Toaplan-esqe
Heh, I saw that the M2 Ketsui version had already released in the US and said well might as well get that one too…
Good procrastination for the game on the left, which is the one I really need to play because I have to review it lol
Also I just realized, I’m friends with the person who uploaded that video, FranFriki is one of the greatest STG and arcade divulgators in Spain, I guess I really should talk to him about this forum huh?
And speaking of Dimahoo intro, may I suggest…
No mention of Tyrian yet? One of those games I played on PC as a kid and have occasionally revisited and still enjoyed. Always loved the upgrades and customization, and the visual variety between levels. Alexander Brandon's soundtrack on it is one of the most enduring works of music in my life, personally. Songs from that soundtrack get stuck in my head almost every day.
Tyrian is real good but it scratches entirely different itches than most of the other shmups I like so I forget that it is one frequently. Ditto UN Squadron
I would like to put forward Armed Police Batrider, a completely bonkers vertical shooter by Raizing that‘s got something like 18 or 19 selectable characters, including original ones as well as crossover ones from Battle Garegga and Mahou Daisakusen. You choose a team of three characters to play as (which given the game came out in 1998 I think must have been inspired by the King of Fighters) and then play through a series of unique stages that include bosses from all three games. It’s completely nuts and I love it. It‘s also criminally unavailable in a modern M2 Shottriggers version, so you’ll have to grab a rom of it to try it out.
Since I’ve mentioned Mahou Daisakusen, I’d also like to mention that I’ve always loved the second game in the series, Shippu Mahou Daisakusen, which I believe has an outrageously expensive Saturn version but no other home versions! Dimahoo/Great Mahou Daisakusen, the third game, is good and extremely pretty, but I’ve always thought it doesn’t quite play as well or as interestingly as the second game. I’ve always wondered why no one else (that I know of, other than a completely sort of game like Roadblasters) attempted the shooter/racing game mashup to try and do it the right way, rather than the way that Great Mahou Daisakusen tries to (and honestly really fails at-- the racing element feels like an afterthought).
I also feel like I should mention Crimzon Clover, which started life as a doujin game but now has both an arcade release and a Switch version:
…and Blue Revolver, which I haven’t played, but which has a super great vibe to it:
Armed Police Batrider is top 10 games ever made material. Love that game. It definitely deserves a console port after all these years.
yeah, the armed police batrider presentation is unmatched for me. music in the menus gets me going everytime.
shooters are one of my favorite genres, but i haven't been on too many of them lately. it's mostly been friendly gunbird 2 score battles against my wife. i'm not good, but she doesn't stand a chance. every once in a while though she'll make it to 1-3, and it's exciting for both of us.
@TracyDMcGrath those are all on my play/buy list.
The whole Bat- trilogy is amazing, Battle Garegga, Battle Bakraid and Armed Police Batrider, but of those probably Batrider is the coolest or at least has the most attractive aesthetic of the 3. The team system a la King of Fighters is a really cool concept too.
@treefroggy Always down to see PCE games that are extremely my thing but that I’ve never heard of before!
What I’m most curious about is how the controls work for aiming left and right! I guess I’ll have to dig it up in emulation to find out! (EDIT: turns out that predictably one button rotates, the other fires, duh)
@JoJoestar are these all by Raizing?
@s thanks for the info/link. Cool to see he worked on Recca too!
@Karasu Flipping the turbo switch to whatever level you need for optimal play in that very moment for both button I for shooting and button II for rotation becomes part of the gameplay. Unless you‘re a god gamer who can rapidly fire AND rapidly hit button II to rotate 45 degrees at a time! Not everyone’s cup of tea for sure, it may seem like an Ikari Warriors style control method would be preferred or…… twin stick? But since it‘s a simple vertical shooter where normally you’d only fire forward, (plus powerups for other directions) it kind of makes sense.
I need to read the manual again and recall if it has hints or explains the intended controls.
Ravenous, govered in drool.
ZeroRanger ZeroRanger.
i had more to write but the site is being hell on my iphone SE