Shmups

From the description:

Expert guests and players in baf and Icarus join on to talk arcade vertical shooter: Raiden Fighters 2 Operation Hell Dive. We break down the mechanics, secrets and plethora of scoring tricks. We view 3 scoring, 1 credit cleared runs in the Raiden MK II, Slave (Judge Spear), and Fairy ship selections. RF2 is jam packed with secrets and technique including grazing bullets - to keep you busy on a high scoring run.

Toaplan was established in 1979, but its gaming division wouldn't come into being until 1984. Its first two titles were Jongō (1984) and Performan (1985), but it was Tiger-Heli (also 1985) which put the firm on the map as a master of the shmup genre.

Now THIS is old school.

FTA:

Moon Shuttle first entered the arcades in the early 80s and was available at the time as a standup cabinet, which could be played with one or two players (albeit not simultaneously). It is one of many space shooters released by the company during this period with "Moon" in the title and has often been compared to Konami's influential sidescroller Scramble, which was released the same year.

FTA:

Manabu Namiki (Santaruru) Joined NMK in 1992 and has been involved in sound production for numerous game titles ever since. After working at Raizing he went independent, and is currently an active composer for Basiscape. His representative works include Battle Garegga, Dodonpachi Dai-Ou-Jou and the Mushihimesama and Deathsmiles series.

This thing look super stylish, and extremely polished. Let's hope they also made it fun to play!

More of a Commando-style run and gun than shmup, it is part of the great history of Toaplan arcade exclusives.

FTA:

The collection will feature the Japanese and western versions of Raiden spin-offs Raiden Fighters, Raiden Fighters 2: Operation Hell Dive, and Raiden Fighters Jet, which were originally released in 1996, 1997, and 1998, respectively, as well as remixed music.

Actual game line up, release dates, and targeted platforms have not been announced yet. In fact, other than the information stating that this release is actively being worked on, there's no other info at all.

I will be especially interested in all the ways this upcoming release will differ from the Raiden Legacy release that already exists, which features the original Raiden, Raiden Fighters 1, 2, and 3.

FTA:

Originally released in arcades back in 1989, Blast Off is the sequel to Bosconian, which was launched 8 years earlier in 1981. It was developed by N.H. System, a short-lived Namco subsidiary that also worked on the isometric platformer Märchen Maze one year prior.

Designed to run on Namco's System 1 hardware, the sequel is a significant departure from its previous iteration, dropping the multi-directional scrolling of the original for a vertical scrolling format similar to other Namco titles like Xevious and Dragon Spirit.

From the announcement:

VISEGUNNE is a non-bullet-hell shoot ’em up where explosive action unfolds around you: cities are leveled, space colonies collapse, and orbital structures crumble catastrophically. Between missions, interact with your squad to uncover secrets about a post-apocalyptic Earth, visit shops to upgrade your arsenal, or customize your machine’s look in the garage. Each mission offers intuitive controls and scalable difficulty settings, welcoming both newcomers and seasoned veterans alike. Set in an era where the human soul is harnessed as a power source, join the DIVINITY SPACE DEFENSE CORPORATION’s elite mercenaries to confront pro-Earth terrorists threatening the fragile peace of space. With a charismatic cast of characters, a killer soundtrack, and screen-melting effects, VISEGUNNE is a thrilling modern homage to retro action games.

The Amiga is a real blind spot for me, but it's home to a lot of shmups that have major cult followings. Glad to see the original devs supporting the fan-sequel in this way.

I love to see some of the obscure memorabilia associated with SHMUPS. How about this 5 record vinyl album for the R-Type soundtrack?!

Fascinating interview with SpidersSTG.

SkyGunner is a Playstation 2 game that I fell in love with back in the day, and I think this is the first time it's been re-released in any form since it originally came out. It's a cute take on the six-degrees-of-freedom flying combat game, with really nice watercolor style art. It's US $10 on its own, but if you have PSN Plus it's included in your membership.

So... not a shmup, but it's adjacent kind of?

Bullet hell x RPG is not a common combination (the only other non-Touhou one I can think of is Undertale). Looking forward to seeing some reviews.

A quote from the interview: "My favorite genre is STG. The basic rules of STG are to shoot the enemy and avoid the enemies' attacks. Despite the simple and easy-to-understand rules, they are very deep and you can get really sucked into them. And I think it is interesting the way you can feel your skills improving by playing through them over and over."

A twin-stick shooter is an outlier for the Raiden series. I hope it's fun, at least.

Alt. Invidious link.

I'm a big fan of the Aleste series, especially the Game Gear titles; GG A 3 is arguably the pinnacle of that branch!

"The colors, children!"

cross-posted from: https://lemmus.org/post/7552450

Super-Fun-Pak Comix by Ruben Bolling for September 11, 2024.

A good game, amongst some good non-shmups, but I'm a little bit disappointed there won't be more STGs in this package.

A good game, amongst some good non-shmups, but I'm a little bit disappointed there won't be more STGs in this package.

Alternate Invidious link.