Death Smiles Mega Black Label [Strats]

Started by EOJ, January 30, 2009, 06:00:14 PM

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EOJ

Use this thread to discuss general DSMBL strats and ask questions.

Here is a list of the differences in DSMBL as compared to DS:

-The scoring system is different in DSMBL - you have a cumulative multiplier (displayed underneath your item counter) that increases from 0 to a max of 100,000. In DS, your multiplier maxed at 10,000 but got reset every time you came out of Power Up mode. In DSMBL, your counter lowers by 30% every time you die (in DS it reset to zero with every death).
-The multiplier rapidly reduces (as in Mushi Futari, Ketsui, and others) during boss fights.
-You can now increase your item counter on bosses. To do this you must have your option be in contact with the boss. For Windia, Follett, Rosa, and Sakura, you need to tap shot (A or B) quickly to raise the counter. For Casper you just need to hold the laser. Follett increases the fastest with tapping, and actually it increases rather quickly if you just hold laser as well, so she is unique in this regard.
-Skull values are higher in DSMBL, and it's more beneficial to let all skulls fall and break, whether in normal or power up mode. Skulls in Power up mode add more to your counter (double?) compared to skulls in normal mode.
-you get skulls when you cross 500 on the counter from enemies that previously didn't drop skulls (and never drop skulls in DS).
-you suck in skulls a lot easier, with a wider "suck in" range
-When you power up at 1000, your shot is about twice as strong (you can see this clearly with Windia, as her sickles are twice as big in power up mode triggered at 1000 as compared to normal mode or a power-up triggered at 500-999). You also get a burst of large gold crowns. When you power up at 500, your shot is of normal strength.
-When you power-up at 500-999, your counter starts counting down from 500.
-You don't get full gold crowns from enemies until you max the counter at 100,000. In DS, you got full gold crowns when you maxed at 10,000.
-Some of the colors look brighter, and some of the bullets have a pinkish hue, instead of the pure purple of DS
-suicide bullets (the little stars) no longer add to your item counter, nor to your score (well, they may add 100 pts each, not really sure about this yet). They convert to skulls during the transition from normal to power up mode.

-A new stage was added, the Ice Palace.
-A new difficulty was added for each stage - rank level 999. The backgrounds turn dark in the stages when you select this rank. If you do all rank 999, then the Ice Palace is also in rank 999 (and the background is dark).
-A new character, Sakura, is playable.
-Boss patterns were tweaked, for example the Forest boss's final attack on rank 3 is very difficult to dodge now, while it is comparatively simple in DS.
-Bosses emit suicide bullets when you enter death mode (play 5 stages at all rank 3, and the fifth (and all subsequent stages) will be in "death mode").
-The characters seem to be slightly rebalanced - Windia is beefed up a bit and Rosa is slightly toned down. Overall it all feels better balanced compared to DS.




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EOJ

I have to say the rank 999 levels are really awesome. The more I play them, the more I really think they make this game superior to the original DS. About half of them seem similar in difficulty to Futari BL God mode, while the other half seem a bit harder.

Anyway, my current route with Sakura is going:

Forest (3)> Graveyard (999) > Trains (3) > Volcano (3) > Halloween town (3) > Swamp (3 or 999)

I can do the Graveyard at 999 now without dying (it's not too hard really), but I have to use a bomb on the boss. I can usually get through the
Swamp on 999 without dying, but the boss is pretty harsh - I have to use 2-3 bombs there and I often die once.
I may fiddle around with the Train stage at 999, as I think it could be a good point boost (plus the bullet patterns are awesome).

Anyone else playing any levels at rank 999?
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Gwyrgyn

Wish I was playing this game, but between the high price tag, the oncoming 360 port, and DS2 coming out, I'll probably hold out unless I see a really good deal crop up.

Quote-you get skulls when you cross 500 on the counter from enemies that previously didn't drop skulls (and never drop skulls in DS).
I might be crazy but I saw someone racking up skulls by hitting a boss before the battle started, so maybe you just get skulls when your bullets hit something? You might be able to milk some extra points in places with this (like any boss you can't point blank enough to max out your power up counter).

EOJ

Quote from: Gwyrgyn on February 03, 2009, 10:23:36 PM
Quote-you get skulls when you cross 500 on the counter from enemies that previously didn't drop skulls (and never drop skulls in DS).
I might be crazy but I saw someone racking up skulls by hitting a boss before the battle started, so maybe you just get skulls when your bullets hit something? You might be able to milk some extra points in places with this (like any boss you can't point blank enough to max out your power up counter).

You're right - I was just going to post something about this actually as I've been experimenting with this. You can leech skulls off enemies if you get close to them. You can get a lot of extra skulls this way if you do it before the enemies fully appear on screen - a very similar gameplay mechanic as found in Futari BL's Original mode. I've been able to increase my Graveyard score by quite a good amount due to this technique. You have to be in power-up mode though, as far as I can tell. If you get close to the Graveyard boss and hold your option fire on him just as he starts to appear, you can leech skulls from him for over 5 seconds and add over 5,000 to your multiplier. The skulls stop coming from bosses once their lifebars appear.

I can get 100,000 on the multiplier before the sixth stage now. Just have to hold it together in the ice palace and I should see a score in the 3-4bil range soon.
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EOJ

Another change I forgot to mention: DSMBL shows the all-time hi score for each character in the on-screen-display everytime you play, just like Futari 1.5 and Futari BL. In DS it only shows "today's" hi score there (like Espgaluda 2, DDPDFK 1.5, etc), resetting every time you turn off the PCB.

Also, the "backgrounds getting all messed up during the final boss fight" bug only happens if you play ALL rank 999 on one credit to the end. So it's not something many people will ever experience (and even if you do it's still playable).
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EOJ

More things I've discovered:

-You get all gold crowns if you are holding lock-shot just before you go over 500 on the counter and continue to hold lockshot to kill enemies until you reach 1000. This trick comes in handy.
-You only need to do 4 stages out of the first 6 at rank 999 to enter the ice palace at rank 999. This must be why the top scorers only do 3 stages at rank 999 - just enough for a top score, but not so much that you need to go through the harder ice palace (reminiscent of how Espgaluda 2 scorers suicide before Seseri in order to avoid her brutal 'no miss' form).
-rank 1 actually has an advantage over the others now - your multiplier does NOT count down on the bosses in this rank. Rank 2 counts down slower than rank 3 as well.

I'm really enjoying this game more and more (may have to remove it from sale!). I love the flexibility and diversity in the play. There are basically 4 main routes:

-mix of ranks 1,2,3 (and 999, if you want)
-all rank 3
-mix of ranks 3 and 999
-all rank 999

And then you can choose to go to the ice palace, canyon, or neither.

This can be considered somewhat analogous to Futari's modes:
-Original
-Maniac
-God
-Ultra

I just wish the game made note of your path at the end, a la Border Down. It does make note of whether or not you went through the ice palace or canyon, but that's it.
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Gwyrgyn

Quote from: EOJ on January 30, 2009, 06:00:14 PM
-suicide bullets (the little stars) no longer add to your item counter, nor to your score (well, they may add 100 pts each, not really sure about this yet). They convert to skulls during the transition from normal to power up mode.

Looking very closely at a video, it seems that while building your current-counter, the value of suicide bullets is equal to your current-counter. So if you have 568, each bullet canceled is worth that (or at least, that's the number that appears when you cancel it).
When your current-counter is maxed at 1000, each bullet canceled just seems to be worth 100?

When you are in Power Up mode, each bullet canceled seems to be worth 100 + 1/10 of your total-counter. So if you have +60000, you will get 100 + 6000 per bullet.

It's easiest to tell when your total-counter is between 10000 and 99999, because the value of items picked up will be in gold and the value of bullets canceled will be in white.

Gwyrgyn

Quote from: EOJ on January 30, 2009, 06:00:14 PM
-You can now increase your item counter on bosses. To do this you must have your option be in contact with the boss. For Windia, Follett, and Sakura, you need to tap shot (A or B) quickly to raise the counter. For Casper and Rosa you just need to hold the laser.

This is untrue, for Rosa at least (haven't tried Casper). You still need to tap shot to build the meter. What you are probably seeing is that with Rosa, you will do more damage if you shoot your rose shots out with laser, then mash shot in the mean time. I figure this is because her option isn't doing anything while you are sitting there holding laser and there are roses still on the screen, so you might as well get the extra laser from shot.

EOJ

Yeah I forgot to edit that, I realized that awhile back when I fiddled around with Rosa. You don't have to tap with Casper though.
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Gwyrgyn

I'm finding that with Rosa it's way better to avoid Death Mode 2 entirely. Her option sits way too far away to be able to block the suicide bullets very well and it swings around her very slowly, making areas like 5-1's green dragons a huge pain.

Maybe I'm missing some unobvious technique to it, but the Death Mode 2 suicide bullets are a gigantic pain in the ass and not really fun to deal with.

I like how your different choices of Level to play at don't really change potential scoring by THAT much, but I really don't like how one slip up at mid game basically knocks off 400-500m points from your potential score. Reminds me a bit too much of Progear or Guwange.

I'm still coming up a little shy of +100,000 out of the first 6 stages, I think I'm focusing too much on grinding targets with the option shots and not enough on killing enemies with the right type of shot, especially the lock shot. All of the 'proper' attacks to use are the same as in DS right? Any idea about the enemies in Ice Palace?

EOJ

Quote from: Gwyrgyn on March 18, 2009, 01:16:39 PM
Any idea about the enemies in Ice Palace?

Most of the enemies need the lock-shot, at least in fever mode.

I agree that Death Mode 2 sucks. That's why I play as Sakura (it's actually manageable with her).
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Gwyrgyn

So Level999 counts the same as Level3 in terms of when you get to Death Mode, going into an EX stage seems to bump you up one (If you weren't in DM you go into DM1, if you were in DM1 you go into DM2). Going to castle seems to leave you the same as the last stage you were in. So what happens if you go to the second EX stage? Does it bump you up again or stay the same?

I did something earlier where I went 3 > 999 > 2 > 2 > 3 > 3 > Ice > Canyon > Final  ...
And doing this it did not seem like Ice Palace was nearly as hard as when I normally go all Level3 strait into Ice Palace.

I tried out doing Graveyard at 999 and it's really not that hard, and worth a LOT more points than at Level 3 (I got almost double the + increase). Level999 is a lot of fun actually now that I'm getting the swing of it.

Also a cool trick with Rosa is that using her lock-shot can actually put her option a lot closer to you than normal, which is a good help to block bullets!

zlk

When you select your character, you also have an option to select some feature in a menu.  The choice is up/down.  Since I can't read Japanese, I have no idea what I am selecting.  Anyone know?

EOJ

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EOJ

The replays on Xbox live are showing me a lot of different possible high-scoring routes. They include:

WINDIA
Lakeside (3)>Swamp (3)>Forest (999)>Graveyard (999)>Halloween Town (2)>Volcano (999): Total score 3.5~4bil

CASPER
Lakeside (3)>Graveyard (999)>Halloween Town (999)>Swamp (3)>Forest (3)>Volcano (999): Total score 3~3.5bil

FOLLETT
Forest (3)>Swamp (999)>Lakeside (3)>Graveyard (999)>Halloween Town (999)>Volcano (3): Total score 3~3.5bil

ROSA
Halloween Town (1)>Graveyard (3)>Lakeside (3)>Swamp (3)>Forest (2)>Volcano (3): Total score 1.8~2bil

What routes/characters are you guys using? I'm trying different characters out, as I'm getting a bit sick of Sakura.
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Ravid

Hey, first post here. I have a few questions to throw out there.
Does anyone know the differences in the shot types required to kill enemies in DSMBL as opposed to regular DS? It appears that the duellers in the final stage need to be killed with laser now and the trains in the lakeside with lock shot (though bizarrely, not the identical trains in the canyon). Are there any others? What's a decent score to be coming out of the first six stages with, assuming I steer clear of lvl999?
How do I view the all time high scores in the port?
Also, just out of curiosity, does anyone know the conditions for the EX stages and final stage to be lvl 999? I noticed that on SIN's run the canyon wasn't 999 but the castle was. When messing around on 999 one time I got the canyon on 999. Why do high scorers never go to the last three stages on 999, is it because they can't survive well enough to score on it or is there really not much of a score advantage?

EOJ

Quote from: Ravid on July 12, 2009, 12:28:32 PM
What's a decent score to be coming out of the first six stages with, assuming I steer clear of lvl999?

At least 1bil is "decent". 2+bil is "very good".

Quote
How do I view the all time high scores in the port?
Press left and right and the A button to scroll through the different rankings during the attract screen.

Quote
Also, just out of curiosity, does anyone know the conditions for the EX stages and final stage to be lvl 999? I noticed that on SIN's run the canyon wasn't 999 but the castle was.

You're wrong here, SIN's run DOES have the canyon at rank 999 (you cannot fight bloody jitterbug without this!). To get to the canyon on rank 999, you have to no miss the ice palace at rank 999.

Quote from: Ravid on July 12, 2009, 12:28:32 PM
Why do high scorers never go to the last three stages on 999, is it because they can't survive well enough to score on it or is there really not much of a score advantage?

Yes and yes.
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Ravid

Thanks for the info  :). Don't know why I thought SIN didn't do the canyon at 999. I shall post a score when I have a halfway decent one.

EOJ

I find MBL much more frustrating to score well in, due to the whole "one death and you've screwed your whole run" element to it. You also have to rely way too much on close proximity/pre-arrival shooting, much like Futari Black Label Original mode. Due to this, I don't find it to be as fun or well balanced as the original Deathsmiles is.

Watch a lot of replays from the live scoreboards. Don't limit yourself to runs with just overall really high scores, at least when looking to see how to score in the first 6 stages. For example, there's a really good Rosa replay, about 3bil in MBL Arcade, where the guy ends the run in 4-1, but his score at the end of the first three stages is like 2.8bil.
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Toxik H

Hello, I have a few questions regarding MBL mode or more precisely rank999 and the TLB Bloody Jitterbug.

What are the exact conditions to make him appear? I have stumbled upon different requirements... What I have found out is that you have to 1cc the first 6 stages at lvl999 to make the Ice Palast Lvl999, then no miss the Ice Palast to make the Gorge lvl999 - and then? Do you have to no miss the Gorge aswell (and the Hades Castle) or is it sufficient to stay on the same credit until you reach Tyrannosatan?
(I have experimented a bit in Training and it appears that the rank gets reset to lvl3 if you lose a life, e.g. lose a life in the first part of the castle and the second part is back to lvl3. However the TLB requirements are not quite evident, although I fear the worst...)

Is there any trick to the bosses? My main problem is that their health drains extremely slow and sooner or later they emit a pattern which I am unable to dodge, e.g. the Volcano boss gets to the phase where he summons stone pillars from the top and the bottom of the screen combined with nasty V-shots. On lvl3 he is already dead before he can even start to act crazy. The same holds for other bosses. (I am using Sakura since she can fend off the suicide bullets pretty well, is she maybe too weak?)

Does anyone have a good strategy for the Gorge boss on lvl999? In training you can't practice boss fights individually or set unlimited lives to experiment with safe spots etc. I understand that there is a Superplay on the official DVD where the player beats Bloody Jitterbug. If someone has seen it, what character/tactics does he apply to take down the bosses effeciently (bomb distribution...?) - unfortunately I have only found one Superplay on youtube whithout the TLB and my knowledge of the Japanese language is not good enough to navigate nicovideo...

Thanks in advance and a 'thank you' to EOJ, whose DS strategy guides have already been very helpful. :)

Van_Artic

point-blanking works very well on the bosses, take advantage to increase the item counter and then enter power-up mode

you can also take a look at SIN's 999all video, there are excellent strategies to take down the bosses as quickly as possible

http://sinmoon.sakuraweb.com/movie.html

it's the fifth one

jyumi

#21
Quote from: Toxik H on April 05, 2011, 03:35:47 PM
What are the exact conditions to make him appear?
You have to do 4 out of 6 stages in lvl999 (I can't confirm because I play 3 out of 6 stages). You can die all you want, but you cannnot continue. Then, you'll activate Ice Palace lvl999, Canyon lvl999, Castle lvl999. You must select Ice Palace first, then Canyon, then castle. You must NOT DIE all three stages. Defeat Jitterbug and DO NOT DIE. You'll activate bloddy jitterbug. Kill Tyrannosatan (you can die during this boss, but still need 1cc) and bloody jitterbug will appear.

Quote from: Toxik H on April 05, 2011, 03:35:47 PM
I have experimented a bit in Training and it appears that the rank gets reset to lvl3 if you lose a life, e.g. lose a life in the first part of the castle and the second part is back to lvl3.
Yep, You die in the first part of the castle stage and rank automatically resets to lvl3 next level. Bloody Jiterbug is available only in lvl999.

Quote from: Toxik H on April 05, 2011, 03:35:47 PM
Is there any trick to the bosses? My main problem is that their health drains extremely slow and sooner or later they emit a pattern which I am unable to dodge, e.g. the Volcano boss gets to the phase where he summons stone pillars from the top and the bottom of the screen combined with nasty V-shots. On lvl3 he is already dead before he can even start to act crazy. The same holds for other bosses. (I am using Sakura since she can fend off the suicide bullets pretty well, is she maybe too weak?)

Yeah I have trouble with that attack too. lvl999 bosses generally take longer to die than lvl3. The key is powering up in certain places, getting out of powerup to cancel bullets, and timed bombing. Also, keep close to bosses (slowdown is there to help you).

Just keep on using sakura (trust me) she is strong enough for all bosses. The only problem with her is that she is extremely hard to score with. follett maybe a good option too.

Quote from: Toxik H on April 05, 2011, 03:35:47 PM
Does anyone have a good strategy for the Gorge boss on lvl999?

I don't think anyone has taken down the Canyon boss in a "sustainable" way. You may have to move right and left near the bottom of the screen while dodging the energy balls. USE bombs for the rest of the other attacks.

The guy that did the lvl999 dvd superplay, had 4 bombs and 1000 main counter (for power up) to start. He bombed to dodge the attacks and power up to make his shot stronger
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Toxik H

Thank you very much for your satisfying answers and the link to the Superplay-video. This pretty much provides the pieces that were missing... it is quite an impressive run, I didn't know you could take down Ozier this fast O_O.

I guess now it is time to go back and train...

jyumi

Quote from: jyumi on April 05, 2011, 05:18:31 PM
You have to do 4 out of 6 stages in lvl999 (I can't confirm because I play 3 out of 6 stages). You can die all you want, but you cannnot continue. Then, you'll activate Ice Palace lvl999, Canyon lvl999, Castle lvl999. You must select Ice Palace first, then Canyon, then castle. You must NOT DIE all three stages. Defeat Jitterbug and DO NOT DIE. You'll activate bloddy jitterbug. Kill Tyrannosatan (you can die during this boss, but still need 1cc) and bloody jitterbug will appear.

Let me revisit my statement as I am finally trying to get to bloody jitterbug.  :facepalm:

QuoteYou have to do 4 out of 6 stages in lvl999

Not true. I did this (while in practice) and once I defeated tyrannosatan. Bloody jitterbug did not appear. So the requirements to get to Bloody Jitterbug is to do ALL FIRST 6 Stages at lvl999.

To revise:

You have to do all beginning 6 stages in lvl999. You can die all you want, but you cannnot continue. Then, you'll activate Ice Palace lvl999, Canyon lvl999, Castle lvl999. You must select Ice Palace first, then Canyon, then castle. You must NOT DIE all three stages. Defeat Jitterbug and DO NOT DIE. You'll activate bloddy jitterbug. Kill Tyrannosatan (you can die during this boss, but still need 1cc) and bloody jitterbug will appear.


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