Muchi Muchi Pork! & Pink Sweets [February 24, 2011, JP X360] REGION FREE

[EOJ]

I played my first credit of the Matsuri version of MMP. I ended up 1CCing it with 144mil - the top score on the leaderboards.  
Replay is available, so check it out if you're interested.



The Matsuri version is superb, and well worth the cost of this port on its own. In regard to differences, I noticed you start with 3 bombs instead of 2, and the lard attack lasts longer than in the arcade version, making it a bit easier, but the extra pink sweets bosses at the end of each stage can be pretty brutal. Stages 3-5 have 2 Pink Sweets bosses each, iirc.

[MikeNeko]

There is a huge programming error in the second half of stage 5 - after the section with the groups of planes that loop down then around the top of the screen and down again (right before the last 1/4 of the level), there should be a few waves of suicide planes. These planes never appear in the port. I've tried it a few times and it's always the same - just a few seconds of complete emptiness on screen. A few guys on 2Ch have similarly commented on this. This costs me a few million points. I hope they will patch this somehow.
They are simply not in this port.

It will be as long as they are informed. In CAVE engines enemies arrival (and boss warning) are condensed in one table per level (pseudo-frame of appearance+offsets+type+moveentry won t go into detail). I think they just had a bug on the offset X/Y and the enemies are here but bot on screen. If they lacked an entry it would messup completely the game -moveentry is relative to the end of the *playlist*- so i really think they are here but just out of the screen. Either that or they had a bug on the move in the moves detail table... X or Y value... so again here but not on screen.

Anyway, it s just a matter to patch the playlist, a matter of a few kBs xD

[EOJ]

I just tried out MMP ver 1.01 and got #1 on the leaderboards with a 181mil score up to the 2-2 Boss (replay available). I'm on a roll today! 

Anyway, in MMP 1.01 the lard attack gauge decreases slower than ver 1.00 (like Matsuri ver), allowing you to use it for longer bursts. I also think the rank goes up a little slower, but this is not a big difference. It's slightly easier than ver 1.0.

[Icarus]

What is it with Cave's ham-fisted handling of Yagawa ports? Are they actively trying to turn YGW fans into Cave haters, or are they just incompetent? :?
Hope there's a patch incoming, sounds like it needs one at the moment.

[EOJ]

For you achievement lovers, note that in this port you can change the number of lives, the difficulty, and the extend settings to anything you like and still unlock all of the achievements.

[evil_ash_xero]

As it stands, this is one of the worst Cave ports ever made. It's like PS2 Ibara or Mushihimesama all over again.

Well, at least these LOOK nice.

[phrenzee]

I really should stop reading this thread. I've yet to recieve the game, and I'm already slightly put off by all the small bugs, errors and weird decisions (not attract? no initials? wtf...).

Anyway, as I haven't played either PCB, I won't really know what's wrong so I can live in blissful ignorance

[Moskovskaya]

There is a huge programming error in the second half of stage 5 - after the section with the groups of planes that loop down then around the top of the screen and down again (right before the last 1/4 of the level), there should be a few waves of suicide planes. These planes never appear in the port. I've tried it a few times and it's always the same - just a few seconds of complete emptiness on screen. A few guys on 2Ch have similarly commented on this. This costs me a few million points. I hope they will patch this somehow.

Maybe they will patch this, but the slowdowns I doubt

I was really looking forward for a good port of MMP, because the PCB is still expensive.

[moozooh]

For you achievement lovers, note that in this port you can change the number of lives, the difficulty, and the extend settings to anything you like and still unlock all of the achievements.

Lol! The programmers who worked on this were so busy making the fancy menus they forgot to actually port the games. :D

Oh well, time for another patch petition, it seems. If this is what people have discovered in the first two days, it appears the release is going to reach DOJBLEX's level of badness.

On another hand, it's more than likely I'm only going to play 1.01 and Arrange versions anyway, so as long as those are fine I'm going to be happy with the port.

[battle gregor]

yeh there's one bit at the end of stage 4 where those circular blue bullets come out and scare teh living shit out me now to lack of slowdown   
i'm still enjoying muchi 1.0 as much as i did the pcb and hot to the 5th stage with 89million on my 3rd or 4th credit so it's not gamebreaking unless you have your scoring routine down to a t like eoj probably does

[Daverost]

For you achievement lovers, note that in this port you can change the number of lives, the difficulty, and the extend settings to anything you like and still unlock all of the achievements.

That sounds... rather cheap, but I can't say I'm completely against it. 1000/1000 on most Cave games is just plain out of my skill range, normally. I do expect it to get patched at some point, though. There's almost no way that was intentional.

[HVL]

Sounds like a 3-day hackjob like DS2 again. Missing stuff, fucked up slowdown, and the possible patch will most likely fuck things up even more. Good job!

Doesn't they have any players playing their ports prior to release anymore? This is getting ridiculous.

[vercimbeer]

As someone ignorant to the arcade versions of the games, I can say that, despite the issues EOJ has pointed out, both games are really fun, particularly MMP.

Would someone care to translate an explanation of the scoring methods in MMP Arrange? It's fun to play, but I don't what the hell I'm doing. An addendum to the existing MMP strategy guide would be much appreciated.

Apologies if this has already been posted.

[brentsg]

Even if the ports are flawed, they are worth owning for the arrange modes even if you own one of the PCBs.

People should encourage them to patch the problems though.

[Plasmo]

In other news, I tested the infinitive lives trick in Pink Sweets. I can confirm it is NOT in this port in ver 1.0 (I didn't try 1.01, but there's no way it would be there).  

This is ridiculous.
Why is it so hard to get a port right straight away WITHOUT millions of patches? It worked well (or let's say at least better) before the age of online gaming. Why can't CAVE simply put some more time into their homeports?!

Anyway, looks like the game is supposed to be played the hard way now. I'm afraid that it'll be a nightmare for me again, but looks like I have no other choice. I'll take it.

I'm very much looking forward to MMP with Pink Sweets bosses. Sounds awesome!  

[Sapz]

I have to say, I'm enjoying PS 1.01 a lot. It's kicking me around quite hard, but it's fun regardless. I think I'm liking Kasumi's shot the most so far. Third boss keeps nailing me. I haven't really played 1.00 much due to the supposed inaccuracies, but as its own game I really like 1.01.

I haven't messed with MMP much yet, but I tried the Matsuri version once. I was expecting boss replacements rather than the Batrider throwback boss rushes. Man, that was awesome.

[gsl]

Got my copy today, and am trying to remember how the heck to play MMP.  Haven't even tried Pink Sweets yet--that'll be a first for me.

I'm glad they give you an option to turn wide mode off (as opposed to Guwange's initial release), but I'm a bit disappointed at the shitty display once you do.  Trying to fill the vertical screen with the game window (on a 4:3 CRT) leaves menus cut off on the left edge, and I can't see part of the Difficulty Gauge in-game.  It doesn't affect the gameplay itself, but it's just an irritating issue that doesn't show a whole lot of care in the presentation.

So what's the deal with redeeming the DLC card?  I've hit the guide button, gone to "Redeem Code" and entered the card, but I get a message about an invalid code.  Do I have to use a Japanese-region gamertag to get it?

[EOJ]

Do I have to use a Japanese-region gamertag to get it?

Yep.

In other news, another difference in MMP 1.01 is you still get extends every 10mil in the second loop (the score-based extends stopped in the second loop of 1.00). Due to this, and the longer lard attack duration, I think 2-ALL scores could top 400mil eventually.

[gsl]

Yeah, I figured I'd try signing in with my other gamertag and just try the download.  Probably didn't even need to ask about it.  Looking back, I almost want to say the same thing happened with the Futari 1.01 DLC (why couldn't the Pink Pork card have been a real card like that one?  )

I was really not surprised to see you at the top of the rankings, EOJ.

[skykid]

This is disappointing, they're not giving Yagawa much respect really. I feel the pain for the big fans of these games (Plasmo and Icarus particularly.)
I'm glad I didn't bother buying on release now, I'll pick a used copy one day to give PS a spin.

They better get Akai Katana right.

[brentsg]

This is disappointing, they're not giving Yagawa much respect really. I feel the pain for the big fans of these games (Plasmo and Icarus particularly.)
I'm glad I didn't bother buying on release now, I'll pick a used copy one day to give PS a spin.

They better get Akai Katana right.

You're missing out.  It's still absolutely worth owning.

[TheSoundofRed]

All of the flaws and glitches are definitely upsetting, but my hype hasn't been diminished at all. I should get my copy on Monday. Hopefully some videos surface over the weekend to keep me going over the weekend. I'd love to see more footage of MMP Arrange and PS Arrange.

Does anyone know if the MMP 1.00 bug EOJ found in Stage 5 is also in 1.01, Arrange, and Matsuri? It seems like such an odd glitch.

[sh00g]

Finally made it to 1-5 and crushed my old arcade mmp v1.01 score. Amazing what happens when I pay attention to my current fun bag collecting numbers. 

Having a lot of fun with this.

[EOJ]

Does anyone know if the MMP 1.00 bug EOJ found in Stage 5 is also in 1.01, Arrange, and Matsuri? It seems like such an odd glitch.

The part of Stage 5 with the missing waves of ships? Yeah, it's the same in 1.01 and Matsuri. Haven't tried Arrange yet, but I'd be surprised if it's any different.

[supabok]

This is disappointing, they're not giving Yagawa much respect really. I feel the pain for the big fans of these games (Plasmo and Icarus particularly.)
I'm glad I didn't bother buying on release now, I'll pick a used copy one day to give PS a spin.

They better get Akai Katana right.

You're missing out.  It's still absolutely worth owning.

I totally agree!! Aside from the issues, both games are a lot of fun to play and worth having in your collection! Now if i could just get rid of my
stupid Otomedius G and Raiden IV to make room for this one

[Special World]

I'm having a blast too, mainly with Muchi Muchi Pork. Not sure how much time I'll spend with Pink Sweets, but I think I'll like the arrange a lot, at least. I was worried about boss milking in MMP, but from what I gather it's a lot less intrusive than I was thinking (not that I can actually do it successfully). I had envisioned a lot of sitting there, waiting for enemies to shoot missiles so that you could cancel them, but it seems rather that you just take out all their parts and then use bombs to cancel their shots into piggies, which is perfectly acceptable to me. I have no idea how to take apart the second midboss, though. Ah well, it'll come with time. Just gonna try to do basic medal scoring until I can 1CC it; managed to get to stage 4, which isn't bad for me on a recent release. The game's just a plain fun time, imo.

And Raiden IV is a good deal of fun, if you play in double ship mode. No need to throw it out!

[StarCreator]

Yeah, I figured I'd try signing in with my other gamertag and just try the download.  Probably didn't even need to ask about it.  Looking back, I almost want to say the same thing happened with the Futari 1.01 DLC (why couldn't the Pink Pork card have been a real card like that one?   )

Actually, I was curious about this too, and I confirmed with a few people over at Shmups that the Futari 1.01 code worked in all regions.

[EOJ]

My review of this package:

http://www.cave-stg.com/?p=1041

[sh00g]

The game now has frozen twice on me. Both times very similar. Played a few pink sweets credits, went back out and swapped to mmp area and when its loading it freezes. 

[Sapz]

Nice review. I'll be sticking to 1.01s, then.

Switched over to Shasta (the points from her lasers are pretty sweet, as is the constant stream), and finally beat that third boss after some credits. Game over'd pretty fast in stage 4 with 2.7m. How's PS 1.01 treating you guys?