Port announced. Details and screens (screens are all of the arcade version, so nothing new) here:
http://www.famitsu.com/game/news/1223648_1124.html
Notes:
-it is 20~30% complete
-It will only have ver 1.5. No ver 1.0 or BL.
-They plan online rankings and score attack modes
-Graphics will be updated like Death Smiles
-Release date will be before the end of 2009
-This port is being developed by M2 and published by CAVE (just like Deathsmiles)
EDIT 11/10/2009:
Official site is up:
http://www.cave.co.jp/gameonline/Xbox360/mushihime2/index.html
UPDATE 12/11/2009:
MFBL is up for download starting the night of December 11th, 2009 (JAPAN TIME). Both Arcade and 360 mode versions are available, with online rankings and training mode also included. 1200 MSP.
I'm sure Black Label will be DLC at some point.
According to Mihara's blog this will be released before the end of 2009. [updated the main post with this info]
I really hope they put alot of love into this and get all the bugs/kinks worked out before it hits. It seems Cave is having lot$ of faith in these ports again!
It's fairly obvious that DS is a commercial success, even though it's not out yet. And from the looks of the demo, it's at least not bloody awful like other ports we've seen.
It will be nice to have practice modes.
Looking forward to the arrange mode, whatever it may be (that's the main reason why I buy these ports). They could go crazy with the multipliers, since they don't really have any hardware limitations.
Buying a Japanese Xbox 360 is the best purchase you can do people.I'm excited about the port even if i have MF 1.5/BL at home.
Looking forward about the slowdown =D
1.1 on paper sounds great. I will probably not bother.
Waiting anxiously to see what's in this mode. Again, I doubt I'll bother w/ Ultra. Just no time to dedicate to such a monstrous (and frustrating) feat.
Wow! =D
Finally will be able to play Futari.
Great that the ports are coming along....now if only Daifukkatsu would come too.
...and 5pb do a great job with Ketsui..
Quote from: Monouchi on April 21, 2009, 05:08:29 AM
Great that the ports are coming along....now if only Daifukkatsu would come too.
After this, DFK seems a shoe-in as the next full release sometime in 2010.
OSHIT I can finally play this!! I'm pretty sure I'll buy a XBOX360 for it.
no keyboards compatible with the 360 - you lose!
This is the one I was waiting for. Cave's best game will finally be accessible to the rest of the nerds and hopefully it'll be done without too much shit wrong with it. I guess I'll buy that 360 now (yea yea, as if 3 other Cave ports wasn't reason enough, but Futari is the funnest by far).
I sure could go for a Saturn pad -> 360 adapter right about now.
I think it's high time I got a 360 soon. For some reason, I expect either DFK or Ibara to come next, and maybe DFK gets a Black Label.
I'm quite surprised at the minimal excitement over this, especially considering how many people tend to rate this game in their top 10. This time last year, who'd have dreamed of Futari and Ketsui getting ported!?! Amazing news! =D
Seems to be a good deal of excitement to me! I own the PCB, so it's not a big deal to me, but I'm happy more people
will be able to play a port of this great game (even if the slowdown is destined to be messed up, judging by every port (including DS) that Cave has done).
welcome to 2007 ;)
such a shoddy console doesn't deserve so much love! i think for myself, and a few others here, the best thing about ports is it bringing down the pcb prices.. =D
I can relate - and I'll probably continue to mix n match, especially if the boards come down enough.
Quote from: EOJ on April 21, 2009, 03:34:02 PM
Seems to be a good deal of excitement to me! I own the PCB, so it's not a big deal to me, but I'm happy more people
will be able to play a port of this great game (even if the slowdown is destined to be messed up, judging by every port (including DS) that Cave has done).
Same sentiments here. Great news as more people will be able to enjoy a fantastic game but I'll stick with my PCB for now. It'll be interesting to see how the slowdown turns out though, especially for Ultra. >:D
Play-asia already has a page up:
http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-br-49-en-70-3cq6.html
OMFG! I just can't believe it... =D
yesssss:D:D
I'M VERY HAPPPY
I LOVE REKOOOOOOOOOOOO
Jejejeje!!
Now i HOPE that the game go out how the PCB
:D
feb
Quote from: jpj on April 21, 2009, 07:27:19 AM
no keyboards compatible with the 360 - you lose!
No shit ! But it's the one game I might accept to play with another controller. Unless Starcraft 2 comes out at the same time, then screw futari !
Quote from: Monouchi on April 21, 2009, 05:08:29 AM
Wow! =D
now if only Daifukkatsu would come too.
wont be long dont worry
So Mihara/Arika is making this Futari 360 port, not 5bp or Cave?
Quote from: Deity on April 29, 2009, 03:54:00 PM
So Mihara/Arika is making this Futari 360 port...?
No. Why would you think that? Arika isn't making any CAVE ports.
The Futari 1.5 port is being made by CAVE, just like the Deathsmiles port (which is excellent, by the way).
Ok, well, I just wondered, since you mentioned earlier in this thread that Mihara had written something about a release in 2009, I thought that maybe he was involved with making the port. But anyway, thanks for clearing that up! :)
Mihara is the self-appointed Cave spokesman/critic for any type of port or new game. He will comment on anything, and I'm going to have to give the guy props for being brutally honest when need be. Watching Japanese people blow each other in the name of saving face gets really old.
Quote from: Deity on April 29, 2009, 03:54:00 PM
So Mihara/Arika is making this Futari 360 port, not 5bp or Cave?
for realeez? Good thing 5pb or taito didn't get their hands on it
Quote from: charlienash87 on May 02, 2009, 03:06:12 AM
Quote from: Deity on April 29, 2009, 03:54:00 PM
So Mihara/Arika is making this Futari 360 port, not 5bp or Cave?
for realeez? Good thing 5pb or taito didn't get their hands on it
Dude, read 3 posts above yours.
QuoteGood thing 5pb or taito didn't get their hands on it
Taito has never ported a game either.
Quote from: GaijinPunch on May 02, 2009, 04:59:44 AM
QuoteGood thing 5pb or taito didn't get their hands on it
Taito has never ported a game either.
so cave was responsible for their own terrible ibara port... I owe taito an apology then
Fo shizzle.
Looks like CAVE is handing this off to M2 due to being too busy with the DS update.
Who is M2? ???
They're a port company, not sure what else they've done but Mihara was bigging them up on his blog a couple weeks ago. He said something like in the past you'd go to Arika for ports, but M2 is the best at the moment.
Thanks for the info. Do you know any other shooters that they've ported?
Otomedius lol
Some more info here:
http://www.mtwo.co.jp/
Oh, they did a lot of the great Sega Ages ports for the PS2! Fantasy Zone, Monster World, and so on. Maybe if they're doing it, we'll get scanlines for the MF1.5 port?
And whether you like Otomedius or not, the port is pretty spot on.
First comparison pics (taken from the blog and rehosted):
Arcade:
(http://i42.tinypic.com/15qcbgo.jpg)
360:
(http://i40.tinypic.com/30ll2s9.jpg)
According to the latest official blog post (http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/2009/06/post-2950.html), they will announce the release date and details about the port in August.
That conversion looks great !
Quote from: Deity on April 29, 2009, 03:54:00 PM
So Mihara/Arika is making this Futari 360 port, not 5bp or Cave?
It's being done by the people who did Otomedius.
Blog was updated today.
Looks like the Futari premium theme has been finished and that Asadasan is going to get around to submitting it to MS soon.
The limited edition of the MF360 release will apparently have a DLC card with it. Doesn't say what it will download. Apparently with DS, they shipped 15k of the LE, but they won't be able to do as many this time around for cost reasons?
Quote from: necpmf on June 19, 2009, 05:18:46 PM
Quote from: Deity on April 29, 2009, 03:54:00 PM
So Mihara/Arika is making this Futari 360 port, not 5bp or Cave?
It's being done by the people who did Otomedius.
M2 did Otomedius?
Yeah, they did the port.
Quote from: EOJ on July 02, 2009, 03:30:30 PM
Yeah, they did the port.
That news didn't make it to the rock I live under.
It's listed on their site:
http://www.mtwo.co.jp/
;)
According to today's official Cave blog post, Ikeda will start working on the Futari Arrange mode in a couple weeks.
That's a great news! :righton:
Just posted on the CAVE Blog.
Arcade
(http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/images/2009/07/17/photo_2.jpg)
Xbox360
(http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/images/2009/07/17/360_2.jpg)
Lookin good. :righton:
Now just get Ikeda on the slowdown...
So damn pretty! Oh, and the high res stuff looks good too. :)
I might have to get a rotatable LCD if this turns out to be good.
The old font choices look better to me... I guess they lost the typefaces or something? =p
The old ones might not scale as well. I agree though, I like the old ones better.
news for date coming out?
Over at shmups some people watched the live stream stuff (I was sleeping :oogle:) and according to them, release date will be 2009-11-26.
Any news about the limited edition stuff?
Quote from: HVL on August 15, 2009, 07:41:59 AM
Over at shmups some people watched the live stream stuff (I was sleeping :oogle:) and according to them, release date will be 2009-11-26.
Any news about the limited edition stuff?
Looks like a limited like Death Smiles with CD.
Espgaluda II is finally on the way,tallking about black label of ESP II too.
http://www.famitsu.com/image/3208/JWqUM4WmRwn5BVj3G1ZPbMOV5P77Uj6v.html (http://www.famitsu.com/image/3208/JWqUM4WmRwn5BVj3G1ZPbMOV5P77Uj6v.html)
Quote from: KOMA on August 15, 2009, 08:30:26 AM
Looks like a limited like Death Smiles with CD.
I don't really fancy those arrangement discs but since it's a double album with both Mushis arranged, I think it's well worth the +2500 yen. That is, if it's easily obtainable.
Big news: according to the official cave blog (8/15 entry), both the regular and LEs will come with a download card giving you Futari ver 1.01 for free. That's the slightly tweaked version of ver 1.0 only shown at a Cave matsuri a few years back. Unbelievable.
No Futari Black Label though. Good thing I still have my kit.
Sweets news!
Quote from: EOJ on August 17, 2009, 08:13:44 AM
Big news: according to the official cave blog (8/15 entry), both the regular and LEs will come with a download card giving you Futari ver 1.01 for free. That's the slightly tweaked version of ver 1.0 only shown at a Cave matsuri a few years back. Unbelievable.
No Futari Black Label though. Good thing I still have my kit.
NTSC-J always said the one difference was just the stage 2 boss. Is that right?
Guess we can do a close comparison now.
I think it was just they added 2 bombs and fixed the messed up last pattern of the Stage 4 boss in Original.
Though ver 1.01 didn't have Ultra mode. So maybe that won't be included? It would be nice if they included that, and tweaked it a bit, as ver 1.0's Ultra
is more or less impossible.
P-A preorders up! No LE yet, I think I will wait.
http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-br-49-en-70-3cq6.html (http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-br-49-en-70-3cq6.html)
The LE is up for preorder on amazon.co.jp (@8200 yen, pretty good deal), but no regular edition yet. The LE is limited to one per customer, so unfortunately I can't grab a few for other members here. :(
Interesting news about the 1.0 version. I always wanted to try it (thought about snatching up your kit, EOJ, when it was available). I need to jump on the X360 bandwagon soon I suppose.
http://sp-game.cocolog-nifty.com/photos/uncategorized/2009/08/26/0826_stick.jpg
Apparently Seimitsu but those look like Hori buttons. Probably not gonna buy it. The LE is still not open for reservations on play-asia yet, which is getting irritating as apparently it's sold out on amazon.jp already.
Nice that they had the foresight to go with Seimitsu though.
I'm thinking about it, but really I've spent way too much on sticks already lol.
Looks like an LS-32 with Hori or Sanwa buttons (let's hope it's the latter). I'll spring for one if I can get one off amazon.co.jp, but otherwise I'll pass.
Agree, if its Sanwa its a sure buy...but not Hori..
I didnt buy any of the other sticks, maybe I should get a go at this one.
Quote from: Megalixir on August 27, 2009, 12:00:49 AM
The LE is still not open for reservations on play-asia yet, which is getting irritating as apparently it's sold out on amazon.jp already.
I have a feeling that history will repeat itself with these MF1.5 limited editions... How fucking hard is it to confirm their order with the supplier? It has been over a week already!
Just checked and that stick has a Seimitsu LS-32-K-SS2. They don't mention what the buttons are (which means they're Hori buttons!). Eh, I'll order one anyway. They're cheap on amazon.co.jp right now.
According to Famitsu this week, the arrange mode splits your character into two, with either Reco or Palm functioning as some sort of shield against which bullets are cancelled and turned into gems. I guess this is what I saw at the Matsuri. Sounds cool but I hope manipulating the "shield character" isn't mapped to a different stick on the 360 controller.
I bet it will be just like DS 1.1 - you move the other character ('the option') around with the other analog stick. For joystick users, you'll be able to hold down a button and rotate the option.
That's my current theory.
I'm open to it but I definitely prefer modes that I can play with an arcade stick.
By the way, from what I saw at the Matsuri this mode currently has 0 slowdown.
Well, I could still play DS 1.1 with a stick. But I agree, I'd rather not have the option control BS.
Quote from: adverse on August 28, 2009, 12:41:02 AM
I'm open to it but I definitely prefer modes that I can play with an arcade stick.
By the way, from what I saw at the Matsuri this mode currently has 0 slowdown.
Didn't the early DS footage lack slowdown too? I'm quite certain the slowdown will be in the final product.
Another vote for no option control, though I find DS1.1 much more enjoyable with a stick than the standard pad.
News from the latest 360 Famitsu:
Asada hopes to release MFBL Black Label as DLC
Arrange mode is called "True Mushihimesama Futari"
Partner character functions much like a familiar in Deathsmiles, absorbing bullets and also firing them back (!)
But the barrier is not unlimited, has a number attached to it which can fall to 0 in certain circumstances
No Co-op mode
Novice mode super easy, built so scrubs can get achievements, but not all of them
No images yet? :lol:
Confirmation of MFBL plans is great news although it was to be expected.
Is there really a need to put the novice mode there; original is quite tame after all. Well, not that I mind as long as it doesn't sacrifice anything else, e.g. accuracy of the traditional modes.
Just got an email from Amazon Japan - the LE joystick's release got bumped back a few days later than the release of the game.
SIN has shot some footage of the arrange mode!
http://sinmoon.sakuraweb.com/movie/090829_futari.3G2 (http://sinmoon.sakuraweb.com/movie/090829_futari.3G2)
Credits to emphatic for linking it on shmups.
Yeah, I mentioned that in the Cave user meeting thread earlier today (before it was mentioned on shmups).
Quote from: EOJ on September 02, 2009, 10:24:37 AM
Yeah, I mentioned that in the Cave user meeting thread earlier today (before it was mentioned on shmups).
Sorry, I completely missed your post.
Anyway, the arrange mode looks fun and different. I wonder why it says "maniac mode" on the screen, though. Does this mean there will be arrange modes for original and ultra too? :oogle:
Arrange mode looks like a lot of fun.
Quote from: HVL on September 02, 2009, 11:44:48 AM
Anyway, the arrange mode looks fun and different. I wonder why it says "maniac mode" on the screen, though. Does this mean there will be arrange modes for original and ultra too? :oogle:
Yes, arrange has Original, Maniac, and Ultra modes. All three play slightly different in the scoring (for example, you can trigger the xXXXX multiplier in Maniac, but not the other two modes, and Original's bullets get really fast once you pass 70,000 on the overall counter).
Quote from: EOJ on September 02, 2009, 08:56:54 PM
Yes, arrange has Original, Maniac, and Ultra modes. All three play slightly different in the scoring (for example, you can trigger the xXXXX multiplier in Maniac, but not the other two modes, and Original's bullets get really fast once you pass 70,000 on the overall counter).
That's just damn cool. Original will be a thrill with super fast bullets. I'm quite interested in the arranged Ultra too; maybe it will be a little more accessible than the normal. =D
I think SIN said he beat Ultra Arrange in his first time playing. Or the game crashed in the 5th stage. Something like that. He said it's pretty easy though.
Arrange also has an auto-bomb, by the way. Let's hope you can turn that off, like in Ketsui DS.
You won't see the difference if you don't get hit. :P
Outside of Ultra mode, I don't think the training wheels are necessary. It dumbs down the whole experience.
Probably… Then again, it urges the players of any caliber to pay more attention to scoring rather than survival. Not particularly a bad thing if you consider that the game has to be accessible to do well with non-hardcore (by Japanese standards of hardcore) audience.
The blog was updated with MF1.5 promotional video.
虫姫さまふたりVer1.5 PV (http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/2009/09/ver15-pv-9079.html)
The arranged Ultra looks pretty cheesy alright.
I can't believe how well the game looks visually. So sharp! :o
The gameplay resembles Imperishable Night a little, heh.
Quote from: moozooh on September 04, 2009, 11:05:39 AM
I can't believe how well the game looks visually. So sharp! :o
Yeah, the upgraded graphics are very nice, especially the bosses.
I'm going to wait until its on the marketplace to check it out on the big screen.
I upped it to Youtube in case anyone here can't download the PV directly: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LG0pyFWlqxw&fmt=35
HI!!!
Rapid info: the donwload card for the futari 1.0 it's included surely and normal version too?
Because i don't have very interested to buy limited edition!
thanks
REKO
Quote from: febas on September 05, 2009, 07:43:31 AM
Rapid info: the donwload card for the futari 1.0 it's included surely and normal version too?
Yes, that seems to be the case. Nothing is set in stone but it was mentioned on the official CAVE blog, according to EOJ (http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=559.msg11366#msg11366).
I wonder will P-A ever get the LE preorders up. I'm quite honestly on the brink of preordering the normal.
Amazon Japan lists the regular version as coming with the 1.01 download card. So yeah, the regular version will get it too.
Quote from: EOJ on September 05, 2009, 09:37:05 PM
Amazon Japan lists the regular version as coming with the 1.01 download card. So yeah, the regular version will get it too.
I set the preorder page as my homepage. I wish they would hurry up already.
Quote from: SuperPang on September 04, 2009, 12:21:59 PM
I'm going to wait until its on the marketplace to check it out on the big screen.
You can transfer it to a USB stick and watch it on your 360, that's what I did.
It looks very sharp visually, it should be a treat to play, even though I can only play it in Yoko. Roll on November :)
thanks at all!!
But if i buy normal edition and cave decide to don't insert card, Can i Download the 1.01 from marketplace with normal japanese point or only with card cave?
thanksthanksthanks!!
I don't intested to limited because i don't love version arrange of ost and music in generallly!and i collect shmup, but my first mission is PLAY AT FUTARI :D:D
feb
I love this game, all reko series!i love rekooooo
Quote from: febas on September 06, 2009, 11:56:43 AM
But if i buy normal edition and cave decide to don't insert card, Can i Download the 1.01 from marketplace with normal japanese point or only with card cave?
I don't think it will be available for download without the card; the full voice pack for Deathsmiles can't be downloaded without the card.
I finally got a chance to watch the promo vid. I'm not liking the 'HD' graphics. Looks pretty ugly IMO - all plastic-y and weird. I'll stick to the original graphics.
For some of the graphics, I agree, though some I like. I think the shot in particular looks really ugly...
Quote from: HVL on September 05, 2009, 09:08:31 AM
Quote from: febas on September 05, 2009, 07:43:31 AM
Rapid info: the donwload card for the futari 1.0 it's included surely and normal version too?
Yes, that seems to be the case. Nothing is set in stone but it was mentioned on the official CAVE blog, according to EOJ (http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=559.msg11366#msg11366).
I wonder will P-A ever get the LE preorders up. I'm quite honestly on the brink of preordering the normal.
yeah I am thinking of the same thing...
just seems weird since we're already in september and the game is getting released in november the only place w/ preorders was amazon.jp...
how far in advance were the deathsmiles LE available for pre-order prior to the actual release date?
Quote from: neomoe on September 07, 2009, 05:39:11 AM
Quote from: HVL on September 05, 2009, 09:08:31 AM
Quote from: febas on September 05, 2009, 07:43:31 AM
Rapid info: the donwload card for the futari 1.0 it's included surely and normal version too?
Yes, that seems to be the case. Nothing is set in stone but it was mentioned on the official CAVE blog, according to EOJ (http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=559.msg11366#msg11366).
I wonder will P-A ever get the LE preorders up. I'm quite honestly on the brink of preordering the normal.
yeah I am thinking of the same thing...
just seems weird since we're already in september and the game is getting released in november the only place w/ preorders was amazon.jp...
how far in advance were the deathsmiles LE available for pre-order prior to the actual release date?
6 months, maybe a bit longer
The Cave shop will be opening preorders for the Futari LE on September 28th, at noon:
http://cave.shop-pro.jp/
The best part: you will get two faceplate stickers if you order from them, which you will not be able to get anywhere else.
EDIT: I am offering these for preorder (http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=668.0).
Has anyone ever stuck a sticker on their faceplate? Does it look ghetto?
Hello there, if someone else offers a preorder of this extra limited edition from "cave shop", count me in ;)
We already knew this but MFBL officially announced:
http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/
Great news but i keep my pcb anyway,this board have a too much value for me,bought it at release and received the 24 december :cool:
That's cool. But looks like they'll have about 2 months to make it, which is the same time frame they had for DSMBL. So I guess we should expect similarly inaccurate slowdown. BL has a lot more slowdown than 1.5 to begin with, and more varied speeds as well. I always thought it would be really hard to replicate that via software. Let's see how close they can get it in the short time frame they have.
Quote from: EOJ on September 09, 2009, 09:13:08 PM
That's cool. But looks like they'll have about 2 months to make it, which is the same time frame they had for DSMBL. So I guess we should expect similarly inaccurate slowdown. BL has a lot more slowdown than 1.5 to begin with, and more varied speeds as well. I always thought it would be really hard to replicate that via software. Let's see how close they can get it in the short time frame they have.
Where did you get the 2 months from? I can say almost for certain that it won't get released until some months later than the retail. I know this might be a bit far-fetched but even the screenshot says "2007, 2010".
QuoteWhere did you get the 2 months from?
From Cave. At the latest cave meeting.
I don't think it will be released too far after ver 1.5. Probably January, if the screenshot says 2010.
Just seeing the screenshot there made it sink in properly that with this release we're going to have MF 1.5, 1.01, a new arrange and BL. That's pretty awesome.
I so wish my LCD was tate-able right now.
Fingers crossed 'cause I prefer a single good conversion than 4 approaches.
Arrange mode looks awful, btw.
QuoteI so wish my LCD was tate-able right now.
I already have surrendered, I'll buy a CRT TV.
Some arrange details and another clip on the blog.
http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/2009/09/post-2740.html (http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/2009/09/post-2740.html)
With as much gold as you get for simply shooting enemies, maybe it would be best to try to avoid powerup items? He got something like 70 million from that twenty second boss fight. In later stages I assume you'd have a counter higher than 39k, and extending those boss fights by even a few seconds could really boost your score.
Interesting that he seems to have earned almost as many points in stage 1 as he did in stage 2.
"Common benefits Edition "two Mushihimesama Ver1.01" DLC card software enclosed"
So this means the 1.01card will be in both edition correct, this is Google translate, as I cannot read Japanese.
Quote from: MrTie on September 12, 2009, 12:08:14 PM
So this means the 1.01card will be in both edition correct, this is Google translate, as I cannot read Japanese.
Yes, as discussed on the previous page.
Very good, that dlc it's included in normal edition yet!!!
It's a good method for people that "buy" the download game from internet!!!
great!
FEB
QuoteI always thought it would be really hard to replicate that via software.
It's not if the slowdown is actually programmed in the first place. You'd think it was in Death Smiles since they did so good at replicating it in Arcade Mode... yet WTF happened w/ 360 mode & MBL? We'll need to ask a fly on the wall who frequents Cave developer meetings.
Fucked up slowdown will crucify God Mode.
I think the slowdown in DS 360 mode was an improvement. I never found it unfair. They dropped the ball with MBL though and theres no room for error with Futari, if they remove more than a little bit it will be a complete nightmare
Mushi Futari will be at the MS TGS booth:
http://www.onlineplayer.jp/modules/topics/article.php?storyid=15356
which indicates MS support for the game which is a good thing.
The newest blog post:
http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/blog/2009/09/index.html
Says you'll be able to try the following modes, each up to the end of stage 2:
Futari 1.5 (Arcade / X360)
Futari Arrange
Futari Novice
Asada will be there in the booth each day except on the 25th, as he'll be busy doing interviews and sales shit that day.
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8202420
Arrange footage. Very challenging midboss, don't you agree?
Edit: I guess this is old footage but I never downloaded the links on the Cave blog, so in any case, direct link to instant footage regardless.
The PV is finally on the Japanese marketplace. I suppose they deliberately stalled it for TGS, because it's now mixed in with a bunch of other TGS stuff. Including Raystorm HD.
Looks real nice, especially the bosses. Actually makes me think its a shame Caves SH-3 generation wasn't high res. Don't get me wrong, I love 15KHz, but from the assets they're using here it seems the original renders could've looked much better. I wonder if it was purely a hardware decision or one favouring the number of Egret 2's in the wild.
http://kotaku.com/5368190/bullet-hell-shooter-creators-cave-going-region+free-for-next-xbox-360-game
Kotaku link, yeah... sorry about that. Still, apparently it's going to be region free. That's great news!!
I'm so going to otonagai that shit so Asada will make future games region free as well.
This is a very unusual and generous decision for a publisher testing the waters but good for them if it happens. I'll certainly be buying copies for people who don't want them.
This is almost too good to be true. Great news if it really happens but I won't be rejoicing before the discs are printed w/o region locking. ;)
Hell yes. The preorder at Play-Asia shall stand, and I might as well start setting some cash aside for that 360 now. If no Cave tiitles past this get a region-free release, I think I'll still feel good about only springing for a US 360, as this should keep me busy for a long while. Really damn excited now.
Awesome! Pre-ordering now!
Guess I should hook up my 360 again to check this out. Haven't been playing much of anything recently.
Oh, boy. This will be fun.
Limit of 1 type per person, so you can get 1 Reco card, and 1 Palm card.
YJ fist fuck to ensue.
And of course, the server is absolutely fucking hammered to a grinding hault, as usual. Way to embrace technology, Cave.
Reco version sold out. Now just the homo Palm/Aki version.
Yep. And one per customer. Lame. I had to cancel all the preorders I was going to do for people.
EDIT: Palm version just sold out too.
And that's all she wrote. :)
30 min for Reco, 40 for Palm. Ridiculous.
LOL. Sometimes Cave seem very reluctant to take any money through their odd little excuse for a shop.
Wow, that's pretty crazy. Can't say I'm not a bit disappointed.
Preorder confirmed through play-asia. Now the wait begins. So happy I'll finally get to play this.
EDIT: Cave's "Experiment" may be a success. Mushi Futari is at the top of the best seller list for the 360 on play-asia.
Quote from: SuperPang on September 28, 2009, 06:25:53 AM
LOL. Sometimes Cave seem very reluctant to take any money through their odd little excuse for a shop.
Typical Japanese thing. Once a food product takes off, the think they're going to make too much money and quit making it.
Yeah, tis a bit of a shame but I think given the circumstances I'll probably downgrade to the normal edition. Given that I'd already written the cash off for the LE, and that I have Play-Asia credit to the tune of $65, I am now thinking of grabbing Bayonetta + Sin & Punishment 2 at the end of next month to tide me over until I can get my grubby mitts on Futari. Cheers for trying though EOJ :)
Just FYI, if you were trying to order the LE of this I'm pretty sure the pre-orders are totally sold out.
Given that, I'd be shocked if Mushi Futari doesn't sell straight through its first order. Hope they've got a re-stock planned.
Ended up preordering the normal. Should have known better and ignored the LE altogether. :rolleyes:
There was another new blog post today:
-Futari 1.5 is complete, the master has been sent.
-They have about 20,000 preorders, the same as they had with Deathsmiles (foreign orders don't seem to have made an impact in this regard).
-Work will continue on Futari Black Label now.
There is also some talk about Ketsui which I'll post in the Ketsui thread.
Did they specifically say something about the foreign orders? The fact it was the top selling game on Play-Asia for a few days following the announcement must mean something at least...
How much would you need to get the top spot on Play Asia? Being #1 is great but doesn't give any perspective as to how many orders have actually been placed.
Quote
Did they specifically say something about the foreign orders?
EOJ made the comparison since DS was region locked, and Futari isn't.
Quote from: GaijinPunch on October 15, 2009, 07:28:42 PM
Quote
Did they specifically say something about the foreign orders?
EOJ made the comparison since DS was region locked, and Futari isn't.
Bingo. Cave isn't seeing any more preorders whether the game is region locked or not. But there is still a month to release, so perhaps there will be more preorders from foreigners in that time.
The question that leaves is, what percentage of all preorders were importers? Because it's not like region locking stopped a decent chunk of us getting Deathsmiles...
I really hope they put the actual breakdown up somewhere.
Sure, let's magically pull statistics we don't have out of our ass.
I said I was hoping they'd put it up. Sorry for rambling aloud.
Quote from: StarCreator on October 16, 2009, 08:07:32 AM
I said I was hoping they'd put it up.
My 2 year old even understood what you meant.
So if I order this :
http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-br-49-en-15-futari-70-3cq6.html
Even though it says NTSC-J, it will play on a PAL Xbox 360, right ?
Quote from: PROMETHEUS on October 18, 2009, 12:05:46 PM
So if I order this :
http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-br-49-en-15-futari-70-3cq6.html
Even though it says NTSC-J, it will play on a PAL Xbox 360, right ?
Yes. Apparently play-asia didn't get the memo.
Well I think that Play-Asia will confirm the Region free game once they will have the official copy.
If some people knows that story, ArcSystem said that BlazBlue XBOX360 US/JAP version would be region free 3 months before release, so we European players were as happy as angry when they said a month before release that it was finally region locked and pretending the reason was just a "miss" from the developpers ...
Play-Asia woud not take the risk against their customer even if officials said that Mushihime futari will be region free until they test the game in their office...
I wonder if they'll release any vids of Maniac or Ultra modes (plain Jane 1.5, not Arrange) before release. So far we've seen nothing other than a few stills of Maniac mode from Famitsu.
Why do I care? Slowdown, of course. While Cave got it right with DS, Futari 1.5 was done by M2. Yes, M2 has a good track record in regard to ports, but they've never handled anything with so much slowdown before. Much like DS, Futari 1.5 is a game that would be ruined by inaccurate slowdown.
Quotebut they've never handled anything with so much slowdown before.
And Galuda 2 will be even worse. O_o
Scary.
so is the artwork they have up on play-asia actually the one for the limited edition?
http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-br-49-en-70-3j1c.html
it sucks
I just would like to notify that the preorders for Futari LE on Play-Asia are opened.
Only ONE preorder by customer is allowed wich indicate the low availability of the product ;)
I love the LE artwork. =D
...but I am buying the normal edition... :-\
Quote from: neomoe on October 20, 2009, 09:50:09 AM
so is the artwork they have up on play-asia actually the one for the limited edition?
http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-br-49-en-70-3j1c.html
it sucks
Yes and yes.
P-A took way too long to get the LE preorders up and I don't give a shit anymore, not especially with that cover art.
That should be an entry on manpaper.com.
Well, if you buy an LE and want to trade to the normal cover, give me a call. =D
Quote from: neomoe on October 20, 2009, 09:50:09 AM
so is the artwork they have up on play-asia actually the one for the limited edition?
http://www.play-asia.com/paOS-13-71-br-49-en-70-3j1c.html
it sucks
I prefer that cover.
... and they're already sold out. Wow.
damn ...missed it
New blog post:
Futari has passed the safety certification (bug test, etc), and so it is now 100% complete. All we have to do now is wait for the release day.
Asada says they'll move into the Galuda 2 port full time now. Wonder if they already finished Futari Black Label too, as he no longer mentions it.
Acheivements are up (in Japanese):
http://www12.atwiki.jp/xbox360score/pages/879.html
They all look easy breezy - 300mil in Maniac mode is very easy. Nowhere near as hard as getting 300mil in Deathsmiles.
I was hoping they'd make it 500mil instead, as that's about 1/2 of the world record (300mil is about 1/2 of the DS world record, in comparison).
Quote from: EOJ on October 22, 2009, 10:28:18 PM
New blog post:
Futari has passed the safety certification (bug test, etc), and so it is now 100% complete. All we have to do now is wait for the release day.
Asada says they'll move into the Galuda 2 port full time now. Wonder if they already finished Futari Black Label too, as he no longer mentions it.
Have they mentioned MBL 1.1 lately? I've been waiting for that for a while now, and I was hoping to get some time with it before Futari steals my soul.
I don't think we'll see MBL 1.1 until early next year. They'll probably toss it in as filler until Galuda 2 drops.
I don't see the "no miss Ultra Mode" achievement...
Maybe it's one of the secret achievements. I'd bet it's just 1CC Ultra, rather than no miss.
Quote from: GaijinPunch on October 23, 2009, 02:00:20 AM
I don't see the "no miss Ultra Mode" achievement...
Has anyone actually done that? If so, I need video.
It has yet to be done in the orignal Mushihime, it'll mostl probably never happen in either of them. I'm surprised that it actually happened for Mushi's Arrange mode...
It was a joke, obviously. I don't think a no miss is going to happen, and I don't think Cave is going to tempt anyone to try w/ some bullshit achievement.
Quote from: GaijinPunch on October 24, 2009, 08:20:20 AM
It was a joke, obviously. I don't think a no miss is going to happen, and I don't think Cave is going to tempt anyone to try w/ some bullshit achievement.
I knew that...it would be hilarious to see people try, however. That Achievement would age people ten years from stress alone, another five from disappointment and regret, not to mention the real time devoted to attempting something that ludicrous.
I don't think this was mentioned here before, but Asada recently mentioned the Futari LE will be in an over-sized DVD box case. It will not be a cardboard slipcase with the normal edition package and soundtrack housed inside, like the Deathsmiles LE (and Mamoru-kun LE) was.
So, you will not get the regular edition cover art with the Futari LE.
Quote from: StarCreator on October 21, 2009, 08:08:31 AM
... and they're already sold out. Wow.
http://www.play-asia.com/SOap-23-83-a120-71-br-49-en-84-j-70-3j1c.html
It's back in stock. I'm biting the bullet.
I own the LE of Trigger Heart Exelica sooo.....
Just noticed another interview with Asada in the Mushi Futari section of Fam 360. He mentions that Arcade/360 mode has exactly the same slowdown as the arcade version thanks to M2.
Quote from: adverse on October 30, 2009, 04:37:37 AM
He mentions that Arcade/360 mode has exactly the same slowdown as the arcade version thanks to M2.
That is great if true. Though judging from the clips of Original mode 360 they showed in the promo vid, Original 360 is missing some (but maybe they added it later?).
As long as they don't fuck it up like DSMBL, I'll be pretty happy.
More details:
Asada says they learned their lesson from DS about the accuracy of slowdown replication.
Mushi Futari Arrange will have a fever mode a bit like Deathsmiles which will encourage players to stay in fever as long as possible.
Quote from: adverse on October 30, 2009, 04:37:37 AM
Just noticed another interview with Asada in the Mushi Futari section of Fam 360. He mentions that Arcade/360 mode has exactly the same slowdown as the arcade version thanks to M2.
Fantastic news. I'm confident this is gonna be aces now.
Quote from: adverse on October 30, 2009, 05:49:49 AM
More details:
Asada says they learned their lesson from DS about the accuracy of slowdown replication.
They should go back and patch it then! That is one benefit of the current console landscape, the ability to actually fix things that went wrong.
In the arcade waiting for dfk...lol
just read the mushi futari review. 8876
they fucking have an ESP II pic instead of a mushi futari pic on the review. Telling!
What were the complaints? Especially the guy who gave it a 6. I know a few guys gave DS lower scores because they said Arcade mode made their eyes bleed on an LCD. I have a bad feeling Futari will be the same.
6 guy said he couldn't tell WTF is going on in arrange mode. Too many bullets for experts etc
two reviewers complained "not much content"
Ah, then we don't have to give up on the hope of a scanline option just yet. :righton:
This is Famitsu 360, right? Famitsu will review it later. I don't expect more insightful reviews from them, but I bet they'll get the pic right.
Quote from: adverse on October 30, 2009, 10:40:18 AM
two reviewers complained "not much content"
Right. :rolleyes:
Anyway, the slowdown news are really fantastic.
Quote from: EOJ on October 25, 2009, 12:55:41 AM
I don't think this was mentioned here before, but Asada recently mentioned the Futari LE will be in an over-sized DVD box case. It will not be a cardboard slipcase with the normal edition package and soundtrack housed inside, like the Deathsmiles LE (and Mamoru-kun LE) was.
Interesting....but I hope that doesn't mean that the soundtrack won't get its own separate jewel case. If that's the case I'll be kinda disappointed...
Ok, there were some details on the Arrange mode written up in the Famitsu 360 that I didn't have time to write up. Sounds like it could have really deep gameplay.
"In Arrange, your secondary character forms a barrier for you. While using shot, enemy bullets will be slowed and paused, and when firing laser the stopped bullets will bounce back and lots of gems will be generated. What's important here are the 4-digit numbers at the bottom of the screen. When your control character is using shot, this will increase, and when the control character uses laser it will quickly drop. However, if your reserve character gets hit by a bullet, the counter of the control character will drop. Your reserve character's counter will not drop and will go on increasing, so a precise switching of both characters is required. When both gauges are at 9999, you enter fever mode in which you are much more powerful and your score increases greatly."
This is gonna be hot.
Sounds even more confusing than I expected, good job, Ikeda. :D
You know it has a deep scoring system when you have to take notes. :righton:
Quote from: adverse on October 30, 2009, 10:40:18 AM
two reviewers complained "not much content"
lol. I can't think of any other shmup port that offers more content than Futari.
Has it been confirmed that the port will be region free, or was it a bad translation? I recall someone mentioning that in one of the threads in this forum. I would like to order a copy, but I don't want to get stuck with a coaster because I don't have a Japanese Xbox 360.
Quote from: antares on November 05, 2009, 02:23:41 AM
Quote from: adverse on October 30, 2009, 10:40:18 AM
two reviewers complained "not much content"
lol. I can't think of any other shmup port that offers more content than Futari.
True.
Its like today people expect so much customization, achievements etc etc that they "cannot see the forest cos of all the trees."
If Cave made the port with only arcade mode, I would still be happy.
Anyone complaining about lack of contents in the Futari port is probably at the very bottom of the leaderboards because they didn't even bother to learn what is there.
Quote from: adverse on November 04, 2009, 09:59:09 AM
"In Arrange, your secondary character forms a barrier for you. While using shot, enemy bullets will be slowed and paused, and when firing laser the stopped bullets will bounce back and lots of gems will be generated. What's important here are the 4-digit numbers at the bottom of the screen. When your control character is using shot, this will increase, and when the control character uses laser it will quickly drop. However, if your reserve character gets hit by a bullet, the counter of the control character will drop. Your reserve character's counter will not drop and will go on increasing, so a precise switching of both characters is required. When both gauges are at 9999, you enter fever mode in which you are much more powerful and your score increases greatly."
Yeah, you can see that in action (in Maniac mode) in SIN's vid he posted. Frankly, it didn't seem too exciting to me, but maybe once I try it out I'll change my tune.
The official site opened up yesterday:
http://www.cave.co.jp/gameonline/Xbox360/mushihime2/index.html
It includes a detailed section on the new Arrange mode.
Some new details (mixed in with info already posted by adverse on the previous page):
-There is a button to switch characters (defaults to X). You also switch between 'OS' and 'DS' when you switch characters (see below).
-the counter on the bottom left is called the 'offense' counter, on the 'offense side' (OS). It increases as you absorb all gems except the blue-hued ones
-the counter on the bottom right is called the 'defense' counter, on the 'defense side' (DS). It increases as you absorb bullets with your option. It decreases when bullets hit the option's hitbox or when you reflect bullets back at the enemy.
-Hold shot while on the DS and your option moves as a trace.
-Hold laser while on the DS and your option is fixed in place.
-While using shot on the DS your option forms a barrier (or 'guard') which you can use to absorb bullets. It also slows the speed of bullets.
-You can absorb bullets as long as your DS counter is not at zero.
-To reflect bullets back you have to be on the DS and have a counter that is not zero. Absorb bullets while holding shot then press laser to reflect them back in the form of gems (the bullets never do any damage to the enemy and are always reflected back as gems for you to absorb). The longer you hold the guard before you press laser, the more gems you'll spawn.
One observation: the whole DS barrier thing is similar to Ibara Kuro's XTC sphere - and they both have counters that go up to 9999 as you let bullets into the sphere/barrier.
I'll add this link to the first post of the thread.
Just got an email from the Cave shop - they will be selling the standard version of this game with a free telephone card, starting from 11/14.
http://cave-matsuri.shop-pro.jp/?pid=16333427
They sell it for the MSRP (7140yen), which is a ripoff really as you can get it from amazon.co.jp for under 5700 yen. So unless you really want the stupid phone card, I don't see the point.
It makes sense though... Add some exclusive collectors item but don't undercut your retailers.
Asada made a new blog post. He says Futari Black Label is pretty much done (about 2 months after they started), so I will be very surprised if the slowdown is completely accurate. He says they'll likely put it up for download before the end of the year, which is basically what I hypothesized (http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=559.msg11637#msg11637) much earlier in this thread.
He also said he'll announce the next port(s) at the Cave festival in December.
There's now an interview with Asada on the Japanese 360 marketplace, for Gold users. With orange hair.
He showcases the game by playing Arrange mode on Ultra.
Meh, all they show is the damn arrange mode. Give me a single vid of Maniac or Ultra arcade modes please. :whyioughtta:
It's been upped to nico douga:
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8828417
For those who don't have access otherwise.
I've saw it.......The arrange mode looks like GigaWing :rolleyes:
MS-sponsored Futari goods giveaway campaign:
http://www.xbox.com/ja-JP/campaign/mushihimesama/
Really looking forward to this.
May be slightly off-topic, but how long does P-A typically take to ship an order to the US? I've never imported before, and I live in NYC.
depends on what type of shipping method you use. if you go the cheapest route it can be anywhere from a day or two up to three weeks. (they've never taken longer than that) if you use more expensive methods then they'll get it to you asap. they usually ship things out early. I received my copy of THE LE the day it was released.
The cheapest option is always a gamble, as bucklemyshoe stated.
I'm tempted to go for a faster method but I'd have to pay 20 bucks extra for UPS and might end up getting hit by taxes. :laugh:
I went with the cheaper option ( UPS doesn't work for me, I am never home to sign for packages ), so I am rolling the dice a bit. Granted, I placed my order when the lack of region-locking was announced, so I may get lucky.
Cool picture of a Futari display in a Japanese shop:
(http://www.andriasang.com/ticker/5820388634/original.jpg)
From: http://www.andriasang.com/e/ticker/5820388634/
I saw a similar display at the Kyoto Sofmap the other day.
I should probably upgrade my shipping option but I am so short of funds right now it's unreal. Play-Asia are pretty decent about marking things down (I have a permanent note on my file to do it by default) but they take no responsibility if things go AWOL. Not really worth gambling with on standard delivery, and if you're getting something huge sent (i.e. a console) with a $10 value marked on it you're just asking to have it taken apart, but if you've got just one game going via a decent courier it can be a good option to speed things through.
That demo pod is really nice.
Quote from: fuse on November 19, 2009, 04:51:58 AMPlay-Asia are pretty decent about marking things down (I have a permanent note on my file to do it by default) but they take no responsibility if things go AWOL.
Not true.
I recently had something go missing and they offered store credit or a replacement, but I had to send them about 20 emails and waited literally over 40 working days before they would do anything. You would think that someone such as myself would have a supplier in Japan, but...
Play-Asia's guilty of overcharging for EMS too. I dunno, maybe they have to pay more for EMS in Hong Kong.
Here's a little treat for you all, to help celebrate Futari's release next week:
http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=713.0
:righton:
プレイｘプレイ up for Gold JP account owners
Yukari plays original arrange and... I turned it off.
Good lord that's gotta be some must see TV. :righton:
Will need beer.
I picked up this week's famitsu, with the futari review. No one has anything particularly negative to say about the port itself, they just say things like "it's a 3 year old game" and "it can be completed in 45 minutes". Typical worthless complaints. One guy also complained that "it's a vertical game, so it's a bit hard to play on my small horizontal monitor". I guess he's never heard of tate-ing a monitor. Otherwise they say good things, praising the range of difficulties and the accessible arrange mode. One guy praises the "visual options", and says you can do things like "adjust the frame rate". Perhaps this is similar to the RFA port with selectable 54fps/60fps? They do not mention a scanline option (as they are clearly clueless scrubs who would not find this to be worth mentioning), but it might be in there considering M2 ported it and the visual options are apparently extensive. We'll find out soon enough!
Unfortunately, there is no other mention of the futari port in the famitsu issue, not even a one page preview. :(
Review of the screen options, some really crazy ones in here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gGf51rJPZA&feature=player_embedded
The one at 0.56 looks like the one they use for the superplay DVD.
Famitsu sucks...... ??? I think that the arrange mode it's so interesting compare with other Cave game's arrange :righton:
Reko chan iku yo!!!!Ik__ku yoo, Palm!
Just noticed that P-A is "preparing [my] order." :lol:
Quote from: adverse on November 22, 2009, 07:13:52 AM
Review of the screen options, some really crazy ones in here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gGf51rJPZA&feature=player_embedded
Thank god, I was hoping for a setting where you could have five images of the game playing at once
Quote from: Megalixir on November 22, 2009, 12:20:01 PM
Thank god, I was hoping for a setting where you could have five images of the game playing at once
:laugh:
I have the Cave games running on a monitor next to my work monitor all day, awesome with more screen modes. =D
Quote from: HVL on November 22, 2009, 10:59:30 AM
Just noticed that P-A is "preparing [my] order." :lol:
Me too! Brilliant! Now I only have to wait a month or so as Royal Mail chuck my package to one side at a sorting office near East Midlands Airport and forget about it. :mad:
Wow, these screen modes are indeed crazy, and the menu/settings is really well done overall for a shmup title (much better than Arika ports, even). And there's a frame delay option to counterbalance HDTV lag. :o
I think the five-screen mode is just the epitome of show-off, though.
Quote from: bcass on November 22, 2009, 09:40:55 PM
Not really. It's actually quite trivial creating individual process threads even on single-core architectures. It might show-off the grunt of the 360 hardware, but certainly not the capability of the programmer(s).
I didn't mean "show-off" in that way, sorry if I confused you. I don't think it's even as much as individual process threads rather than just buffering more frames in video memory. However, being able to play on five screens each of them passed through some kind of a matrix text filter… oh yeah.
...disagreeing about options and all that....but isnt this game a big step for Cave in making really serious ports.
I mean, for me that only play ports it is absolutely amazing, it started with DS getting HD graphics.. (Finally made my colleagues at work stop complaining about the resolution when I played Espgaluda.)
And now Cave is working hard on getting the slowdown correct, more options, arrange modes etc in Futari....and Esp2 is allready finished they say?!? :o
(Not to forget that Futari is rumored to be region free.)
Just a couple of years ago I would never have imagined this bright future.
Once again, direct your thanks for the Futari port to M2, not Cave. Cave did the arrange mode and provided the HD graphic upgrade, but the ver 1.5 (and most likely 1.01) coding was done by M2. The options appear to have been done by M2 as well, due to their extensive nature, but it's also possible Cave did the options (and they've just tried expanding them this time around) and this could explain the lack of a scanline option.
Cave did DS, and are doing Espgaluda II. This is why EII is nearly finished - Cave was working on it while M2 was doing Futari. Let's hope they toss Daifukkatsu (or MMP) to M2 while Cave does Deathsmiles II, so we have a steady supply of new ports in the coming year.
Amen!
shinshaobaka (http://www.youtube.com/user/shinshaobaka) posted a video confirming it's really region free. :righton:
Good news. Let's hope those outside Japan buy the game instead of pirate it, so future ports will be region free.
Pics of the normal version package, from a japanese guy who got it early:
http://blog.livedoor.jp/shinsha3/archives/1010897.html
No pics of the LE yet, but as reported earlier in this thread Asada stated awhile back that the LE is in a DVD case, not in a cardboard box like the DS LE.
Quote from: EOJ on November 22, 2009, 06:25:43 PMM2 put in scanline options for all their Sega Ages ports.
Did they do the Treasure Box? That was fine work.
Yes, as well as the most (all?) of the successive ones, including the Fantasy Zone Collection, which is such a fucking awesome set of games I can hardly contain myself.
Treasure Box made me very happy in the pants.
I quite like all of these crazy display options. The second one in the video where you have one decent-sized window then a close-up of various parts of the screen looks pretty cool. Can imagine some of them being quite fun for Superplay videos.
If they can pull off a quality port that looks good on an HDTV, which should have plenty of resolution for the playfield even without needing a vertical screen... that would be awesome.
My biggest knock to the older ports is that they look terrible if I don't turn my TV on end, and I can't do that with my little kids around. I just can't make it stable enough.
(http://img266.imageshack.us/img266/1878/wwwdotuporg389531.th.jpg) (http://img266.imageshack.us/i/wwwdotuporg389531.jpg/)
:righton:
Quote from: KOMA on November 23, 2009, 05:08:29 PM
(http://img266.imageshack.us/img266/1878/wwwdotuporg389531.th.jpg) (http://img266.imageshack.us/i/wwwdotuporg389531.jpg/)
:righton:
:righton:
*crosses fingers that NCSX will come through and get enough copies*
My order for the LE at Play-Asia has been "Preparing order" status as of at least this morning.
No update from NCSX besides the brief mention on the blog's incoming releases table, though I noticed they did finally close preorders for the LE at some point. Given I haven't been contacted about any potential shortages yet, it looks like I might actually get both copies.
Love that LE cover. :)
I'm not as big on the soundtrack and whatnot (it'd be nice, but I've got enough game soundtracks I don't often listen to), but that is indeed a sweet cover. Not enough for me justify having sprung for the LE instead of the regular edition, but it's pretty slick nonetheless.
I'm interested in seeing how that faceplate decal looks for the lucky few who got the set from Cave.
Now to wait for Play-Asia to finish taking their sweet time preparing my order and actually make with the shipping...
Spent the evening playing this. The game is really gorgeous in high-def.
So far I've played mainly original in 360 and Arcade modes, and at first I thought there was something really off with the slowdown. 2nd phase of Boss 3, and last phase of Boss 4 all were much faster than I remember. However I am used Black Label, and this game is very different. I put in my 1.5 DVD to see what the slowdown was like and most of it was completely accurate. I would take issue with the stage 5 slowdown which so far seems a little minimal, especially on the big dragons.
Ultra in 360 mode seems to be nearly slowdown free...? And some of the bullet patterns are changed? Dunno what happened there. Arcade mode seems fine, allthough it's Ultra so I got my dick kicked in.
Couldn't really render a verdict on Maniac since I really dislike 1.5 Maniac compared to Black Label but I'll probably play it after I 1CC Original.
I really like the menu system they've come up with this time, very user friendly.
Arrange Ultra was...chaotic. Not sure what to make of it just yet.
Definitely no scanlines option hidden in there then for Arcade mode?
Quote from: adverse on November 24, 2009, 11:12:07 AMUltra in 360 mode seems to be nearly slowdown free...? And some of the bullet patterns are changed? Dunno what happened there. Arcade mode seems fine, allthough it's Ultra so I got my dick kicked in.
What slowdown setting were you using? It'd be interesting to know if the PCB setting made a significant difference.
I'd love to give ultra a serious try, but if DS is any indication arcade mode is really hard to look at on my TV.
NCSX's latest update:
All preorders for the regular edition (http://www.ncsxshop.com/cgi-bin/shop/5AD-00001.html) of X360 Mushihimesama Futari and roughly 5/8 of our preorders for the limited edition should ship out to customers tomorrow. The game was dispatched from Japanese distributors last night but one supplier whom we preordered the limited edition from did not receive their Futari LE allocation yet. They'll receive the game tonight.
We're targeting Friday for the arrival of the remainder but please note that there may be shortages of the limited edition from the upcoming Friday batch. We'll update accordingly once we receive the shipment proforma. If Cave actually fills our entire original order, we'll be very surprised.
Quote from: adverse on November 24, 2009, 11:12:07 AM
Spent the evening playing this. The game is really gorgeous in high-def.
So far I've played mainly original in 360 and Arcade modes, and at first I thought there was something really off with the slowdown. 2nd phase of Boss 3, and last phase of Boss 4 all were much faster than I remember. However I am used Black Label, and this game is very different. I put in my 1.5 DVD to see what the slowdown was like and most of it was completely accurate. I would take issue with the stage 5 slowdown which so far seems a little minimal, especially on the big dragons.
Ultra in 360 mode seems to be nearly slowdown free...? And some of the bullet patterns are changed? Dunno what happened there. Arcade mode seems fine, allthough it's Ultra so I got my dick kicked in.
Couldn't really render a verdict on Maniac since I really dislike 1.5 Maniac compared to Black Label but I'll probably play it after I 1CC Original.
I really like the menu system they've come up with this time, very user friendly.
Arrange Ultra was...chaotic. Not sure what to make of it just yet.
So how many buttons overall are involved in the arrange mode? There's the one to switch between Palm and Reco, are there any more necessary for play? I'm making a custom stick for this game and wondering if a 4 button panel is enough. It seems like it probably is from EOJ's description, but just wanted to make sure.
Also, greetings western CAVE fans :righton:
Quote from: adverse on November 24, 2009, 11:12:07 AM
Spent the evening playing this. The game is really gorgeous in high-def.
So far I've played mainly original in 360 and Arcade modes, and at first I thought there was something really off with the slowdown. 2nd phase of Boss 3, and last phase of Boss 4 all were much faster than I remember. However I am used Black Label, and this game is very different. I put in my 1.5 DVD to see what the slowdown was like and most of it was completely accurate. I would take issue with the stage 5 slowdown which so far seems a little minimal, especially on the big dragons.
BL has loads more slowdown than 1.5, so I'm not worried just yet. Also, the PCB doesn't have much slowdown on the big dragons in stage 5.
Quote
Ultra in 360 mode seems to be nearly slowdown free...? And some of the bullet patterns are changed? Dunno what happened there. Arcade mode seems fine, allthough it's Ultra so I got my dick kicked in.
Ultra has little slowdown in the first couple stages especially. I'm worried about the changed bullet patterns though. Which ones are you referring to? Hopefully it's just in Ultra 360 mode.
I'll have my copy in about 24 hours, whereupon I'll commence detailed testing.
Shit there IS a scanline option! Picture setting -> Preset #D
Rejoice scanline partisans!
EOJ, one pattern which IIRC being different in 360 ultra is the sort of V-shaped pattern which comes off of the big cliff/rocks in stage 1. In Arcade Ultra it's doable, 360 mode it seems to have a ton more bullets.
Yay! Scanlines! It's just in Arcade mode, right?
I can go through and remove the parts of this thread complaining about no scanlines. Thanks M2, I knew you guys weren't dumb enough to forget the scanlines!
Strange they changed patterns in Ultra 360...
Pretty sure all screen options available in every mode.
Ah, okay. I would only use it in Arcade mode (doesn't make a lot of sense to use scanlines on HD graphics), but I'm really happy it's in there. It'll make arcade mode look 1000x better on an HDTV.
Amazon Japan shipped my Hori Mushi X360 stick just now, so I'll get that tomorrow. They haven't shipped my Futari 1.5 yet, so if they wait until tomorrow (release day) to ship, I'll just head down to Sofmap in the morning to buy a copy. Bleh.
Will take and post pics of the stick soon after I get it!
Also, if for some strange reason you haven't ordered the game yet, Play-asia raised the price to $74.90. They do this with most games (their pre-order price is lower, then it raises on the day of release) though, so it's expected. Still not a bad price considering you can use an $8 off coupon from them and the yen is really strong (88 yen to 1 USD now).
Quote from: adverse on November 24, 2009, 06:33:14 PM
Shit there IS a scanline option! Picture setting -> Preset #D
Rejoice scanline partisans!
Great news! :D
Now follow M2's lead and make a scanline patch for Deathsmiles Cave.
I'm done with DS patches. Give me a full disc-based "Deathsmiles Kanzenban". With all the display options of Futari 1.5, as well as DSMBL, and DSMBL ver 1.1 on it.
More realistically, I'm hoping the Galuda 2 port has all the same display options, rather than Deathsmiles' comparatively weak selection.
Cave said there is another patch coming when MBL 1.1 is released. They could include scanlines in that patch easily. But yeah, your're right I don't see it coming either.
I'd really love to begin playing DS Arcade mode for score and try to get 300+ mil but it's unplayable on my vga screen. Currently I have a horizontal vga screen, a vertical vga screen and a vertical sd screen in my gaming room and there's just no space left to put in another horizontal sd screen.
My copy is winging it's way from Play-Asia via UPS. If I have it for the weekend I'll be very happy camper.
I've just watch an original replay on youtube and before the boss 3 you get two bomb ,don't remember if you get the same amount on the PCB.It seems to me there is less enemies at the last phase of the stage 3.
So can I ask why people prefer 1.5 to Black Label?
1.5 seems to me to have
・More limited scoring in Original (no proximity system, right?)
・Fairer counter penalty for using a bomb
・Less flashy effects
・Fairer danmakus on stage 2 and 3 bosses, a bit harder stage 4 boss.
・Restrictive Maniac scoring
・Unfun Ultra mode
While Black Label has
・Much more scoring depth in Original thanks to proximity system, stage counter.
・Pretty brutal punishment for using a bomb or dying.
・Fucked up danmaku on stage 2 boss Maniac (first form)
・More fun in Maniac mode, due to more flexible gauge・
・Fun if not a little too random God mode.
・Flashy graphics.
Have to say I prefer Black Label on the whole.
Black Label has:
-completely messed up slowdown (probably the worst in any CAVE game)
-No Ultra mode, just some kind of girly Goddess mode (which tbh has a better scoring system)
-brutal punishment for dying / bombing
These are the main points why I prefer 1.5
BL Maniac sucks compared to 1.5. Scoring in BLM is comparatively blah, boss patterns are sped up and messy, end bonus is frustrating (lives x bombs), difficulty is too dumbed down and easy. Learn to play 1.5 maniac and you'll see it has much more depth and better overall balance.
I still enjoy BL Maniac, but I think 1.5 Maniac is one of the best games ever made.
Totally forgot about that annoying endbonus in BL, suiciding on the last boss really sucks (after you have done the math if it's worth it while dodging hundreds of bullets of course, not a good idea imo)
Shipping has been confirmed as of this morning. Can't wait to fire this badboy up!
Wow, I had no idea ncsx.com were so clueless. Look at their product description for Futari:
"Mushihimesama Futari has the distinction of being the most difficult shooter in existence but it's mainly because the bullets from bosses rain down in sheets. Repeat: sheets. Literally, bullets upon bullets. Gamers can look forward to nonstop streaming shots, mesmerizing spiraling shots, and thick waves of rapid shots that afford 1cm of leeway. Even elite players who regularly conquer shmups of all stripes on one measly credit are confounded by Futari. We're of the opinion that Cave and arcade operators conspired to make sure that Futari cannot be completed on 1 credit. Top players will need at least 5-25 credits depending on individual skill level and hitbox alertness."
From: http://www.ncsx.com/2009/112309/mushihimesama_futari_le.htm
I hope they're just referring to Ultra mode, because Original is one of the easier Cave games ever made and Maniac is challenging, but far from impossible. Anyway, it's a pretty horrible and inaccurate description of the overall game difficulty.
From everyone (usually Americans) I've spoken with that have had some interest in the game, they've been turned away at the $75 dollar price. I can just imagine one hitting up NCSX, reading that, and being turned away. Are they even trying to sell the game here?
"This game is ludicrous and you're going to die hundreds of times, please buy it"
Wow that it is an epically awful description.
95% of people buying this game will not even play Ultra seriously.
This is one thing I hate about the reputation danmaku shooters have gotten in the states and abroad...
Then again you will see some people getting this game only to experience the famed Ultra bullshit. :P
But the way the game sells now we probably shouldn't worry too much, Futari by itself has enjoyed enough publicity to not provide any new knowledge via description written by casual gamers for casual gamers (which is exactly what it is). Everybody who wants to buy it already knows what it is, and the rest aren't going to be persuaded even by a well-written description seen in an internet shop, anyway.
Quote from: KOMA on November 25, 2009, 05:10:06 AM
I've just watch an original replay on youtube and before the boss 3 you get two bomb ,don't remember if you get the same amount on the PCB.It seems to me there is less enemies at the last phase of the stage 3.
It looks like you get 2 bombs instead of one whenever you get them in whatever novice mode you play, not just before boss 3.
From the Youtube vids, novice original looks like the easiest mode Cave has ever created in any of their games. I mean there was like a 10 second portion in the stage 2 replay where enemies didn't even fire a single bullet. But it looks like this game has something for everyone, and should make a nice gateway shooter for new people who want to get into these types of games. I always thought it was dumb when people would spam that ultra stage 5 boss vid on forums everywhere and turn people off from ever playing the game. It's like showing people videos of Ninja Gaiden 2 on Master Ninja difficulty and having them believe it's the only difficulty you could play in the game. :rolleyes:
Novice ultra looks pretty interesting. I haven't played Futari yet, but it reminds me of original from Mushi 1 with much slower bullets.
Also, there's no right-analog stick option control in arrange mode like there was for DS 1.1, is there? I hope there isn't but I'm just wondering.
Quote from: adverse on November 25, 2009, 07:11:36 PM
Wow that it is an epically awful description.
I e-mailed them about the awful description when I got home and they replied, and toned it down a little bit.
Mushihimesama Futari 1.5 has the distinction of being one of the most difficult shooters in existence but it's mainly because the bullets from bosses rain down in sheets. Repeat: sheets. Literally, bullets upon bullets. Gamers can look forward to nonstop streaming shots, mesmerizing spiraling shots, and thick waves of rapid shots that afford 1cm of leeway. Even elite players who regularly conquer shmups of all stripes on one measly credit are initially confounded by Futari. We're of the opinion that Cave and arcade operators conspired to make sure that Futari 1.5 gobbles as many credits as possible from average players. Top players might need to feed the beast 2-20 credits depending on individual skill level and hitbox awareness.
>Gobbles as many credits as possible
>44 Yen for two credits at my local arcade
ok.
So do they actually explain that it's a bullet hell shmup or just start off by saying the bullets throw bullets at you?
>Top players might need to feed the beast 2-20 credits depending on individual skill level and hitbox awareness.
I wasn't aware top players credit fed. Hitbox awareness? What does this even mean?
It's still wrong, NCSX couldn't write their way out of a sale if they tried.
Despite the mantra of the 1-credit rule that most serious shmuppers live by, plenty of top players continue in order to practice later sections or try out new strategies, given that the PCB's have no practice mode.
Funny how ncsx "toned down" the 5-25 credits to 2-20 credits. I wonder where they pull these numbers from...
Whoever wrote the description probably just youtubed mushi futari to learn more about it.
Of course all top players credit feed to practice sections on the PCB, SWY even shows you how he credit feeds to practice in the Futari Ultra superplay DVD. The difference is they don't credit-feed to clear or "beat" the game, like your average Joe Halo does.
In other news, I went to Teramachidori in downtown Kyoto bright and early this morning with the intent of buying the standard edition Futari, as I assumed the LE wouldn't be available anywhere. Sofmap didn't open until 11am so I headed over to A-cho arcade and played a round of Deathsmiles II (Oh how I love this game), and then a quick credit of Futari 1.5 so the PCB would be fresh in my memory when I tried the port. I walked down to a place called Kid's Land, which was the only software shop open by 10am, and lo and behold they had two Futari LE's sitting on the shelf for 8400 yen each, with no one else in the store yet other than two sleepy employees. I of course bought one and happily brought it home, as I have not received my order from Amazon yet (should arrive later this afternoon or tomorrow). Below are pics of the package. It IS in a box, but not a slipcase like DS. The box folds and shuts close, similar to a console box. Also note that Reco is on the LE disc, while Palm is on the standard edition disc.
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/f2.jpg)
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/f3.jpg)
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/f4.jpg)
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/f5.jpg)
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/f1.jpg)
I started first with a credit of Maniac Arcade mode, as I like this mode the best. I am playing it on a 13" TV tated, via composite inputs, so I cannot comment on any HD graphics really.
First, if you are playing on a CRT or other lagless monitor switch the default frame delay to "PCB". If you stay on the default it's 1 frame too fast. Keep the default if you're playing on an LCD to offset the inherent lag of those.
Second, I am happy to report the slowdown in Maniac mode is nearly 100% accurate. They even kept in the "kamikakushi" effect (where the OSD flickers or disappears for a second when you trigger a large number of the multiplier). I'd say it's basically the same slowdown accuracy as the DS port. There are a couple spots where the slowdown is a little too slow, or a little too fast, but only someone like me who has sunk over 200 hours into the PCB will be able to notice this, and I don't think it will effect scoring in any way.
The visual options are amazing, preset #D does seem to be the scanline one, but also the last one (I think it's #H) looks like a scanline one. Hard to tell much on composite inputs in a CRT, so HD or RGB monitor people can test this out.
While the music is crisp and clear and overall remastered for the better, one thing that jumped out at me, and I do NOT like, is they seem to have changed, or remixed part of the final boss music. It's really not as good as the original IMO and there does not seem to be an option to change to the PCB music, so this is sort of a big letdown as that fight is pretty intense, and the new music part is less intense.
I tried Ultra Arrange, and it was alright, but a little too fast and messy. I'll need to put more time into it. It says 2009/9/18 Xbox 360 Arrange Ver on the copyright screen, which is pretty cool.
Other cool things:
-In training mode you can start at the start of a stage, or at the boss! Finally, we can practice the bosses. Thank you M2.
-Sound effects in the option mode are really neat.
-Basically no loading times with or without the install.
-You see a big M2 logo when you fire up the game (you don't see this on Otomedius, which they also ported).
Alright, that's it for now. I'm off to test Original Arcade, Ultra Arcade, and all the 360 mode versions to test for slowdown accuracy. Will post the results in a few hours. I'm hoping my Futari stick arrives in the next few hours as until then I'm stuck with the XBox wireless pad, which sucks ass.
So far, this is probably the best port of any shmup ever.
Have I missed it, or do we still not know when Black Label is going to be available?
Also, has there been any news regarding the pack-in DLC?
''slowdown in Maniac mode is nearly 100% accurate.''
''don't think it will effect scoring in any way.''
This is nice!
Cool!
Training mode for bosses did surprise me. I was like...wow, I could use this to actually come up with a strategy for the final boss besides bombing when I get in trouble!
Nice snag EOJ.
Did you also buy an LE from the CAVE shop? Did anyone actually manage to buy that?
How's the bonus CD? Also, what is the install size? I'm also wondering what resolution on my 360 I should set. I'm gonna tate my CRT when this thing arrives.
Quote from: EOJ on November 25, 2009, 10:33:08 PM
one thing that jumped out at me, and I do NOT like, is they seem to have changed, or remixed part of the final boss music. It's really not as good as the original IMO and there does not seem to be an option to change to the PCB music, so this is sort of a big letdown as that fight is pretty intense, and the new music part is less intense.
Aw man, why would they do that? That''s a bit disappointing to hear.
Quote from: Megalixir on November 26, 2009, 12:24:47 AM
How's the bonus CD? Also, what is the install size? I'm also wondering what resolution on my 360 I should set. I'm gonna tate my CRT when this thing arrives.
815MB install size, according to people on shmups.
Black Label should be available near January 1st. No exact date has been set. Ver 1.01 will be downloadable from tonight (Japan time), via the DLC card. I don't have high speed internet at home, so I won't be able to download and test it out until early January when I return to Hawaii.
Haven't bothered opening the CD, and I doubt I will. I don't listen to game music outside of the games.
@adverse: I had a Cave shop LE on reserve, but didn't pay for it as I decided I didn't care about faceplate stickers or telephone cards. Don't regret it at all.
Alright, I played through just about everything over the past few hours. Here's what I noticed:
-There are no changed bullet patterns in Ultra 360 mode. They're all exactly the same as Ultra Arcade.
-Slowdown in Original and Ultra Arcade seems near perfect, just like Maniac.
-Slowdown in the 360 modes seems identical to Arcade modes. This is pretty great. Unlike Deathsmiles, that had quite different slowdown in 360 mode rendering the mode useless for serious score attackers.
-Novice mode is really fucking easy. I played Ultra Novice and 1 life'd it on my first try. I didn't use a bomb until Larsa (keep in mind you have an autobomb). You get 2 bombs from every bomb carrier, as well as a bomb from both of the large dragons in Stage 5. Way too many bombs. You also get 2 1ups in Stage 5. All the bullet patterns are seriously dumbed down and really slowed down. It's way easier than Original Arcade, or any other Cave game mode released in the arcade or in a home port, if you need a reference point. You do get to fight the TLB larsa at the end, but not the final, third form. I got some 1.2bil score or whatever. I'm not even going to bother trying Original or Maniac Novice, as those must have been made for Grandmas to play.
-I fooled around with Maniac Arrange, but I'm not digging the sped up hyper gameplay with no slowdown and goofy scoring. But, I will continue to give it time, as I do with all Cave games.
I also got the Hori Futari stick, which is really lovely. Great Seimitsu stick, with stock hori buttons. Beautiful color overlay, beautiful box. Pics:
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/futastick001.jpg)
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/futastick002.jpg)
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/futastick003.jpg)
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/futastick004.jpg)
Damn, I can't wait for my stick to come in the mail now... :)
Saturday just can't come soon enough. :(
Damn, I could buy an LE just for the cover. :)
Thanks for the detailed descriptions EOJ. Can't wait to get mine, hopefully by the end of next week.
Quote from: adverse on November 25, 2009, 11:38:28 PM
Did you also buy an LE from the CAVE shop? Did anyone actually manage to buy that?
I will get one :D
That stick looks very pretty, but I think the artwork could've been better.
Is the Dlc card for downloading the 1.01 vers included in the normal pack...?
Nice stick EOJ..... ;)
Quote from: Ast-Kot on November 26, 2009, 02:47:14 PM
Is the Dlc card for downloading the 1.01 vers included in the normal pack...?
Yes, all first print copies are supposed to have it.
Quote from: HVL on November 26, 2009, 02:21:12 PM
That stick looks very pretty, but I think the artwork could've been better.
Yeah... seeing that artwork just makes me wish the art style was closer to the first game... love Reco's first game design, can hardly stand to look at the new Reco =/
My stuff arrived
(http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/1930/42dd3982.jpg)
Just kidding, it's the same guy who did the Death Smiles haul. link (http://blog.livedoor.jp/htmk73/archives/1374521.html)
I gave arrange mode some more time, and I really don't like it. I think it's Cave's worst arrange mode ever actually. Sort of a disappointment.
Anyone try ver 1.01?
Yeah,is it just me or does it take longer to kill some enemies in 1.1?
The UPS man just knocked at my door, and demanded some cash, thing is I didn?t have enough... :(
? 23,- custom fees seem a lot for a ? 43,- game...
Man, it?s my day off and Futari is gone again, this sucks... :rolleyes:
Quote from: grotto on November 27, 2009, 06:09:23 AM
? 23,- custom fees seem a lot for a ? 43,- game...
Welcom to the wonderful world of EU customs laws :-\
Yep!
I rather wait an extra couple of days and just send with economy bubble package from PA.
Gets right into the postbox without any EU customs etc.... =D
...and I absolutely do not want to feed the UPS monster... :mad:
I haven't picked up a 360 yet but was thinking maybe I should get the game now while I can. I was at Sofmap tonight and almost bought the LE because I figured it would be hard to get a copy but they had stacks of 'em at the kiosk and behind the counter, as well as the one's that come with the phone card. If the only difference is the cover and the soundtrack I'll go with the regular one, but is it confirmed that this first shipment is the only way to get version 1.0?
Despite the orrible EU customer fees, I've always used Ups cause Italian mailing sistem sucks :-\
I'm very angry with Play-asia causa I've pre-order my mushi copy on the first pre-order day and it is still preparing it.... :mad: I'think I've missed the 1.01 download card :-[ Maybe, can I download it from Xbla paying with the points?
Was it not all first prints were going to get the 1.01 DLC card? I dig the actual card itself, much larger than the phonecard-esque size I was expecting, and very nice to look at.
Mine copy yesterday (via UPS but marked down, customs free :righton:) but I didn't get a chance to play. Looking forwards to a good weekend binge on it.
You should be able to pay for ver 1.01 if you don't have a DLC card. I don't see why Cave wouldn't want your money on this.
Only differences between the LE and SE are the LE has different box art, comes in a box, and includes a double remix album.
I gave Maniac Novice mode a whirl. Pretty fun actually, in a pure score attack way. I got a 477mil no miss no bomb ALL on my first credit, but it will be hard to squeeze more points out of it due to the lack of bullets.
Also, I'm not totally sure yet, but I've played Original Arcade and 360 modes more, and it seems like the Arcade mode slowdown is a bit faster in a good number of spots (or totally missing), whereas 360 mode feels pretty much exact. Pretty weird (and not good), I'd have expected the opposite.
Quote from: EOJ on November 27, 2009, 08:50:07 AM
You should be able to pay for ver 1.01 if you don't have a DLC card. I don't see why Cave wouldn't want your money on this.
Kind of like how Cave doesn't want money for Deathsmiles's full voice option?
Is it just me or can you not set different screen settings for different modes? Arcade needs picture mode D, 360 mode does not. Bit of a pain.
Really great port. Scanlines leave the picture a little washed out but its still a big improvement in Arcade mode. Good effort with the slowdown, lovely wallpapers, tiny install and amazing load times.
Arrange is a bit gay.
5pb better can Ketsui and let Cave/M2 do it or its going to be a bit of a joke.
Quote from: SuperPang on November 27, 2009, 11:34:58 AMScanlines leave the picture a little washed out but its still a big improvement in Arcade mode.
Shame they don't allow you to adjust the intensity of the scanlines, which would rectify this.
For those of you who care about achievements, I think the doable achievements are going to top out at about 875 for this game.
What seems to be in the way of 1000/1000 are
25 Clear stage 3 in Ultra (some people have reported continuing and unlocking this)
50 Unknown (but a top player on the Ultra leaderboard has it unlocked and sequentially it would seem to be an achievement for beating the stage 5 boss in Ultra mode. However the player did not clear the game it seems, so I imagine that the other 50 point achievement is for defeating Spiritual Larsa)
50 Unknown
Clearing stage 3 in Ultra seems pretty goddamn tough since MHK and EOJ are the only Western players known to have done it.
Otherwise the achievements are not massively difficult, but will take some practice for those new to the game.
Incidentally, the achievement for getting the counter to 100k in Arrange mode is probably only possible on Stage 4 Ultra and up judging from some of the replays up right now, since the counter resets every stage.
Edit: No-continue clear for all modes in Arrange might be really hard for Ultra given that you have to take out Spiritual Larsa. Will give it a go tomorrow.
I love the stick, it looks great. If I hadn't just picked up a SF 4 TE one, I would have to get one.
Quote from: adverse on November 27, 2009, 01:12:31 PM
25 Clear stage 3 in Ultra (some people have reported continuing and unlocking this)
I got this one already, don't know how really. I think it was either in Novice or Arrange Ultra mode.
Looks like Play-asia is already shipping Futari without the DLC card - themasha69 over on shmups reported his did not come with the card.
Looks like pre-order dates don't matter either. Someone pre-ordered from PA as late as October and reported getting a DLC card, while someone else pre-ordered 2 copies at the end of August and got no card for either. Maybe they're combining shipments without regard for the first print DLC. Let's hope not.
Every copy I've seen in Japanese shops has the DLC card. All the copies for sale on Amazon Japan (even right now) still come with the card. Maybe they didn't include it with a batch of games shipped to asian distributors like P-A, as they thought the people buying those wouldn't have Japanese xbox live accounts, and thus wouldn't be able to use the card?
Still sucks, no matter the reason.
NCSX.com is reporting the LE is sold out from all distributors except two, who are now charging about $172 for it. So, ncsx.com will not be selling any more LEs.
http://www.ncsx.com/2009/112309/ncs1123f.htm
Quote from: adverse on November 27, 2009, 01:12:31 PMEdit: No-continue clear for all modes in Arrange might be really hard for Ultra given that you have to take out Spiritual Larsa. Will give it a go tomorrow.
An Ultra 1cc is going to be really hard. Is it just me, or is there no slowdown?
I didn't really notice until I hit the stage 5 boss and ran out of points to reflect bullets with but it's really fast
Asada mentioned in the Famitsu 360 interview last month that Arrange mode was built based on an engine supplied by M2 which completely eliminated slowdown. Taking the slowdown out is basically the whole point of the mode, otherwise the character switching/bullet slowing mechanic would be too powerful.
Just 1CC'ed Arrange Ultra with a score of 1.4 billion. Only made it to 131 on the leaderboards though. :whyioughtta: I think this mode is a ton of fun!
Edit: Arrange mode score is billions not trillions! Sorry.
Quote from: SuperPang on November 27, 2009, 11:34:58 AM
Really great port. Scanlines leave the picture a little washed out but its still a big improvement in Arcade mode. Good effort with the slowdown, lovely wallpapers, tiny install and amazing load times.
Quote from: bcass on November 27, 2009, 12:18:17 PM
Shame they don't allow you to adjust the intensity of the scanlines, which would rectify this.
If you haven't figured out yet it is possible to change the itensity of the scanlines, turn off smoothing and a ton of other stuff. You just need to press A on the Preset #D option and another menu will pop up that has ridicolous many screen options. Will be quite difficult to even find the best solution.
Quote from: antares on November 28, 2009, 03:45:06 AM
If you haven't figured out yet it is possible to change the itensity of the scanlines, turn off smoothing and a ton of other stuff. You just need to press A on the Preset #D option and another menu will pop up that has ridicolous many screen options. Will be quite difficult to even find the best solution.
Oh wow, thanks. The screen memu could be a little clearer.
What are the top scores in Novice and Arrange modes? I don't have internet at home, so I can't check the leaderboards. I played Novice Original and did a 413mil ALL on my first credit. Pretty fun, once again, in a pure score attack sort of way (sorta like the easy modes in Ketsui Death Label). Also, much to my surprise there is still rank in Novice Original. I noticed the bullets sped up when I hit 50K on the counter, and got faster as I maxed out at 65K before Larsa.
Also, I've been reading various Futari threads on the web, and one thing that I think is pretty disheartening is people keep saying stuff like "version 1.01 is just a couple tweaks". There are lots of differences between ver 1.01 and 1.5. Including the SCORING SYSTEMS, overall game system, bullet patterns, bullet speed, character attributes, enemy hit points, bomb strength, slowdown, difficulty curve, etc. It's not just ver 1.5 with " a couple tweaks". All the differences between ver 1.0(1) and 1.5 are listed here in these forums, but I guess not many people know that.
As a final point, I think it's ridiculously stupid to have ver 1.01 already on the disc, but require people to use an unlock code on a card to play it.
Arrange Ultra right now is 3.9 billion. Sin is ranked 7 right now with 3.3.
Novice Original high score is 411020235, so you have a higher score than that. Connect your damn internet man :righton:.
Your Novice Maniac score would also be #1.
Quote from: EOJ on November 28, 2009, 06:39:39 AM
Also, I've been reading various Futari threads on the web, and one thing that I think is pretty sad is people keep saying "version 1.01 is just a couple tweaks, that's why it's only a 100K download". First, the 100k download is just the unlock code, ver 1.01 is on the disc. Second, there are lots of differences between ver 1.01 and 1.5. Including the SCORING SYSTEMS, overall game system, bullet patterns, bullet speed, character attributes, enemy hit points, bomb strength, slowdown, difficulty curve, etc. It's not just ver 1.5 with " a couple tweaks". All the differences between ver 1.0(1) and 1.5 are listed here in these forums, but I guess not many people know that.
As a final point, I think it's ridiculously stupid to have ver 1.01 already on the disc, but require people to use an unlock code on a card to play it.
I think the card is there to encourage people to buy the game and not download it. I would've expected it with every copy though. Are we sure everyones checking their boxes? At least its not as bad as some publishers who charge for DLC thats already on the disc.
On the v1.01 subject, don't forget a lot of people who are are buying this are more casual shmup players who won't notice much difference without extended play. It might seem a little pointless.
A Q for anyone with the LE - is the menu music on the CD?
Quote from: EOJ on November 28, 2009, 06:39:39 AM
As a final point, I think it's ridiculously stupid to have ver 1.01 already on the disc, but require people to use an unlock code on a card to play it.
I think it might be an anti-piracy measure, and of course to encourage more people to buy it on day of release.
I've been playing this today, and having been hammering Dai-Ou-Jou for the last few weeks, the difficulty gap is astounding!
Quote from: adverse on November 28, 2009, 07:11:08 AM
Novice Original high score is 411020235, so you have a higher score than that. Connect your damn internet man :righton:.
Your Novice Maniac score would also be #1.
LOL. I don't think any of the really good players have bothered with either Novice mode yet. I'm sure by the time I connect my x360 to the internet again (early January), my scores in those modes will be obsolete.
I've not downloaded 1.01 yet -- is it more or less the same as the PCB? I've only played Maniac Arrange, and cleared it after a few credits (1.1 billion). I have no clue what the fuck I'm doing though. Well, a slight clue. It's fun, and a nice package, but I'm still looking forward to ESGGaluda II. I'm hoping my slate is a lot more open by then.
Any idea how well this game sold? I remember the producer saying if it sold well to overseas users then more region free games could follow.
Quote from: PsychoDiver on November 28, 2009, 01:31:57 PM
Any idea how well this game sold? I remember the producer saying if it sold well to overseas users then more region free games could follow.
I heard/read something along the lines of cave shipping 24k copies day one.
For people that are running this on 4:3 CRTs, what settings are you using?
Trying to get it set up on a 29" tri-sync at 640x480.
Zoom of 128 seems close to being the right size. Being a power of 2, I'd hope that's 2x native res (does anyone know if futari arcade is 320 x 240 or some weird size?), but there's still a bit of the background wallpaper visible.
The scanlines option literally just makes the image darker at that size, there's no alternation.
As it is, it honestly looks worse than the PS2 ports (well, not the unpatched 480i filtered ones). I understand a lot of that is down to 360 being unable to do 240p, but where's the setting for tate in exactly 2x upscaling with nearest neighbor. . . I'd gladly have given up the matrix lolol 5 screens options.
The issue of a lot of people not having the 1.01 card in shipments from Play-Asia is a little disconcerting, especially since I ordered from them with airmail shipping. Sounds like there's still plenty else in the game to keep busy with (especially in light of the upcoming BL), but it's still a bit of a rip-off since they were saying a card would be included in every first-print copy. I'm hoping it's just an issue of boneheads not looking in their manuals.
If the DLC is really just something that unlocks the mode already on the disc, I wonder if perhaps there will be another way of getting at the content.
Assuming I'm one of the people who get screwed, I'm wondering what recourse I'd have. Something tells me that PA might not care, considering they never mentioned including the card in the first place. Would this be something one could conceivably take to Cave, or is it best to just acknowledge that someone has been screwed and the result is not in my favor?
You could always buy the card off YJP. And if too many people get screwed I'm sure someone would be willing to do a group order for them.
http://page18.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/w45740652
Quote from: KoD on November 28, 2009, 05:06:15 PM
For people that are running this on 4:3 CRTs, what settings are you using?
Trying to get it set up on a 29" tri-sync at 640x480.
Zoom of 128 seems close to being the right size. Being a power of 2, I'd hope that's 2x native res (does anyone know if futari arcade is 320 x 240 or some weird size?), but there's still a bit of the background wallpaper visible.
The scanlines option literally just makes the image darker at that size, there's no alternation.
As it is, it honestly looks worse than the PS2 ports (well, not the unpatched 480i filtered ones). I understand a lot of that is down to 360 being unable to do 240p, but where's the setting for tate in exactly 2x upscaling with nearest neighbor. . . I'd gladly have given up the matrix lolol 5 screens options.
I was able to get the picture to fill the screen in 480p while retaining the "Dot for Dot", now granted i had a bit over overscan while doing so. Then I turned all the extra stuff of in the "maniac" picture settings and used one of the scanline options, I believe is was "x 3 sharp".
It looked dead on..... are you using the "maniac" picture options or just choosing one of the presets in the "simple" menu for the display?
How exactly can you tell that you're retaining "dot for dot"? I've noticed that notation in e.g. the RFA collection, but not this game.
Yes, I'm using the maniac picture options (and the submenu underneath that). 3x sharp seems like its doing something along the lines of 2 lines at normal brightness for 1 line of reduced brightness, it looks really silly and nothing like a 240p signal.
Edit - got it figured out - I had set rotation and scaling under the standard picture options first, then gone to maniac for fiddling with the scanlines & etc.
Instead, if you go to maniac and then hit A on "layout" to get the submenu for scaling and rotation, it'll actually show you the scaling factor and a "d.b.d." notation instead of the arbitrary scaling number it shows you on the standard picture options.
Looks about as good as you could expect now, on par with RFA (and without the 54hz judder).
I'm playing 720p Yoko on a Pioneer plasma so it's no doubt very different but I have Smoothing off, x2 Scanline with 16 effect bias. No glare mode. Colour brightness 7, gamma 3, contrast 1 and Frame delay 2V (PCB) and am really impressed with how arcade mode looks.
Quote from: Megalixir on November 28, 2009, 07:05:53 PM
You could always buy the card off YJP. And if too many people get screwed I'm sure someone would be willing to do a group order for them.
http://page18.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/w45740652
It's a good idea and nice to know I could resort to it if nothing else (and ?1000 isn't too unreasonable even with the horribly strong yen), but it doesn't fix the issue of someone having fucked up. Either Cave's got some problem on the production end of things where cards aren't getting included (unlikely as Play-Asia seems to be the only one affected so far), they neglected to mention that they weren't including the DLC with Hong Kong shipments (a dick move considering there were no other restrictions stated other than the DLC would be first-print only) or Play-Asia is messing around with items they're selling (also unlikely, but odd considering that NCSX and other foreign distribution channels don't seem to be having this problem).
I just want to try and figure out who to gripe at if mine doesn't include the card; I'm sure there's lots of other people who would appreciate it as well. My concern could be for nothing and the card could arrive with no problems, but I figure I've got another week at least before it gets here, so I might as well worry neurotically about it for a while. :/
--
So with the leaderboards, is this like Raiden Fighters where even Silver XBL members can post scores? I'm fairly new to the 360 and not at all sure how a lot of the Live stuff works, other than a vague impression of Gold accounts being useless if you're not into playing online FPS titles.
Quote from: gsl on November 29, 2009, 12:25:17 PMSo with the leaderboards, is this like Raiden Fighters where even Silver XBL members can post scores?
Yes, Silver members can post scores too (as is the case with 99.99% of all 360 games).
Quote from: gsl on November 29, 2009, 12:25:17 PM
Either Cave's got some problem on the production end of things where cards aren't getting included (unlikely as Play-Asia seems to be the only one affected so far)
I'm guessing that this is more than likely the case. It would make perfect sense that only one retailer is effected if it just happened to be only one box that was effected? sometimes things happen in production that aren't caught instantly.
Besides that, PA usually includes all pre-order bonus items even when they don't mention them. I got my THE balloon and my DOJBLEX guide book.
Thanks to those who have been posting their screen setup config (Superpang, etc). It'll save me a lot of time and fiddling when I hook this game up to an hdtv soon! :)
I've been having the most fun practicing Ultra mode stages (Arcade) in training mode. I wanted this so much when I had the PCB, and it's such a joy to be able to practice a stage over and over and try out different patterns. I'm already seeing rapid improvement, so look for more Ultra mode scores from me soon. I also love the fact you can practice the stage 5 boss, including the TLBs!
ABI just got his copy of the game, and has posted his first impressions (in Japanese):
http://abi123.blog110.fc2.com/
He's the WR holder in Original mode for both characters, so you should care what he thinks about the port. He says the slowdown is "amazing", and he implies there is more slowdown in the port than in the PCB, at least in stages 3 and 5. He's playing with the Xbox pad and mentions the fun stuff he can do in the port that he couldn't on the PCB, like set the Original mode counter to 70K and stage counter to 9999 in training mode and practice stage 1.
Someone got a 3.86 billion clear at Arrange Ultra:
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8947905
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8949852
Looks crazy and really tempting. Considering the exponential score growth (about 60% of the score comes from the final boss fight alone), it also seems that 4 billion is, by far, not the limit. If any serious players try their fangs at this mode, way more optimal reflection patterns will be found, so I guess we can expect as much as ~5 billion sometime soon. Then again, I don't have the game yet so I can't check the scoreboards. What are the current records?
It would be funny if it still counterstops at 3,999,999,999.
You know, it actually got me thinking: maybe they've also removed the counterstop from the arcade (or at least arcade-360) mode? That would be an interesting opportunity for SWY and K.K to get back into the game.
It might be gone from 360 mode. That would be a neat thing to test. I doubt they removed it from Arcade mode, the port seems really spot on in all respects, and M2 likes to keep the ports 100% faithful.
One thing I forgot to mention is this port is based on the bugfixed (yes, there was a bugfixed revision of Futari) ver 1.5. You can tell because it has a bunch of periods in the copyright screen MASTER VER string (whereas my original 1.5 PCB had no such periods). I owned one bugfixed Futari 1.5 PCB over the years, so I can confirm it exists. I know there was a bug in stage 5 regarding the hit detection during the medial descent that caused some cheap deaths, I think they fixed this and maybe the goofy counter in Ultra that gets messed up when you cross 100,000 (hmm, I could easily test this in training mode...).
Arrange Ultra top score is already 4.5 bil last time I checked.
Cool beans.
Quote from: moozooh on November 30, 2009, 12:10:26 AM
Someone got a 3.86 billion clear at Arrange Ultra:
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8947905
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8949852
Looks crazy and really tempting. Considering the exponential score growth (about 60% of the score comes from the final boss fight alone), it also seems that 4 billion is, by far, not the limit. If any serious players try their fangs at this mode, way more optimal reflection patterns will be found, so I guess we can expect as much as ~5 billion sometime soon. Then again, I don't have the game yet so I can't check the scoreboards. What are the current records?
could someone rip and up to megaupload?
I can't upload atm, but try these links, they don't require authentification:
http://dic.nicovideo.jp/v/sm8947905
http://dic.nicovideo.jp/v/sm8949852
Additionally, there's http://aerith.mydns.jp/bin/nicodav/
While the more I've played the more I've noticed differences in slowdown across the modes as compared to the PCB, I thought that playing on a 13" TV via composite inputs might have been altering my perception a bit. However, after reading lots of comments from Japanese players, it seems it has nothing to do with my setup, as many have posted that they also notice differences. Having not had much experience in Ultra past stage 3, I was unable to notice differences in slowdown in the later levels of Ultra. Upon scouring the threads over at 2Ch, many people have posted the slowdown is noticably different in the 360 port in Ultra mode (in both Arcade and 360, though there are some differences between the two). They say there is more slowdown in many sections, so consequently the port of Ultra is easier than the PCB version of Ultra. :( They also mentioned something else I recently noticed, which is the fact that some enemies seem to die sooner than in the PCB, particularly in 360 mode (this is not restricted to Ultra mode). Just a split second earlier, as if their hit points were slightly reduced. This includes some boss fights (such as the stage 2 midboss). I also think the last part of the second phase of the stage 2 boss in Maniac mode (when you are doing the ika-loop milking) is off in timing, but in the opposite way - the last set of large expanding balls take a split second longer to destroy. I can see how this can sound nitpicky to those who never played the PCB, but when you've honed your pattern on the PCB version and have it down pat, even a split second difference in timing in a critical scoring section like the second phase of the stage 2 boss is rather jarring.
The PS2 port of Mushihimesama also had more slowdown than the PCB in Ultra mode, which made it easier, and the scores done between the two incomparable.
In contrast slowdown replication in Deathsmiles (Arcade mode only) is nearly perfect (I'd say 99% accurate). Mihara (http://mihara.sub.jp/top/blog/sb203/mihara) also noticed differences in Futari's slowdown in the X360 port, though he hasn't tested it in detail. In comparison, he said he thinks his DOJ port is about 95% accurate, while his Espgaluda port is 98% accurate in terms of slowdown replication.
I downloaded v.1.01 and it was like a blast from the past. Not since 2006 has Original mode ripped me up like that and I'm very pleased to be able to enjoy all this Futari at home, finally. Been a long time coming.
And seeing as this is my first experience playing with a 360, I apparently underestimated the shittiness of the d-pad. I kind of assumed that it would be uncomfortable but would at least go left when I pushed said button, but I find more often than not that my character goes up when I press left or right. My god. Guess I'll need to get that Futari stick this weekend unless I can find a better alternative.
anyone know what settings should i have for Frame delay if i'm playing 1.5 arcade mode on a crt via scart??
i've got it on 0 but the pcb in brackets on the 2 setting makes me wonder if i should pick that?
which is most accurate to the pcb?
thanks!
The PCB setting is most likely the best bet for displays w/o input lag, it's not like they added the "PCB" there for shits and giggles.
thats what i was thinking :P i never knew that the pcbs had lag ???
i spose it'll get rid of the random tearing tho :righton:
I gave Ultra arrange a few more credits. I got this score in my 5th or 6th credit ever playing the game:
(http://i147.photobucket.com/albums/r283/blueskied/futa_arr_ultra_3bil.jpg)
3.4bil :righton:
First, this was easy as hell and I basically just improvised the whole thing. So the upper scores must be at least double that (I hope). Second, once you figure out you basically need to play it like Pink Sweets (in infinite lives mode) with ikaruga-style switching instead of an infinite bomb, then everything clicks. It's like a crazy fast Pink Sweets with a fun scoring system, no slowdown, and no rank. Loads of fun.
Glad you got 1.0 again, Kaneda. It's been awhile. Wish I could download it sooner, but in about a month (when I can download it) I'll be chasing your scores.
http://www.ncsx.com/2009/113009/mushihimesama_futari_printing.htm (http://www.ncsx.com/2009/113009/mushihimesama_futari_printing.htm)
As speculated, copies w/o the card are not from the first print run.
Interestingly, P-A lists "5AD-00004" under the catalog number, but it seems they did ship copies from the first print too.
Can anyone tell me what exactly are the differences between arcade and arcade-360 modes, aside from higher resolution graphics?
Quote from: HVL on November 30, 2009, 12:38:26 PM
http://www.ncsx.com/2009/113009/mushihimesama_futari_printing.htm (http://www.ncsx.com/2009/113009/mushihimesama_futari_printing.htm)
As speculated, copies w/o the card are not from the first print run.
Interestingly, P-A lists "5AD-00004" under the catalog number, but it seems they did ship copies from the first print too.
This is so damned bizarre. When people talk of printings or print runs, be it with books, movies, games, or whatever, the implication is usually that an additional printing was necessary because the previous one sold out and demand was still high. This sounds like they ran off two at essentially the same time!
Quote from: moozooh on November 30, 2009, 01:00:00 PM
Can anyone tell me what exactly are the differences between arcade and arcade-360 modes, aside from higher resolution graphics?
Not much. There are some slight differences in slowdown, but that's it. It's not like Deathsmiles, where the two modes were really different.
So are scores made between the two comparable?
Most Japanese players seem to think so. I haven't played all of the modes enough to form my own opinion.
EOJ or anyone else who's good at Ultra Arrange, does skipping powerups allow you to score higher on bosses by extending the time you fight them? (If nothing else, allow for more time to reflect and collect gems to increase the counter)
I'd test it myself but I'm still working on clearing the mode normally so I think I would game over too soon to be able to form a good opinion.
I doubt it makes much difference if you skip one or two, but if you skip ALL of the power ups? Hmm. Might make later boss fights worth more, though they would also take much longer to finish (and everything would be harder). Interesting idea.
The first boss fight seemed to take me a bit longer if I skipped the two powerups, but my scores in that mode are so inconsistent that I couldn't tell if it really helped.
I figure that if you go into the Larsa fight with a 200k counter and no powerups that could really give a lot of points, assuming you can stay in fever often enough to survive.
Some secret achievements:
Only in ver 1.5
-Clear Ultra Stage 3 (you can use up to 5 continues)
-Clear Ultra Stage 5 (you can use up to 9 continues)
Also, unconfirmed, but one Japanese guy says the last 50pt secret achievement is to no miss no bomb the game (ver 1.5 only) in any mode. Probably only Original mode would be doable, but it would be pretty damn hard even there (I've never done it).
Nice thanks for the info EOJ.
I think the achievements were really well set this time for the most part. The get an extend via a power-up item/bomb is a huge pain in the ass, and the 1up->Gameover one is also harder than you'd expect, but the Ultra achievements seem like real invitations to actually challenging the mode. I'm down for the rush.
Quote from: gsl on November 30, 2009, 06:43:26 PM
This is so damned bizarre. When people talk of printings or print runs, be it with books, movies, games, or whatever, the implication is usually that an additional printing was necessary because the previous one sold out and demand was still high. This sounds like they ran off two at essentially the same time!
How so? They did the initial 20k print, then realized the demand is higher and printed more in order to fill all orders. Isn't that basically the same thing?
Some Japanese guys are reporting the following bug in the game:
-Music fades or glitches out at various spots in the game
Also one guy confirmed one of the enemies in the second half of Stage 4 appears at the wrong time (or is misplaced?).
Quote from: EOJ on December 01, 2009, 01:24:21 AM
-Music fades or glitches out at various spots in the game
There are reports of this on shmups too. Patch time. =D
Quote from: adverse on December 01, 2009, 01:00:43 AM
Nice thanks for the info EOJ.
I think the achievements were really well set this time for the most part. The get an extend via a power-up item/bomb is a huge pain in the ass, and the 1up->Gameover one is also harder than you'd expect, but the Ultra achievements seem like real invitations to actually challenging the mode. I'm down for the rush.
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8966916
There's also a 攻略 up for anyone who wants to 1cc Original with really low rank, maybe that unlocks it?
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8967795
http://www.nicovideo.jp/watch/sm8967856
I've seen the video on youtube already, it's harder than it looks because there are a lot of random elements at play. I thought maybe it could be unlocked in Training mode, but no.
Quote from: HVL on December 01, 2009, 01:23:47 AMHow so? They did the initial 20k print, then realized the demand is higher and printed more in order to fill all orders. Isn't that basically the same thing?
Sure, except this is happening within the week of release, and it's people who've had preorders for the title for a while that are getting screwed (okay, this is partially Play-Asia's fault not sticking to any sort of first-come, first-served order with the first print). It's one thing to only go for a certain number of limited editions (hence the name), but it almost seems like they just settled on an arbitrary number for the first print of the regular edition and then scrambled to a second printing when their first print numbers didn't match up with order numbers from distributers.
Has anyone compared the bug-fixed 1.5 PCB to the 360 version(s)?
Just a warning to folks, according to the achievements Wiki, achievements do not unlock in 1.01 mode. Be advised.
here are pics from the stickers if anyone care:
(http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/1923/sticker2w.th.jpg) (http://img248.imageshack.us/i/sticker2w.jpg/)(http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/8164/sticker3e.th.jpg) (http://img134.imageshack.us/i/sticker3e.jpg/)
Not bad looking. Are they regular stickers with some sort of adhesive, or more of a removable vinyl cling sort of affair? It's a moot point, but if I had one I could see myself royally screwing up the application what with the curve of the faceplate and all.
Quote from: bcass on December 01, 2009, 03:10:45 AM
Has anyone compared the bug-fixed 1.5 PCB to the 360 version(s)?
Yeah, that's what I've been talking about a lot in this thread. When I talk about slowdown emulation and so forth. No one really knows exactly what bugs were fixed in the bug-fixed 1.5 PCB, but I already offered my theory. The only bug I ever experienced in the PCB was the hit-detection bug in Stage 5.
Is there any difference in slowdown between the original 1.5 PCB and the bug-fixed 1.5 PCB?
No, there's never slowdown differences between bug-fixed and non-bug-fixed SH3 PCBs. They just fix bugs.
SIN got his copy of the game, and has posted his impressions of the slowdown:
http://sinmoon.blog.shinobi.jp/Date/20091202/1/
He says there is more a bit slowdown than the PCB, for example you can trigger slowdown on the Stage 4 boss in Maniac that you can't do on the PCB (I've also confirmed this, it makes the fight easier). Basically, Normal Reco's shot has more slowdown-triggering power than the PCB. Overall though, he's pleased with it and doesn't think it's anything to fuss about. His main complaint seems to be he finds the training mode in Arrange quite flawed and disappointing, due to the lack of options regarding fever mode.
Alright, I think this will be my last post on the slowdown issue. I've tested all the modes enough, and read enough comments from top Japanese players. Here's what I've concluded:
-This port of the arcade game is not perfect, and it is not as good as Deathsmiles. Deathsmiles is 99%~100% accurate*** (in other words, about as perfect as you can get really), while this port is about 93%~95% accurate overall.
All the fancy menus and HD graphics and arrange modes and options are great, but I'd trade all of that (except the scanline options, keep those in!) if I could have the port as accurate as Deathsmiles Arcade mode is. I'm quite worried about the accuracy of the upcoming Black Label port too, as they apparently did that in 2 months, and I'm not sure if Cave or M2 did it.
It's quite painful that Deathsmiles' perfect Arcade mode looks like ass on an HDTV (no scanline options), while Futari's imperfect Arcade mode looks lovely. I guess we can't have it all in one game. :(
I guess this is good news for Espgaluda II fans, as Cave is doing that port, so we should expect an accuracy in Arcade mode on par with Deathsmiles. If they can do that while using M2's visual options, we should finally get a truly "perfect port".
The end.
***I should clarify that I am only referring to Deathsmiles' Arcade mode. Deathsmiles' 360 mode is horrendous in terms of slowdown and game speed replication (only about 80% accurate overall), it is so bad I cannot even play it anymore. Deathsmiles Mega Black Label (both Arcade and 360 modes) is a similarly horrendous port.
So what kind of scores are you guys getting in ver 1.5? Or are you all playing only Novice and Arrange?
As for achievements, somehow I've racked up nearly 900 without even trying to get specific ones (I don't really care about this stuff). Looking them over, I think the two 1CC achievements for ver 1.5 Maniac mode and the clear Ultra stage 5 with 9 credits or less achievement will be unattainable for 99% of the people who bought this game.
Also my japanese friend that are playing the game on 360 told me about these kind of non accurate slowdown :mad: Maybe a patch could fix it?or this slowdown is acceptable for a maniac player? :-\
Talking about the novice mode, there are only a difference with the quantity of bullets on stage?
Quote from: EOJ on December 02, 2009, 01:24:51 AM
So what kind of scores are you guys getting in ver 1.5? Or are you all playing only Novice and Arrange?
Not too good myself, but I'm blaming the analog stick. I'm mainly enjoying 1.01 Original and almost beat it just now but died going for the 1up, having forgotten that it was in a different spot in this version :P. Not too many people on the leaderboards yet; only one ALL and I'm in 4th place after just a few runs.
Edit: Looks like the 360 mode board is the popular choice. Lots of ALL clears.
Quote from: CRI on December 01, 2009, 12:32:42 PM
here are pics from the stickers if anyone care:
(http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/1923/sticker2w.th.jpg) (http://img248.imageshack.us/i/sticker2w.jpg/)(http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/8164/sticker3e.th.jpg) (http://img134.imageshack.us/i/sticker3e.jpg/)
Not so fussed about the actual faceplate, but I'd love one of those small Cave stickers for my laptop. Dayum.
Just got a 213 mil all clear with Abnormal Palm in Original Arcade. Best I've done in Original so far. : /
Just can't get into the top 10 in Arrange Maniac. 12 is my best (3.13 bil)
In regards to bugs (or just plain shit) I'm curious to see how Original 1.01 Stage 4 boss plays. Those pink ball things are just dickheads.
On day one I played a ton and pulled a 233 mil on Original with Abnormal Palm, but I haven't been able to replicate it. Would have done better and probably gotten to the stage 5 boss, but the 1 up didn't appear. :/
I hit 150 mil on Maniac yesterday; Maniac is considerably more awesome than I expected from videos. Harder than Mushi's Maniac, too. Makes me really look forward to God Mode.
I can't seem to get Arrange down which is fine because I don't like it all that much. Got no interest in novice.
Just got the achievement for getting either an extend by picking up a bomb or power-up item.
There is an easier way to do it than that video shows. Hint: bomb items are worth 100k when you have 6 in stock, power-up items worth 10k when at full power.
If no one guesses right I'll just post up tomorrow.
Quote from: EOJ on December 01, 2009, 11:07:25 PM
Alright, I think this will be my last post on the slowdown issue. I've tested all the modes enough, and read enough comments from top Japanese players. Here's what I've concluded:
-This port of the arcade game is not perfect, and it is not as good as Deathsmiles. Deathsmiles is 99%~100% accurate*** (in other words, about as perfect as you can get really), while this port is about 93%~95% accurate overall.
All the fancy menus and HD graphics and arrange modes and options are great, but I'd trade all of that (except the scanline options, keep those in!) if I could have the port as accurate as Deathsmiles Arcade mode is. I'm quite worried about the accuracy of the upcoming Black Label port too, as they apparently did that in 2 months, and I'm not sure if Cave or M2 did it.
It's quite painful that Deathsmiles' perfect Arcade mode looks like ass on an HDTV (no scanline options), while Futari's imperfect Arcade mode looks lovely. I guess we can't have it all in one game. :(
I guess this is good news for Espgaluda II fans, as Cave is doing that port, so we should expect an accuracy in Arcade mode on par with Deathsmiles. If they can do that while using M2's visual options, we should finally get a truly "perfect port".
The end.
Could you specify it for each Mode? Is only Ultra concerned or Original and Maniac, too?
Quote from: EOJ on December 02, 2009, 01:24:51 AM
As for achievements, somehow I've racked up nearly 900 without even trying to get specific ones (I don't really care about this stuff). Looking them over, I think the two 1CC achievements for ver 1.5 Maniac mode and the clear Ultra stage 5 with 9 credits or less achievement will be unattainable for 99% of the people who bought this game.
I'm up to 790, but it'll take me some time to get the Maniac ones since I got so used to Black Label.
I don't think the Ultra 9 (or 10) continues achievement is that crazy myself.
If you can get your continues down like so:
Stage 1: 0
Stage 2: 1
Stage 3: 2
Stage 4: 3
Stage 5: 4
It should be doable. There is also the chance (albeit small) to get an extend with every continue, but that takes some smart scoring.
Achievement-wise, these are the online leaders at the moment (although this gamercard site is a a few days lagged it seems):
http://www.mygamercard.net/leaderboard.php?gt=&g=1029&z=&c=&x=43&y=19
Looks like "stgpo" is the only one who has comped the game as of these rankings. There are very few people with 900+ achievement points.
Edit: One bullet pattern that I think got totally botched is the second phase of the last boss on Ultra, where the tight "woven" pattern appears and you have to dodge very precisely. If you bomb or die, the danmaku literally appears on top of you, it seems to scale way too fast to player movement. Anybody else notice this?
Ok, so the Japanese achievements wiki is saying that the last 50 point achievement is not to no-bomb or no-miss a mode, but instead to kill Spiritual Larsa's final form in 1.5.
This requires an Ultra clear without continuing, but it is possible to get this via "every extend". Is that the extend every 80 million setting?
Quote from: Moskovskaya on December 02, 2009, 09:06:29 AM
[
Could you specify it for each Mode? Is only Ultra concerned or Original and Maniac, too?
The good news is Maniac has all of the slowdown of the PCB, except maybe a few small spots. The bad news is Maniac has more slowdown than the PCB - I've confirmed this. Spots I confirmed last night include:
-Last phase of Stage 3 boss with Normal Reco (use shot and you'll induce slowdown that lets you get through the pattern without a bomb. Even TAC on the superplay DVD uses a bomb in the PCB version in this spot because there's no slowdown and a ton of bullets)
-Big dragons in Stage 5 with Normal Reco (again, just use shot and you'll get helpful slowdown that let's you do TAC's pattern on the superplay DVD much easier than what he had to deal with)
-Last phase of Stage 4 midboss
-Second phase of Stage 4 boss (makes this crucial scoring spot easier)
Some timing differences in Maniac:
-Stage 2 midboss dies a little too quickly with Normal Reco
-Stage 2 boss expanding balls take a little too long to destroy (like .5 sec more time)
I haven't tested differences between Arcade and 360 Maniac in detail yet, but overall I think they're pretty similar. So far I only noticed the following difference:
-Arcade maniac is missing some slowdown on the last icicle in Stage 2, whereas 360 Maniac has this.
@AST-KOT:
so far I think Maniac is acceptable in the port, but scores should be marked with an asterisk or something because the added slowdown occurs in a few big scoring spots. It's pretty unfortunate the added slowdown mainly occurs in these spots, otherwise we could discount it as insignificant.ABI says there's more slowdown in Stages 3 and 5 in Original mode. More info to come when I've confirmed it.
Bottom line:
-the port is basically the same difficulty in terms of a 1CC, as compared to the PCB, but it is easier to score in due to these added slowdowns.
-Normal Reco's shot has added slowdown-inducing abilities in the port that are not present in the PCB
@adverse: I haven't noticed any differences in the Stage 5 boss (in any mode). Every extend hopefully means every 80mil, as otherwise it'll be impossible for all but 3-5 people on the planet.
I got the clear stage 5 achievement in Ultra last night. I think I used 10 or 11 continues, but I wasn't keeping track exactly. Pretty easy really, if you make good use of your bombs and don't start using continues until the end of stage 2 (or later). I still don't think most people will be able to get this one, you have to be pretty good at these games.
Nice scores all around from you guys, I'm looking forward to see your progress in ver 1.5.
Quote1 -Last phase of Stage 3 boss with Normal Reco (use shot and you'll induce slowdown that lets you get through the pattern without a bomb. Even TAC on the superplay DVD uses a bomb in the PCB version in this spot because there's no slowdown and a ton of bullets)
2- -Big dragons in Stage 5 with Normal Reco (again, just use shot and you'll get helpful slowdown that let's you do TAC's pattern on the superplay DVD much easier than what he had to deal with)
3 -Last phase of Stage 4 midboss
4 -Second phase of Stage 4 boss (makes this crucial scoring spot easier)
Some timing differences in Maniac:
5 -Stage 2 midboss dies a little too quickly with Normal Reco
6 -Stage 2 boss expanding balls take a little too long to destroy (like .5 sec more time)
I have any question:
1, 2 and 5 happen only with Normal Reco. OK?
3,4 and 6 happen with any character. OK?
Sorry for my English and waiting for reply.
Cool!
Good questions. I haven't tested this with the other character types yet, but I will do that tonight and post the results. I'm pretty sure 5 only occurs with Normal Reco, though. Both 5 and 6 aren't really important though, if everything else was perfect I'd say these were insignificant.
Thanks for reply, I will waiting for results.
Let put one last question: Can one patch solve this problems?
Cool!
Japanese players have said that the Deathsmiles patch added/fixed slowdown in the Deathsmiles Mega Black Label 360 mode (only this mode, not Arcade mode, and they didn't add/fix it nearly enough), so I guess it's possible.
BTW in spite of the inaccuracies, I still love this port. I had a great time practicing stage 3 in Maniac mode last night, for example. The training mode alone is worth the price, IMO, and the slowdown in the stages themselves is basically 1:1 (well, I can only confirm this for Maniac mode). Nearly all the added slowdown is only in some boss/midboss fights (again, I can only say this for Maniac mode).
M2 had a lot to deal with in this port, so when all is said and done they still did a great job (and went above and beyond in many respects). Keep in mind they had to try to get the slowdown replication correct in SIX modes (original, maniac, and ultra in both arcade and 360), and 12 if you count ver 1.01 (which I have not tested yet). While Deathsmiles Arcade mode is a perfect port, that's only one "mode" to deal with, and they royally fucked up Deathsmiles 360 mode (as well as both DSMBL modes).
Quote from: Ast-Kot on December 02, 2009, 03:42:47 AM
Talking about the novice mode, there are only a difference with the quantity of bullets on stage?
Forgot to answer this. Bullet quantity and speed are both different, but many patterns are totally different too.
Novice is a fun, stress-free score attack.
So I'm trying to envision how one would approach the final Ultra mode achievement.
Basically you're going to need to, at the least, learn how to survive managably up to stage 5 by passably scoring and earning extends along the way. There was an every 80 mil thread on the forums where EOJ made it up to the stage 5 boss, so if we add training mode into the equation, it's probably possible for people that really practice.
Stage 5 itself will be the key to getting the achievement, you will have to hit almost every Taulon (lantern) correctly, and try to somehow scrape together 5 lives by the end of the level (what are the max lives for every 80??). Then, you're going to have to push through the dragon boss, dying maybe twice? Then blow three lives/bombs on Larsa.
If you practice Larsa in practice mode, you could probably get down the superplay pattern enough to beat her. And if the max lives goes over 5, it might be easier...but still...
I never got to the Stage 5 boss, but I got to stage 5 a couple times. With practice mode and a couple months, I think I could do it. I don't think I want to put in the time/effort though.
Max lives at one time are 7 with the "every 80mil" setting.
Just got the game. Can someone elaborate on how to make this look as close to the PCB as possible on a 17" rotated CRT?
I just need to know what to mess with under Picture Setting #D; mainly the effect mode, effect bias and glare settings.
QuoteJust got the game. Can someone elaborate on how to make this look as close to the PCB as possible on a 17" rotated CRT?
+1, but for 29 "(I guess it's the same ...)
This would definitely be a
very useful guide for many people around here.
So, please, anyone? :righton:
First week sales are in. Not too hot, sold about 15K and didn't make the top 10:
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=381294
Deathsmiles sold ~20K in the same time frame, and ranked #6. And deathsmiles wasn't region-free. Make of that what you will.
It'll be interesting to see the second-week sales. DS sold ~7000 in its second week.
BTW Amazon Japan has both the regular edition (w/DLC) and LE back in stock now.
I suppose the only interesting stats for Cave as to whether or not they make any more games region-free is what percentage of those sales were made to foreigners...
It's a shame it hasn't sold as well as DeathSmiles (yet) though as I think this is definitely the better game.
Yep. I don't think more than a few hundred foreigners actually bought it, though (would be interesting to get ncsx.com's sales numbers, though they stated it wasn't their top seller for the week it was released). Most people outside of Japan have no clue what this game even is, and they can't go into a store and buy it.
There's no way that Futari is going to sell like gangbusters to foreigners who have not even played the PCB first week. Asada and CAVE probably have the foresight to release that if overseas sales will have an effect, it will be a slow one as people familiarize themselves with the game.
Ikaruga was not an overnight success for instance.
Ikaruga on the Dreamcast sold a ton outside of Japan when it was first released. NCSX.com said they had to spend 3 days just to box and prepare all the preorders they had. This was nowhere near that level, and Dreamcasts were not region free.
I take that back then. Actually I'd be curious as to why Ikaruga sold so well then, and what the numbers were back then. I doubt it would go over 4k/5k...wasn't the initial Ikaruga print run quite low?
Damn, those sales are pretty disappointing. I was expecting it to sell more than Deathsmiles. It must be them lolis. :laugh:
It's been 8 days since P-A shipped mine, I hope I get it today or tomorrow. Already tate'd my 37" LCD. :righton:
Futari officially released on the 26th so these first week sales are only for 4 days. I will be interesting to see how well it sells in its first full week.
If it sells less than DS I could think this is because of the screen format.
Quote from: EOJ on December 02, 2009, 09:17:23 PM
Japanese players have said that the Deathsmiles patch added/fixed slowdown in the Deathsmiles Mega Black Label 360 mode (only this mode, not Arcade mode, and they didn't add/fix it nearly enough), so I guess it's possible.
So DS MBL 360 mode is more arcade perfect than MBL Arcade mode?
Could you give an accuracy percentage for each mode compared to the PCB?
Quote from: adverse on December 03, 2009, 02:36:07 AM
I take that back then. Actually I'd be curious as to why Ikaruga sold so well then, and what the numbers were back then. I doubt it would go over 4k/5k...wasn't the initial Ikaruga print run quite low?
1) There are a ton of Treasure fans that gobble up anything Treasure
2) I think Radiant Silvergun had already spiked in value, so the "rare" crowd snapped up Ikaruga quickly (and I know some folks bought copies to keep sealed)
3) It was terribly easy to play imports on the DC and a lot of people were tuned into Japanese releases for this reason
4) It's painfully hard to play imports on 360, so most people wouldn't even pay attention to JPN releases and thus wouldn't know it was region free
5) The economy sucks now, plus people are trying to figure what they can do for Christmas... and MF is expensive
Maybe I'm full of shit, who knows. I actually believe that the Playstation/Saturn/Dreamcast/PS2 days were pretty damn good days to be importing games from Japan. The 360/PS3 era.. not so much. Sure, there are still a few non-localized gems but for most people there aren't enough to justify importing a 360. And on the PS3 front it's easy but it seems to me the gems are either localized or have too significant of a language barrier.
Now that EOJ and other Jp players have confirmed differences in slowdown accuracy what is your overall opinion of the port in terms of quality and playability? Though the PCB counterpart may not be interchangeable with this installment 100% it is still a great experience. Sometimes when i read those comments of arcade perfection i get the feeling that some people think its a poor product. Now if the original PCB were a port of this then what would be the overall opinion? and if this were an original title for the Xbox everybody would say it's perfect. What does everyone think?
Also posting here since I think someone wanted pics of the limited edition limited edition:
(http://f.hatena.ne.jp/images/fotolife/e/elixir68k/20091203/20091203081658.jpg) (http://d.hatena.ne.jp/elixir68k/20091203)
The cat's facial expression was the same as mine when I turned it on.
Quote from: lawnspic on December 03, 2009, 11:22:02 AM
Now that EOJ and other Jp players have confirmed differences in slowdown accuracy what is your overall opinion of the port in terms of quality and playability?
How about reading the previous pages, it's all there. The port is not perfect, but M2 did hell of a good job all things considered. I think the only real complaint is the slightly inaccurate replication of slowdown.
QuoteThough the PCB counterpart may not be interchangeable with this installment 100% it is still a great experience. Sometimes when i read those comments of arcade perfection i get the feeling that some people think its a poor product.
Well, of course. You wouldn't notice any differences if you haven't played the original arcade version. It is inevitable that the port gets ripped apart and compared to the original. You simply cannot avoid critical comments regarding the quality, especially of slowdown replication.
QuoteNow if the original PCB were a port of this then what would be the overall opinion? and if this were an original title for the Xbox everybody would say it's perfect. What does everyone think?
That's pretty bad comparision. A port will never be "perfect" unless it plays exactly the same way as the original.
I hope my copy gets here soon from P-A. I am considering rotating my 32' LCD which I have not done before. Is there any smart method of doing this?
@HVL, in the last quote i meant if this were an original title for the Xbox it would be a perfect game. Your right in saying that it would not be "perfect" compared to the original. Then again how many ports exist that are perfect to their console counterparts. On its own i think it will be well received and many players will adapt to reach another high score.
BTW, as far as the slowdown in the original PCB is concerned is it due to hardware limitations of the SH3 (so much going on at once sprite wise) or is it intentional? Thanks
Quote from: lawnspic on December 03, 2009, 06:29:39 PM
@HVL, in the last quote i meant if this were an original title for the Xbox it would be a perfect game.
It isn't an 'original xbox title', so this point is irrelevant. If I were a Martian I'd live on Mars.
Quote
Then again how many ports exist that are perfect to their console counterparts.
I think you mean "PCB (or Arcade) counterparts". Off the top of my head: Radiant Silvergun, Ikaruga Dreamcast, Espgaluda PS2, and Deathsmiles (only Arcade mode, and disregarding the lack of 240p or scanlines). Maybe Battle Garegga Saturn too? All of those ports are highly regarded by shmup fans (not necessarily the games, but just about everyone respects the port quality). Can't say that about inaccurate, sloppy ports like Mushi PS2, Ibara PS2, and DDPDOJBLEX X360.
Quote from: adverse on December 03, 2009, 02:36:07 AM
I take that back then. Actually I'd be curious as to why Ikaruga sold so well then, and what the numbers were back then. I doubt it would go over 4k/5k...wasn't the initial Ikaruga print run quite low?
According to wikipedia, Ikaruga DC sold 50,000 (same as Deathsmiles). Ncsx.com says they estimate they sold over 30% of the entire print run. They say that to this day, it is still their best selling import game ever. I think points that some people mentioned in this thread were probably correct, such as it being a Treasure game, and Radiant Silvergun love being at a peak before its release. All of that added to the desire for it outside of Japan. In America today people are conditioned to expect these games to be $10 XBLA downloads, or at the most a $20-$30 disc release. Few Americans are going to shell out $70+ for something like this.
Quote from: antares on December 03, 2009, 08:30:33 AM
Quote from: EOJ on December 02, 2009, 09:17:23 PM
Japanese players have said that the Deathsmiles patch added/fixed slowdown in the Deathsmiles Mega Black Label 360 mode (only this mode, not Arcade mode, and they didn't add/fix it nearly enough), so I guess it's possible.
So DS MBL 360 mode is more arcade perfect than MBL Arcade mode?
Yeah, 360 DSMBL is probably more accurate than Arcade mode, if only for the fact that the Ice Palace has much more of the arcade slowdown, whereas the Arcade mode runs way too fast, missing like half the slowdown. However, in the first six stages, Arcade mode is more accurate, particularly in rank 999. So it's hard to judge a "percentage" or whatever overall - both are majorly flawed in different ways.
Also, sorry, but I didn't have a chance to test the slowdown with the other character types last night. I'll try to do it over the weekend.
Could someone please post the current high scores on the leaderboards for the following modes?
Ver 1.5 (Arcade or 360, whichever scores are higher)
ORIGINAL-RECO
ORIGINAL-PALM
MANIAC-RECO (<- Especially this one)
MANIAC-PALM
ULTRA-RECO
ULTRA-PALM
As someone without access to the online leaderboards, I'd very much appreciate it.
It seems xbox mode have higher scores right now ...
I took only the best score because scores are divided for each character and each shot style ... too much pictures to take .. sorry :-\
Ver 1.5 Original Reco Normal
(http://www.monsterup.com/upload/1259894064783.jpg) (http://www.monsterup.com)
Funny last day I did 326millions in normal play (not score attack) !! I should be at 7 place !
Ver 1.5 Maniac Reco Normal
(http://www.monsterup.com/upload/1259893521208.jpg) (http://www.monsterup.com)
For Palm, the best score in Maniac is in normal shot !! ---> 516 322 699
Ver 1.5 Ultra Palm Abnormal
(http://www.monsterup.com/upload/1259894824904.jpg) (http://www.monsterup.com)
Thanks. I'd currently be #4 on the Reco Maniac list, I have a 500+mil score. In 4 weeks I'll be able to post scores online. :righton:
I score much better with Normal Palm in Maniac too - Abnormal Palm, while easier to 1CC, is harder to score with for me.
V 1.5 X360 Mode
ORIGINAL-RECO 486180630 N
ORIGINAL-PALM 396070648 N
MANIAC-RECO- 698760113 N
MANIAC-PALM- 516322699 N
ULTRA-RECO- 1969781172 N
ULTRA-PALM- 2941778983 AN
V1.5 Arcade
ORIGINAL-RECO 375482251 N
ORIGINAL-PALM 414054993 N
MANIAC-RECO 643533357 N
MANIAC-PALM 519046706 N
ULTRA-RECO 729116562 AN
ULTRA-PALM 2069625540 AN
N=Normal
NA= Abnormal
Thanks a lot! :)
Question- When playing arrange and you hit laser when in fever the counters drops back to zero, do you have to avoid doing that not to lose fever and keep scoring. Can that be stopped?Thanks
Once you get in fever, it's going to go down to zero no matter what you do. Laser might make it go down faster than shot, anyone test this?
Quote from: EOJ on December 03, 2009, 10:05:25 PM
Once you get in fever, it's going to go down to zero no matter what you do. Laser might make it go down faster than shot, anyone test this?
From what i can tell once in fever it's infinite untill you get hit (you or your option and you only lose a %) or you use laser to reflect bullets in desperation to survive (this will make it count backward quickly to zero).
That would make sense so you are encouraged to basically play like normal and not get hit, nice twist to the gameplay IMHO
Well you have to reflect bullets back in fever, that's how you score. So there's no way of (or benefit to) staying in fever "infinitely".
The fever counters count down no matter what you do, BTW. Just trigger fever before a boss - it counts down rapidly while you are waiting for the boss to appear. It wouldn't do that if your conditions were true.
Yes that true but its like a balancing act, you have to use it sparingly or you lose fever (which delivers large gems in return, i think) What is better hitting fever and staying there or reflecting. I think its a careful combination of both. I just dont know which is more rewarding. BTW i just started to dabble in this since playing 1.5 so excuse any mistakes i may have made in judgment
Sorry, I'm not following you. Maybe we're talking about slightly different things (i.e. you're ALWAYS going to lose fever after a short time, it has nothing to do with what you're doing in fever mode).
Well i will have to go see again. I thought that when both your counters reach 9999 and you enter fever you can start accumulating large gems. On the flip side you could reflect and trade those bullets for gems. Now when i was playing i thought that when i kept using shot in fever it kept my fever counters at 9999 till i got hit or used reflect. Im probably wrong so i will have to play some more to see. I think if it did it would be one hell of a play mechanic as it adds some more variety
Quote from: lawnspic on December 03, 2009, 10:28:53 PM
Now when i was playing i thought that when i kept using shot in fever it kept my fever counters at 9999 till i got hit or used reflect. Im probably wrong so i will have to play some more to see.
If your counters are at 9999 and you only use shot and not laser, then yes, it keeps your counters at 9999. Maybe this is what happened. Once you press laser you go into fever, and shot will no longer keep the counters up.
Also, --> please post in the strategy thread (http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=3.0) if you want to keep discussing this. I don't want the main thread to get too cluttered with this.
Thanks lawnspic and HUU for posting those scores up, nice to check em out at work. :righton:
So I promised the other day to post an easier way of getting the extend via power-up/bomb pickup, but no one has taken a guess at the method yet. So I guess I'll just post it up.
What I kept noticing when I was trying to get the achievement the way the video shows it is that I would be slightly above 35 million every time I hit the stage 2 boss. It was also really tough to incrementally get the point total to just before 35 million to pick up the item and get the extend.
Solution?
Suicide three times as soon as you start the game in original, then continue. A Max Power-up item will appear. Pick that up and score well on stages 1 and 2. You should be right around 35 million before the boss. Shoot the boss a bit to adjust the score to 34,990,000 and up and then pick up the power item. 10,000 points since you're at max power. I'm pretty sure this is the best way to get the achievement since it cannot be done in training.
FYI ncsx.com still has SE copies with the DLC, but they've increased the price to $75.90:
http://www.ncsxshop.com/cgi-bin/shop/5AD-00001.html
Is there some secret way to get rapid-C in the control config? Or at the very least map one shot to more than one button? I really hoped the port would give rapid-C. Even Deathsmiles gave you rapid fire in the default config. :rolleyes:
BTW if you don't know, having rapid-C makes milking the stage 2 boss in Maniac way easier on your hands, it also helps out in many other sections (in all modes). Many arcade cabs have rapid-C wired up for this game.
Quote from: adverse on December 03, 2009, 10:59:07 PM
Thanks lawnspic and HUU for posting those scores up, nice to check em out at work. :righton:
So I promised the other day to post an easier way of getting the extend via power-up/bomb pickup, but no one has taken a guess at the method yet. So I guess I'll just post it up.
What I kept noticing when I was trying to get the achievement the way the video shows it is that I would be slightly above 35 million every time I hit the stage 2 boss. It was also really tough to incrementally get the point total to just before 35 million to pick up the item and get the extend.
Solution?
Suicide three times as soon as you start the game in original, then continue. A Max Power-up item will appear. Pick that up and score well on stages 1 and 2. You should be right around 35 million before the boss. Shoot the boss a bit to adjust the score to 34,990,000 and up and then pick up the power item. 10,000 points since you're at max power. I'm pretty sure this is the best way to get the achievement since it cannot be done in training.
Can you still get the Achievements using the restart? I'd rather not go for this one or the "game over with the 1up" one doing full runs each time...
"Let's try without the restart"
Nope you can't :P
Boo-urns.
IT CAME TODAY ASJMDIFPOWSK;DJK!
Afew thoughts:
-Holy hell there's a ton of content with all the different game modes.
-All but one of the display modes serve to illustrate what a crappy TV I have.
-Novice Ultra is really fun.
-The wife does not play stgs, and had to continue only once--right before Larsa--in Novice Original. That's pretty accessable.
-It took Umihara Kawase DS three full weeks to arrive from Play-Asia; Futari took eight days. I'll never understand airmail.
I experienced my first glitch while playing Maniac in 360 mode. Right away in stage 1, some of the bullets were just purple cubes which then turned into fractions of other weird geometric shapes. They didn't seem to hurt me in the first stage but I got killed in the second. Kinda weird, but I restarted and it was fine again.
I experienced a glitch this morning too. I was messing with Novice Ultra and killed Larsa's final form, but the bullet pattern didn't stop even after she died.
Not like it matters since I was invincible during that time, but it's still weird.
Quote from: Kaneda on December 04, 2009, 08:17:30 AM
I experienced my first glitch while playing Maniac in 360 mode. Right away in stage 1, some of the bullets were just purple cubes which then turned into fractions of other weird geometric shapes. They didn't seem to hurt me in the first stage but I got killed in the second. Kinda weird, but I restarted and it was fine again.
that happened to me on the stage one boss in my first maniac game
fortunately it's not a usual occurrance
YOS.K (of DFK1.0 counter-stop fame) has a bitching replay of v1.01 Ultra up on the leaderboards. His credit ends in stage 5 at the mid-boss and he starts to flub things up in the third stage, but some of the stuff he does in the first two levels is sick.
Good lord that is up there with some of the craziest replays I've ever seen.
・That obscene trick on the dragon after the first mid-boss = gdlk :o
・That Ultra 1.01 demands that you switch shot type every 500 on the counter is just so cruel.
・There seem to be straight up undodgeable patterns in this mode
・Yos. K is playing in a totally different universe from me
P.S. Sorry, hit modify on your post instead of Quote by accident. Didn't mod anything of course!
Oh yeah, I ran into a pair of glitches on last nights play as well. I had the same issue with Larsa on Novice Ultra where the bullets kept coming during her death animation (wasn't completely sure if it was supposed to happen that way to be honest), and had some graphical corruption with the third level boss in XBox 360 Maniac. The boss's right rear leg and a square around it (the sprite for that leg, I'm assuming) kept flashing pink and white, and kept switching between the actual leg and graphical garbage.
Wow, the difference between 1.01 and 1.5 is brutal. Everything in Original is way faster, there's less enemies that cancel bullets (stage 3 for example), there aren't as many gems nor multiplier for that matter, and holding down shot doesn't pick up any items. What other changes did I miss? I've never touched 1.01 before.
Still waiting on my delivery from P-A. Should have gone with NCSX, since they're local.
I need to download that shit. I still haven't installed 1.01. Any good Maniac replays?
Piss all, even less on Arcade. For 1.01 360 mode, there's one 1cc at 146k. I might download that. It seems most people are playing either novice modes, ultra arrange, or 1.5 360.
I haven't experienced any graphical glitches. Are you all playing on Jaspers from the hdd? I have noticed the following glitches in ver 1.5:
-If you continue at a boss and the MP is floating around the screen, instead of fading away before you start the next stage, it's still floating around the screen!
-Ultra 1.5 360 mode's text description is that of ver 1.0(1), while only Ultra 1.5 Arcade has the original 1.5 text (they changed the description of Ultra from 1.0>1.5).
I also noticed the fact that the bullets keep firing after you destroy Larsa in Novice (in Arrange too, IIRC). No biggie.
I 1CC'd Original 1.5 Arcade with both characters last night (323mil w/ Reco, 294 w/ Palm). I think this mode is pretty much the same as the PCB, I can't notice any real differences. I played around with both Ultra 1.5 Arcade and 360, and I think Arcade is more accurate. As adverse mentioned earlier, Ultra 1.5 360 is too fast right before the midboss, and some other sections are too slow. Feels a bit messed up to me, but Arcade feels pretty much as I remember the PCB.
Basically, I'd say just stick to 1.5 Arcade, and skip the 360 modes.
BTW Larsa in Ultra 1.5 is totally exact to the PCB, adverse. When you die on the second form, the bullets overlap on you the same way on the PCB.
Quote from: EOJ on December 04, 2009, 07:25:40 PM
BTW Larsa in Ultra 1.5 is totally exact to the PCB, adverse. When you die on the second form, the bullets overlap on you the same way on the PCB.
Yikes, so this is CAVE basically telling us: you shouldn't have bombed (or died). Nice.
Speaking of Larsa, I'm still really bummed about the crappy remixed track on the last boss. Watching the superplay DVD again, I was reminded how much better the song sounded on the PCB. :( I think Stage 3 sounds better on the port, though.
This is apparently 1st day sales data for Futari, from a 2ch leak (http://64.233.163.132/search?q=cache:9pi26Gw-RdMJ:dubai.2ch.net/test/read.cgi/ghard/1259419660/843+http://dubai.2ch.net/test/read.cgi/ghard/1259419660/843&cd=3&hl=en&ct=clnk&client=firefox-a):
[360] Mushihimesama Futari Ver 1.5 (Cave) - LE 7,700 (54%) / RE 5,700 (38%)
Makes sense that more LEs would sell first day.
Quote from: EOJ on December 04, 2009, 07:25:40 PM
I haven't experienced any graphical glitches. Are you all playing on Jaspers from the hdd?
Yep, one of the last batches of 360 Pro Jaspers, game installed to the HDD. That graphical glitch with the stage 3 boss just happened the one time when I was playing last night. Kinda reminded me of various glitches that might show up on the NES if your cart was dusty--things would be entirely fine, and then you'd come up against some multi-sprite enemy or piece of scenery where one part was all garbage. Didn't affect gameplay at all though.
Sounds like the final Larsa bullets in Novice are a pretty consistent thing, though.
Quote from: EOJ on December 04, 2009, 12:29:31 AM
Is there some secret way to get rapid-C in the control config? Or at the very least map one shot to more than one button? I really hoped the port would give rapid-C. Even Deathsmiles gave you rapid fire in the default config. :rolleyes:
BTW if you don't know, having rapid-C makes milking the stage 2 boss in Maniac way easier on your hands, it also helps out in many other sections (in all modes). Many arcade cabs have rapid-C wired up for this game.
I'm not sure what your asking here but all three (4 in arrange) buttons can be "remapped". Rapid C is mapped to RT by default.
Quote from: EOJ on December 04, 2009, 07:37:44 PM
Speaking of Larsa, I'm still really bummed about the crappy remixed track on the last boss. Watching the superplay DVD again, I was reminded how much better the song sounded on the PCB. :( I think Stage 3 sounds better on the port, though.
Since you mentioned the DVD (and I have no better place to bring it up)
Was K.K's first death in stage 5 an accident or suicide? It seems like a silly way to get killed considering everything else he doges, but I can't figure out any way it would have been beneficial for him to die.
QuoteAre you all playing on Jaspers from the hdd?
Can't remember if I got the glitch while playing on my US or JP system (probably JP, which is probably new enough to be a Jasper but I'm too lazy to check). Playing from the disc though.
Quote from: lawnspic on December 04, 2009, 10:48:15 PM
I'm not sure what your asking here but all three (4 in arrange) buttons can be "remapped". Rapid C is mapped to RT by default.
I know you can remap them, of course. There is no rapid C, there is only shot/autofire. I want a setup like:
A-Laser
B-Bomb
X-Shot (Autofire)
Y-Rapid Shot (Rapid Autofire)
Which, apparently, I can't have. :(
Did a couple runs in Maniac 1.5 Arcade today - Got 555mil w/ Reco and 499mil with N. Palm. No 1CC with either though.
Still no graphic glitches for me (are they only in 360 mode? Might explain why I don't see them as I don't play in 360 much and don't plan to), but I did have the sound glitch finally on the stage 4 boss in Maniac 1.5 training mode.
Re: Dame K.K.'s death in Stage 5 - I have no clue.
Quote from: EOJ on December 04, 2009, 07:37:44 PM
Speaking of Larsa, I'm still really bummed about the crappy remixed track on the last boss. Watching the superplay DVD again, I was reminded how much better the song sounded on the PCB. :( I think Stage 3 sounds better on the port, though.
Does anyone with the LE know it the CD contains the original versions or the altered versions of these tracks?
Also, does anyone know if the LE CD contains the menu music heard in the port?
I don't know about the LE soundtrack, but the Stage 3 track sounds the same, just clearer, with a nicer stereo mix. Same with everything else save that final boss. The problem with the stage 5 boss track is they lowered the distorted, strong guitar track in the mix in the second part and raised up some choir type track that I guess was buried in the background in the PCB version (you can barely hear it there). Makes it sound less raw and intense, and too "cold digital".
Interesting. I've just this minute ripped the audio data from the game disc (it's stored as RAW PCM in XWB containers), and it appears that the music is higher quality than on the CD (the game audio data files are sampled at 48000Hz). I imagine that the PCB sample rates are considerably lower than those found on the CD and in the 360 audio files, which might explain the perceivable difference. Does the PCB output in stereo? That might also affect how it sounds (if it outputs in mono).
Hm, 48khz is DAT standard. Interesting.
Yeah, SH3 PCBs only output mono. No matter the reason, the end result is the boss track sounds worse than before IMO.
Is this the version you're talking about: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nscP9QpXoFM ?
Quote from: bcass on December 05, 2009, 01:22:02 AM
Also, does anyone know if the LE CD contains the menu music heard in the port?
It does not sound like a remix of any track from Mushi 1 or Futari, so it probably isn't in there.
Quote from: bcass on December 05, 2009, 01:32:43 AM
Interesting. I've just this minute ripped the audio data from the game disc (it's stored as RAW PCM in XWB containers), and it appears that the music is higher quality than on the CD (the game audio data files are sampled at 48000Hz). I imagine that the PCB sample rates are considerably lower than those found on the CD and in the 360 audio files, which might explain the perceivable difference. Does the PCB output in stereo? That might also affect how it sounds (if it outputs in mono).
I'm sure that the sample rate has little to do with the changes EOJ mentioned. Converting sample rates from 44.1kHz (CD quality) to 48kHz (the port) or vice-versa should be imperceptible if you use tools that do the conversion using the proper math. Now I'm not sure if they changed the tracks further from the original OST CD or not for the port, but I do know that the stereo imaging has a LOT to do with the mix that you're hearing. Now that you mentioned the PCB only outputs mono (ewwwwwww), I did a little test and when I collapsed the stereo CD mix of the last boss track to mono, the balance of the guitars became louder and were more evenly matched to the choir-like synth track.
So it could either be one of a few things:
1. You're not used to hearing the soundtrack in stereo while playing the game
2. The composer made mono mixes for each track for the PCB and then made stereo ones for the original OST which were then used for the port
3. They've tweaked the balance of the OST even further for the port and accidentally made it worse than ever
I'm leaning more towards #2 at the point.
Since we're on the topic of audio and I haven't gotten my port yet (damn you play-asia economy shipping!), are the SFX for the port in mono or stereo? To clarify, do you hear explosions on the left-hand side of the screen more on the left speaker, or does it all sound centered? I wouldn't be surprised if the SFX were in mono and the music was in stereo, but it'd be really cool if M2 spent some time localizing sounds in the stereo field.
I took another listen... I have to say, I have the opposite opinion as EOJ, as I feel downplaying the guitars in that portion of the song vastly improves it - I found the entire song completely unlistenable when watching the superplay DVD. Killing the guitars makes the track a lot more dynamic and interesting.
Quote from: Schrodingers cat on December 05, 2009, 02:55:54 AM
Quote from: bcass on December 05, 2009, 01:32:43 AM
Interesting. I've just this minute ripped the audio data from the game disc (it's stored as RAW PCM in XWB containers), and it appears that the music is higher quality than on the CD (the game audio data files are sampled at 48000Hz). I imagine that the PCB sample rates are considerably lower than those found on the CD and in the 360 audio files, which might explain the perceivable difference. Does the PCB output in stereo? That might also affect how it sounds (if it outputs in mono).
I'm sure that the sample rate has little to do with the changes EOJ mentioned. Converting sample rates from 44.1kHz (CD quality) to 48kHz (the port) or vice-versa should be imperceptible if you use tools that do the conversion using the proper math.
Yes, I'm well aware of that. I was referring to the difference between the quality of the PCB compared to the CD and 360 mastering. It's entirely possible the PCB audio files are heavily compressed (using lossy compresion) which would further alter the way they sound (as can be heard on other Cave PCBs). Personally, I'd like to see someone undertake a project where the MAME ROMs are hacked to use lossless audio taken from the official CDs as some of the lossy compression is horrendous on some of the games.
Quote from: Schrodingers cat on December 05, 2009, 02:55:54 AMSince we're on the topic of audio and I haven't gotten my port yet (damn you play-asia economy shipping!), are the SFX for the port in mono or stereo? To clarify, do you hear explosions on the left-hand side of the screen more on the left speaker, or does it all sound centered? I wouldn't be surprised if the SFX were in mono and the music was in stereo, but it'd be really cool if M2 spent some time localizing sounds in the stereo field.
Examination of the sound effects bank reveals them to be mono (@ 48000Hz). I'm only playing through a stereo TV and I can't say I've noticed any particular stereo panning on the sound effects in-game.
I think it's odd that they didn't include the arrange tracks as an option in the actual game. Maybe they'll sell them as DLC at a later date like Konami did with Otomedius...
The sounds themselves are likely going to be mono anyway — the stereo effect should be done using panning coefficients depending on the sound source location on the screen, so one would have to use the tv's output to test for sure. Though I'm certain they wouldn't bother doing this for tate mode at least.
I do like the guitar parts a lot, just not the way that they sound. I think that the guitar tracks should have been re-recorded and/or EQ'ed differently because they are very thin sounding. There's just no meat to the sound. But I guess it works in a way because it makes the next part with the fluttery synth line (which I love) much more epic by comparison. Different strokes for different folks I guess.
Quote from: bcass on December 05, 2009, 01:32:43 AM
Yes, I'm well aware of that. I was referring to the difference between the quality of the PCB compared to the CD and 360 mastering. It's entirely possible the PCB audio files are heavily compressed (using lossy compresion) which would further alter the way they sound (as can be heard on other Cave PCBs). Personally, I'd like to see someone undertake a project where the MAME ROMs are hacked to use lossless audio taken from the official CDs as some of the lossy compression is horrendous on some of the games.
Oh, gotcha. Perhaps someone with both the PCB and the port can record the audio for a stage with the SFX off so we can do an A/B comparison for the music, because I'm quite sure that the mastered tracks are different for each version. From doing professional audio work I can tell you that you would probably never see a merely folded-down track (stereo->mono in this case) as a master, unless people were irresponsible, the client ran out of money, or something else like that happened. You would mix and master for mono from the start and then repeat the process from the ground up for a stereo mix/master if you needed that as well.
As for lossy compression, I don't think it's as much of an issue for recent games (SH3 and such) as it used to be with older games (like DonPachi [cringe]). I think that having stereo sound outputs instead of mono for PCBs would probably make a bigger difference in sound quality than using lossless audio, at least for more recent games.
Quote from: bcass on December 05, 2009, 01:32:43 AM
Examination of the sound effects bank reveals them to be mono (@ 48000Hz). I'm only playing through a stereo TV and I can't say I've noticed any particular stereo panning on the sound effects in-game.
Thanks for this.
Just got 1,444,780,862 in Ultra Novice with Normal Reco. Does anyone on the online leaderboards have a higher score than this?
BTW the 50pt achievement for "clearing Ultra on one credit" actually isn't too hard. This is because:
1)You can set the extends to every 80mil
2)You can restart any stage as many times as you like!
3)You can continue after the first form of Larsa, you just have to beat the first form on one credit, then finish off the other two forms.
I'll try to do this tonight or tomorrow.
You first! :laugh:
I'm up to 870 GS. Only got the Maniac clears/score and the above ridiculousness to go.
I went down to A-Cho again today and played a credit of 1.5 Maniac. Bad news. I was wrong about the slowdown being basically 1:1 in the stages. Stage 3 in the port has a lot more slowdown! I tried to play stage 3 on the PCB with the strats I've been doing on the port all week, and I kept dying due to the lack of slowdown. So scores between the two versions definitely are not comparable. Such a shame! :-\
Spots where the port has more slowdown in stage 3 maniac:
-Every hive (load the screen up with bullets from them, and there's lots of slowdown that makes scoring on these easy. Not so much slowdown on the PCB, so it's much harder to score here)
-The big beetles - there is only slowdown when you use shot in the PCB. When you revert back to laser to
score on them, the speed throttles back to normal. On the port, the slowdown remains even after you switch back to laser, making scoring here much easier.
Quote from: antares on December 03, 2009, 04:39:42 AM
If it sells less than DS I could think this is because of the screen format.
or lack of lolis
Quote from: EOJ on December 05, 2009, 05:32:28 AM
Just got 1,444,780,862 in Ultra Novice with Normal Reco. Does anyone on the online leaderboards have a higher score than this?
Last time I checked the highscore was something about 1,9b.
Just got this yesterday, and I'm loving it. No DLC card, though, and I ordered it on 9/28. A little bit pissed about that. So much for "First come, first served." :whyioughtta:
I just started to play maniac novice and i really like the scoring here. It lets me concentrate on the game more and not be so distracted with counter like in original and ultra. Sometimes you can keep your eyes on the action and use your intuition more. Almost got 200mil on my first score attack.
Quote from: antares on December 06, 2009, 11:15:25 AM
Quote from: EOJ on December 05, 2009, 05:32:28 AM
Just got 1,444,780,862 in Ultra Novice with Normal Reco. Does anyone on the online leaderboards have a higher score than this?
Last time I checked the highscore was something about 1,9b.
Really? In Ultra
Novice? It's hard to fathom where they're finding an extra 400mil. :oogle:
The highest is indeed 1.90 bill, followed by 1.87.
Hmm. Looks like I need to rethink some strats. BTW thanks for the info, guys. :righton:
Ultra Novice is actually a really quality game (my favorite among all the Arrange and Novice modes in the port). It would be perfect if they took out the autobomb, kept the bomb carriers as in the normal game, and beefed up some of the bullet patterns a little bit (like the snakes in stage 4). I also wish they kept in the last form of Larsa.
EOJ, did you give the 80 mil extend Ultra run a try?
Achievement-wise I'm at 900, but the maniac clears are probably gonna take some time.
Nah, I haven't bothered with that Ultra thing yet.
It sure was fun watching the Ultra Arrange 1.9 bill replay, complete with 10 minutes of stage 2 boss milking.
Pulled out a quick and dirty 1cc of Original Arrange last night on my first try. Still need to try out Maniac and Ultra Arrange. I've played all modes of 1.5, and can reach the Stage 3 Boss on one credit in Original Mode...but that bastard ices me very quickly. Overall, I'm having a total blast with this game and I really think it it something special.
Quote from: Megalixir on December 07, 2009, 02:32:40 PM
10 minutes of stage 2 boss milking.
Ah, so that's part of it. I was able to pull 630 mil my first go, and last night brought it up to 680 mil, but I'm really having a tough time seeing how to easily pull another 400 out of my ass. Granted I start losing bombs and lives on stage 5 which probably makes a big dent on the final score, but would it really account for that much?
It would probably behoove me to get back online and download some of those replays.
Dying isn't really an option, it brought him up from 1.88 to 1.9something. I did see some strategic bombing against Larsa. She has one pattern which comes and goes.. he bombed timely enough to cash in on it.
I played a bunch of Maniac 1.5 360 mode last night, and I think it's slightly more accurate than Arcade. Slowdown in Stage 3, in particular, feels closer to the PCB.
I did experience my first graphical glitch in 360 mode last night - got to Larsa (in Maniac) and there was a thick pink beam going through her body horizontally, stretching across the screen. It was there the whole fight, and was rather distracting. They need to patch this shit.
How is the slowdown in Stage 3 Original Arcade compared to 360 mode?
I haven't played much 360 original yet, but I haven't noticed any differences yet. Both modes seem pretty close to the PCB in Original, to me at least.
There's a nice 5bil ALL clear vid for Arrange Ultra up on nico douga, for schmucks like me who don't have access to the leader-boards.
Pt1:
http://dic.nicovideo.jp/v/sm9024212
Pt2:
http://dic.nicovideo.jp/v/sm9029837
Too bad half the score is done on the last boss, and he has to milk it for 10 minutes via bombs and suicides. Seems rather Yagawa-esque, but too much, to the point where scoring is pretty much broken.
I'm only asking because I always seem to score higher on 360 mode for some reason.
I think it might be due to the clearer, HD bullets. Easier to dodge. That's my theory for why I find it easier to score in 360 Maniac compared to 360 Arcade.
Anyone else experiencing this graphic glitch with Reko normal shot in 360 Original mode? I took a video of it, and it's quite disturbing...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/zapeipaa/4169167121/
Quote from: zap on December 08, 2009, 02:12:07 PM
Anyone else experiencing this graphic glitch with Reko normal shot in 360 Original mode? I took a video of it, and it's quite disturbing...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/zapeipaa/4169167121/
That's odd...hasn't happened to me yet, though I can confirm the Ultra Novice TLB glitch.
Quote
Too bad half the score is done on the last boss, and he has to milk it for 10 minutes via bombs and suicides. Seems rather Yagawa-esque, but too much, to the point where scoring is pretty much broken.
I've only played Arrange Ultra for a day or so, but I like Maniac much better. The deflection is used far less for survival.
Yeah, I've played Maniac Arrange a bit, but I don't know how you people are getting the 3 to 5 bil scores there. I can't get over 2.5bil.
Watching the replays would help I would suppose. One trick that helps big time is that you should always end a boss fight with 9999 on one side.... always. For stage 1 & 2 bosses, I flip over to the other character and kill him w/ shot to fill them up to 3000 or so. Let's you go into fever mode quickly on both stages which makes a big difference.
I got 3.7 bil I think now. I was #6 on the Leaderboards as of a few days ago. #1 is damn near 5 bil though (TAITOAPLAN). Haven't watched his run closely to figure out how he does it. No miss stage 5 helps a lot, which I've only done once.
Not sure if I'll stick w/ Ultra or not. Maybe if I make the top 30 or so. Don't want to look like too big of a pussy.
I've played arrange maniac mode too and I've noticed that if you kill all the boss transformation with 9999 on one side and shooting holding A you get a different score... I don't know if this is the same for the mid boss.... :( I think that you can reach the boss with a 9999 on one side and the max counter that you can reach; I've finisched the 5? stage with over 200.xxx saidai counter and the boss fight give you a lot of points like 1 billion over :lol:
@Gaijinpunch: In fever mode did you use palm or reko..There are any difference in order to reflect more items? I normally use Palm reflecting bullets with A...I've not understand if, in fever mode, you've to kill the big enemies that exploding cancel all the bullets on screnn (like on stage 3) with C or holding A... ;)
I can't connect my 360 on live cause my home wi-fi connection sucks....for watch the replay need a gold account?
Question: what would be a better way to learn the later stages of the game, restart or "training" mode? I want to be able to practice the patterns and my scoring techniques without starting from the top every time, but I want accurate rank based on my stats up until the trouble spots.
If Training is the better option, how do I calculate rank based on the overall counter/survival time? I'd like to make sure the stages play the same based on what i usually have by the time I get there. A typical run for me right now is no miss/no bomb up until right after the stage 3 mid-boss ( I usually get my first extend at or just after the second boss ), then it all goes to hell. I am referring, of course, to 1.5 Original mode.
Take note of what your multiplier is at the beginning of each stage and start of each boss, then practice training mode with it. Rank is based on your multiplier.
That's what I thought...and it maxes out at 70k on the overall counter, correct? I'll try and calculate where rank increments...
EDIT: Maybe I should be discussing this in the strategy thread?
Original counter maxes at 80k or so before the last boss, if you do everything perfectly. I've never gotten it over 55k, even with a no miss up until the boss. So I wouldn't start practicing at 70K+ rank until you can get that consistently (as it very likely may never happen!).
Quote from: NR777 on December 09, 2009, 06:18:11 PM
EDIT: Maybe I should be discussing this in the strategy thread?
Yes indeed, that's what it's there for.
Well, it wouldn't hurt to get used to higher rank so that one could be more confident when it's lower. At least it won't make him worse at it. :)
Yeah, but I don't see the point in practicing a super high rank if you're never going to get that in an actual run, particularly if you're just starting out on the game. If you are practicing to get better in runs, of course. In isolation, such rank in a particular stage could be a fun challenge.
Hi,
I'm sure someone can help me here.
How can I start a 2-player game? I pressed start ingame - didn't work. When I start the Game with 2 controllers connected, I always get "no entry" for player 2.
Pressing Start on Character Selection doesn't help either. So how does it work?
Are you playing ver 1.5 or the arrange modes? There is no 2player in the Arrange modes, but it should work for ver 1.5.
I tried both. Ver 1.5 doesn't work either. I tried the P2 controller as P1 too to make sure it isn't broken.
Quote from: EOJ on December 09, 2009, 08:06:47 PM
Yes indeed, that's what it's there for.
Of course. Sorry for clogging up the regular thread...just trying to figure out if I have to mess with rank settings on Training or if it will automatically configure rank based on multiplier.
Yeah, as long as you keep the rank "stage default", it will calculate it based on your overall multiplier.
Cool, thanks.
The game arrived last weekend (I'm on a small island of Spain), it came with the DLC card, and I did the preorder in early November...
I'm totally amazed with the game, but I have a question (maybe I'm blind or something but:) Where the hell is the novice mode ??? ???? I find no trace of it. Maybe it's only a feature of 1.01 version? ( since i don't downloaded it yet)
Quote from: mushi_klopfer on December 09, 2009, 09:14:56 PM
I tried both. Ver 1.5 doesn't work either. I tried the P2 controller as P1 too to make sure it isn't broken.
anyone can help me here? did someone try 2 player modus? does it work and how?
Quote from: Lunchbox on December 10, 2009, 06:39:38 AM
The game arrived last weekend (I'm on a small island of Spain), it came with the DLC card, and I did the preorder in early November...
I'm totally amazed with the game, but I have a question (maybe I'm blind or something but:) Where the hell is the novice mode ??? ???? I find no trace of it. Maybe it's only a feature of 1.01 version? ( since i don't downloaded it yet)
It took me a while to find it too. It's under the Arrange section of the main menu.
Quote from: mushi_klopfer on December 10, 2009, 07:11:33 AM
Quote from: mushi_klopfer on December 09, 2009, 09:14:56 PM
I tried both. Ver 1.5 doesn't work either. I tried the P2 controller as P1 too to make sure it isn't broken.
anyone can help me here? did someone try 2 player modus? does it work and how?
Did you try signing in a second Xbox account? The game keeps track of the account that was active during a run.
Quote from: mushi_klopfer on December 10, 2009, 07:11:33 AM
Quote from: mushi_klopfer on December 09, 2009, 09:14:56 PM
I tried both. Ver 1.5 doesn't work either. I tried the P2 controller as P1 too to make sure it isn't broken.
anyone can help me here? did someone try 2 player modus? does it work and how?
I tried it last night, and it worked. Just press start on P2 anytime. Of course, you can't use it in SCORE ATTACK mode, only in NORMAL PLAY, but surely you know that?
yeah it works now. thanks :)
Apparently the game dropped off Media Create's list already. Last week the last place had 4.8k sales, so it's not looking very bright.
Any more info regarding the sales now that the game's been out for two weeks?
Yeah, it's not in the top 30 this week, but we have yet to see its numbers. The lowest game in the top 30 this week sold ~7000, so all we know is it sold less than that. As stated before, Deathsmiles sold ~7000 in its second week.
New blog post:
http://cave-game.cocolog-nifty.com/
MFBL is up for download starting the night of December 11th, 2009 (JAPAN TIME), which should be 3-5 hours from the time of this post. Both Arcade and 360 mode versions are available, with online rankings and training mode also included. 1200 MSP.
I wonder if they'll allow the DLC to be purchased via non-Japan marketplaces, since the game is region free and they allowed the 1.01 card to be redeemed like that.
Quote from: StarCreator on December 10, 2009, 08:47:39 AM
Quote from: Lunchbox on December 10, 2009, 06:39:38 AM
The game arrived last weekend (I'm on a small island of Spain), it came with the DLC card, and I did the preorder in early November...
I'm totally amazed with the game, but I have a question (maybe I'm blind or something but:) Where the hell is the novice mode ??? ???? I find no trace of it. Maybe it's only a feature of 1.01 version? ( since i don't downloaded it yet)
It took me a while to find it too. It's under the Arrange section of the main menu.
Thanks man!
Pretty fun!!, i think will be a fun (short-ranage) challenge clearing ultra no miss. I lost two lives in the last boss :-[
I will focus on 1.5 before downloading BL.
Quote from: brentsg on December 11, 2009, 02:04:21 AM
I wonder if they'll allow the DLC to be purchased via non-Japan marketplaces, since the game is region free and they allowed the 1.01 card to be redeemed like that.
I just tried, and downloading it via the game wouldn't work with a JPN account or a non-JPN account. Maybe they'll fix it later. At the moment, it's only downloadable by going to the Japanese Marketplace using a JPN Gamerag. File size is 264.34MB.
It's up, on what would appear to be all Xbox Live marketplaces!
Following through from the Game Library I've been able to get it with UK points on my UK account, with comedy mis-translation joy!
(http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/4051/photojwz.jpg)
This is a huge relief, given that I realised I only have 1170 left on my JPN account :laugh:
I think there was a short delay from when it was available on the JPN Marketplace and then available on all the other Marketplaces, which would explain why I couldn't originally download it using a non-JPN gamertag.
Fuck, achievement for getting counter to 100k in BL Original. That'll take some work.
They better fix this stuttering quick-sharp :mad:
Wow, Black Label slowdown seems overdone. I remember the arcade being much faster than this, particularly stage 3 boss.
I won't complain necessarily, since it'll make getting 100k on the counter doable, but the scores are not going to be comparable to the PCB.
I think the massive slowdown and the freezes are both bugs.
I played 1.5 after I had downloaded BL and the freezes happened there too. Also it seemed to me that there was now more slowdown than before.
Only solution is to delete BL than everything is back to normal in 1.5. I'll download BL again when they release a patch.
Quote from: adverse on December 11, 2009, 11:42:50 AM
Fuck, achievement for getting counter to 100k in BL Original. That'll take some work.
It's actually pretty easy. I think I did that after a few credits with the game, back when I first got it 2 years ago.
All the slowdown and glitches suck. They need to test this stuff before they release it. I also think they released this way too early, people
haven't had a chance to spend enough time with ver 1.5. They should have waited until January, ironed out the bugs, etc. As it stands it just looks like another lazy-ass, inaccurate, "quicky" port for cash, like DSMBL was.
Just read comments from Japanese players on 2Ch about BL: they're really complaining about it. Slowdown is really fucked up in all the modes (very different from the PCB), freezes, stutters, etc.
The slowdown is really weird, yeah. The stuttering is annoying from time to time so I hope they will do something regarding that. It's a shame because I really like BL Original.
Does the stuttering occur more in God Mode?
I think BL Original is easily the best of all the modes. With or without the (occasional) stuttering.
Alot of people have complained about graphical glitches in various places here and on Shmups. I have yet to see any (just the audio glitch), now BL is said to have some issues with slowdown and stuttering. I will give it a try to see.
FYI, you can practice Spiritual Larsa in God mode training. Just set bombs to infinite, and start at the stage 5 boss. Bomb it like crazy until it dies, then Spiritual Larsa pops up. Will probably be the only chance most of us get to experience that boss fight.
It fucking sucks that Black Labels always get the "quick and dirty cash, lol" treatment. Hopefully this shit will be fixed and quickly, along with the MF1.5 bugs.
Still have not seen the glitches that are reported. I'm running from HDD on a Jasper connected to a Sony HD CRT via component running in 480p. Exactly what points are the glitches seen?
I sunk a good amount of time into BL last night (mainly Original, though a few runs on Maniac and God) and I only ran into any stuttering one time, that I was aware of. Got it installed to HD on a Jasper, and was playing the Arcade version of the games.
Man, I've forgotten how much fun God mode is. It's like a doable Ultra that doesn't require OCD reflexes or scholarly dedication to get into. Now scoring well, on the other hand...
Quote from: EOJ on December 11, 2009, 06:41:25 PM
It's actually pretty easy. I think I did that after a few credits with the game, back when I first got it 2 years ago.
Well, it took me some practice but I got it today. For anyone else going for it, you're probably going to need at least 70k on the counter coming out of stage 4 if you want a shot at it. I died trying to stunt on the stage 3 midboss and still managed to get it. Scored 634 mil on the run too (and then promptly canceled my score registration like an imbecile).
Quote from: bcass on December 11, 2009, 07:38:17 PM
I think BL Original is easily the best of all the modes. With or without the (occasional) stuttering.
Play it for over 5 hours and say that. I'm still unsure on whether I like it or not, the entire thing is
ludicrously memorization based, which I don't mind for games like Samidare since they're only 3 levels, but this shit is just dumb. 1.5 to BL goes from survival and high rank to a pretty easy 1cc, but requires you to shove your ass into everything imaginable. I've been trying to learn Stage 1 (personal best is a multiplier of 17k) and I've not crashed into so many enemies in my entire life.
Stunt without fear
(http://4gifs.com/gallery/d/140595-2/Motorcycle_mountain_stunt.gif)
Thanks for the 2 mb gif image, it's almost like I'm really browsing NeoGAF.
And I'm serious, the scoring system seems really finnicky and tedious - die once and kiss your run goodbye, crash into enemies trying to get them to ooze gems at every available opportunity. It even has daioujou's method of keeping a chain alive, by shooting at things you can't even see on screen yet, milking them because they won't explode until the map has progressed a certain point. I don't dislike this mode totally, else I wouldn't be playing it, I just think it's way too hasty for people to be saying things like, "oh well there's no point in playing 1.5 Original again BLACK LABEL IS SO AWESOME XDDDD!!!!!!!!" after playing it for one night.
QuotePlay it for over 5 hours and say that.
I think BL Original is easily the best of all the modes. With or without the (occasional) stuttering.
According to VGChartz (http://www.vgchartz.com/games/game.php?id=37735), the port has sold 18,616 copies after two weeks. That's less than Deathsmiles' first week sales.
For anyone disappointed they didn't get the faceplate stickers, don't be, they don't work. Both mine are now in the bin. I think Cave know this, hence the proper one for Espgaluda 2. :whyioughtta:
Incidentally, there seems to be only one person so far with the final BL achievement, a guy called Nakkuru.
http://live.xbox.com/ja-JP/profile/profile.aspx?pp=0&GamerTag=NAKKURU
I watched his God mode replay and he no misses->TLB and beats her. Not sure when the achievement pops, but if this achievement is like the Ultra mode one, wherein you only have to beat the second form of Larsa and resetting and "every extend" setting work, then it's doable. If you have to beat the TLB though...that'll be outta my league.
Quote from: SuperPang on December 13, 2009, 10:25:45 AM
For anyone disappointed they didn't get the faceplate stickers, don't be, they don't work. Both mine are now in the bin. I think Cave know this, hence the proper one for Espgaluda 2. :whyioughtta:
LOL, justice! I was wondering how a flat sticker was meant to fit on a curved surface properly without horrible creases. Not that I approve of custom faceplates anyway, I think they look like ass.
Anyway, Megalixir, as you know, I primarily play for 1CC, but I still think BL Original (after over 2 days of play) is still the best of all the modes. I just think the whole thing flows so much better, what with the reduced need to keep switching shots, the audible cue indicating when to change, and the more interesting bullet patterns. It just feels like how it should have been all along to me.
I've some credit on BL original mode today and I think that there are a lot af slowdown in 3-4 and 5 stage....Expecially during the boss fight: I arrived with 80+ of counter at the 3? stage's boss and the bullets was too too slow or slower than the pcb rank...also at the 4? stage boss (and also during the stage) with over 100+ counter the bullet and the enemies have a really slow movement...I ve played on Pcb for 2 month and I can't dodge a 100+ counter 3-4 boss/stage without bombing at least 2-3 time.. :-[ I've also see again the reko original mode dbs's super-play and I think that the ranking sistem and also the score sistem seem to be a little wrong... :(
Quote from: adverse on December 13, 2009, 10:42:50 AM, but if this achievement is like the Ultra mode one, wherein you only have to beat the second form of Larsa and resetting and "every extend" setting work, then it's doable. If you have to beat the TLB though...that'll be outta my league.
You have to no miss the game to get the TLB to unlock, so extra extends aren't going to help you. I'd assume resetting is still valid, though.
If you can get her to show up, I don't think beating her is going to be an issue. :P
Quote from: Megalixir on December 13, 2009, 03:11:51 AMI've been trying to learn Stage 1 (personal best is a multiplier of 17k) and I've not crashed into so many enemies in my entire life.
I keep slamming into one of those little flying bastards in the first half of the stage. With as many runs as I've put in you'd think I'd learn, but I honestly have no idead where it pops out from or why I end up hitting it. Every. Other. Goddamn. Time.
I really like the memorization aspects of BL; I know there's memorization involved in getting through 1.5 as well, but in Ultra I just get so overwhelmed by the amount of stuff going on and then it's game over, no chance. God and Maniac BL seem to allow for a bit more "oh shit!" twitch play during the more hectic bits; or rather, they don't actively punish you for not having the route mapped out beforehand. I could never make any progress in the original Mushi Ultra or in DOJ (past the last part of stage 3) as there was never really any wiggle room for learning what works, just a lot of bullets up the ass to punish you for your failure. I'm not sure I could say God or Maniac BL are easier, but they certainly feel a lot more accessable and forgiving.
Not sure if I like BL Original or Maniac more at this point; I definitely get farther in Original (though my ~100mil halfway through stage 3 is a pretty pathetic score), but there's something more rewarding about the whole save-up-and-cash-in scoring of Maniac.
Do we have an XBL gamertag thread anywhere? I know shmups has one but I'm not too keen on putting mine out in such a large group.
I used the training mode trick to get to Spiritual Larsa last night just for the hell of it, and with all the slowdown I felt like I could potentially beat her with some practice--definitely easier than Larsa beforehand. The fight felt almost Touhou-esque with the bullet speed. Of course, there's no chance I could even hit normal Larsa on a regular playthrough, but it was fun nonetheless. =D
Quote from: gsl on December 13, 2009, 02:30:09 PM
Do we have an XBL gamertag thread anywhere? I know shmups has one but I'm not too keen on putting mine out in such a large group.
Just made one in Ura Loop. Those interested should post up there!
Quote from: SuperPang on December 13, 2009, 10:25:45 AM
For anyone disappointed they didn't get the faceplate stickers, don't be, they don't work. Both mine are now in the bin. I think Cave know this, hence the proper one for Espgaluda 2. :whyioughtta:
This guy (http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/1930/42dd3982.jpg) had no problems applying it.
Quote from: adverse on December 13, 2009, 10:42:50 AM
Incidentally, there seems to be only one person so far with the final BL achievement, a guy called Nakkuru.
http://live.xbox.com/ja-JP/profile/profile.aspx?pp=0&GamerTag=NAKKURU
I watched his God mode replay and he no misses->TLB and beats her. Not sure when the achievement pops, but if this achievement is like the Ultra mode one, wherein you only have to beat the second form of Larsa and resetting and "every extend" setting work, then it's doable. If you have to beat the TLB though...that'll be outta my league.
You can't use restarts, and you have to play on defaults. Good luck.
Quote from: Megalixir on December 13, 2009, 07:47:08 PM
Quote from: SuperPang on December 13, 2009, 10:25:45 AM
For anyone disappointed they didn't get the faceplate stickers, don't be, they don't work. Both mine are now in the bin. I think Cave know this, hence the proper one for Espgaluda 2. :whyioughtta:
This guy (http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/1930/42dd3982.jpg) had no problems applying it.
Given the obvious "gotta get one of each version for the different phone cards and one to keep sealed forever" otaku stylings of that individual, I'd imagine the only recourse in the event of putting the sticker on incorrectly would be suicide.
Quote from: Ast-Kot on December 13, 2009, 12:29:21 PM
I've some credit on BL original mode today and I think that there are a lot af slowdown in 3-4 and 5 stage....Expecially during the boss fight: I arrived with 80+ of counter at the 3? stage's boss and the bullets was too too slow or slower than the pcb rank...also at the 4? stage boss (and also during the stage) with over 100+ counter the bullet and the enemies have a really slow movement...I ve played on Pcb for 2 month and I can't dodge a 100+ counter 3-4 boss/stage without bombing at least 2-3 time.. :-[ I've also see again the reko original mode dbs's super-play and I think that the ranking sistem and also the score sistem seem to be a little wrong... :(
Horrible news.
Quote from: Megalixir on December 13, 2009, 07:47:08 PM
Quote from: SuperPang on December 13, 2009, 10:25:45 AM
For anyone disappointed they didn't get the faceplate stickers, don't be, they don't work. Both mine are now in the bin. I think Cave know this, hence the proper one for Espgaluda 2. :whyioughtta:
This guy (http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/1930/42dd3982.jpg) had no problems applying it.
That's not an especially detailed picture. I don't see how you can apply a flat peice of paper a largely curved surface. Even if it was made out of vinyl, it still wouldn't be possible to fit it perfectly.
Quote from: bcass on December 13, 2009, 09:23:27 PM
Quote from: Megalixir on December 13, 2009, 07:47:08 PM
Quote from: SuperPang on December 13, 2009, 10:25:45 AM
For anyone disappointed they didn't get the faceplate stickers, don't be, they don't work. Both mine are now in the bin. I think Cave know this, hence the proper one for Espgaluda 2. :whyioughtta:
This guy (http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/1930/42dd3982.jpg) had no problems applying it.
That's not an especially detailed picture. I don't see how you can apply a flat peice of paper a largely curved surface. Even if it was made out of vinyl, it still wouldn't be possible to fit it perfectly.
I can't find a better picture but that looks fine to me. I'm pretty sure it's big enough to cover the whole thing, but it's not as good as a real faceplate. Anyway, I don't have a scanner nor a printer, but some people have made some nice faceplates like this before. Example: http://pds.exblog.jp/pds/1/200612/31/70/d0028770_4273951.jpg
I'm not really game to use my Futari faceplates because I'll no doubt mess it up somehow. Just thinking about PSP/DS screen protectors makes me die a little inside.
I've made a separate thread in the Reviews forum dealing with the ongoing issue of this port's accuracy (slowdown replication, etc) here:
http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=733.msg12985#msg12985
Quote from: Megalixir on December 13, 2009, 07:47:08 PM
This guy (http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/1930/42dd3982.jpg) had no problems applying it.
Mine looked great from 10 feet away too.
It's the bit around the power button that simply will not stay stuck due to the curvature. Similar issues around the eject button and the inevitable bubbles here and there as you try to get it perfect. To get a good job you'll need some extra adhesive of some sort and a lot of patience and even then it'll never look perfect and will peel some day
According to a new post on Cave's blog thare a report of five guys said that after the installation of the BL the game shot down for a moment. Cave said that they'are checking what happened reading the guy's report. They also says that cause the BL and the vers.1.5 are two different programs they think that if there are some problem with the game it's only a problem connected to the BL version. However, they are cheking all the game's version. If they find error connected to the software they release an update asap.
Sorry guys for the rough translation but I heave read it a while and then I can not access the cave blog from my portable device.There is also some news regarding the presence of playable demo of ketsui with galuda 2 BL at the matsuri but I could not read it. :(
Quote from: Ast-Kot on December 17, 2009, 02:52:55 PM
According to a new post on Cave's blog thare a report of five guys said that after the installation of the BL the game shot down for a moment.
He means the game froze for a moment during play, just like others here have reported. They apparently had no idea about this problem, and yeah, since BL is a different program they don't know how it could affect ver 1.5, but they're looking into all possibilities and will release a patch soon if necessary (and we all know it will be necessary).
Too bad he doesn't comment on the horribly inaccurate slowdown. I guess they don't care about that. :rolleyes:
According to vgchartz.com (http://www.vgchartz.com/games/game.php?id=37735®ion=All) this sold another 3,323 from Dec 6-13th, bringing its total up to 22,039. They apparently shipped 24,000 copies (1st+2nd print), so about 2,000 of those remained unsold as of 12.13.
I think it will inch toward 30K after the new year, but that'll be it. Foreign sales are more or less done by now, everyone who wanted it bought it already (basically), from what I can gather.
Still, if it can make it to 30K, that's pretty good. Not Deathsmiles' *region locked* 50K good, but good.
Where are you seeing Deathsmiles 50k?
CAVE's own material says 30k shipped for Deathsmiles.
http://www.cave.co.jp/ir/archives/ir/pdf/2009/ir090713.pdf
Don't be so pessimistic on the region-free sales. The lower sales for Mushi are clearly a side-effect of the near collapse of the 360 in Japan.
Soory for my english guys...The correct word is frozen ;)
I was astonished too they didn't said/report anything about the BL's slowdown...I hope that we this game's frozen report they will fix the slowdown too.
Quote from: adverse on December 18, 2009, 02:48:57 AM
Don't be so pessimistic on the region-free sales. The lower sales for Mushi are clearly a side-effect of the near collapse of the 360 in Japan.
What?
Vgchartz.com shows nearly 50K sold for Deathsmiles (they give the week-by-week breakdown, the total after 19 weeks is about 47~48K).
http://www.vgchartz.com/games/game.php?id=34131®ion=All
It's obvious Mushi is not as popular as DS, hence the lower sales. Nothing to do with the state of the 360 in Japan.
Vgchartz aren't the most reliable source for sales figures. They tend to use lots of different (often unchecked) sources for figures and estimates.
Vgchartz is to echo bcass, bad info. The site is banned at NeoGaf for instance for its incorrect information. A better measure of Japanese software sales is Media Create, but you have to pay to get their data.
Again, CAVE's own IR report says 30k and that was reported in July, more or less three months after release. Imagining a 20k sales boost from July to now is not realistic.
--------------
Congrats to Nakkuru, the first person to 1250/1250 Futari 360.
http://live.xbox.com/ja-JP/profile/profile.aspx?pp=0&GamerTag=NAKKURU
He had gotten the God mode achievement first, but it took him awhile to get the Ultra mode achievement.
Can anyone explain the message prompts (A and B) after a run? There is a lot of confusion regarding uploading/overwriting high scores and such. Simple fact is i don't speak Japanese and have no idea what i am choosing. I also would like to add this info to Shmups as there is some confusion regarding this as well.
Quote from: lawnspic on December 19, 2009, 05:42:25 PM
Can anyone explain the message prompts (A and B) after a run?
Do you want to save replay? A - Yes. B - No.
Quote from: adverse on December 19, 2009, 08:05:11 AM
Again, CAVE's own IR report says 30k and that was reported in July, more or less three months after release. Imagining a 20k sales boost from July to now is not realistic.
Yeah, they say 30K. But the report covers up to May 2009 (the end of the fiscal year), it was just published in July. They shipped 30K at launch. As evidenced from the fact nearly 30K sold in 2 weeks from launch. An extra 15-17K from May-November is not unrealistic, and that's what the sales numbers show. Yeah I know vgchartz isn't perfectly accurate, but it's a decent approximation. More accurate than speculative forum posters can provide, I'm sure you'd agree.
BTW what's so bad about DS selling well. ??? We should be happy for any Cave game that sells well!
Quote from: zap on December 19, 2009, 06:55:47 PM
Quote from: lawnspic on December 19, 2009, 05:42:25 PM
Can anyone explain the message prompts (A and B) after a run?
Do you want to save replay? A - Yes. B - No.
And I think the second one in score attack is for uploading your score.
Ok I knew I had a quote from Asada about the Deathsmiles sales.
Xbox 360 Famitsu October issue, interview with Asada about Futari/DSMBL 1.1, last question says that they have shipped 33,000 copies which exceeded their initial expectations. Again, October issue.
Vgchartz are not accurate, in fact not even near it, in this case overestimating sales by 66% or so.
Well it's hard to argue with Asada in October. I've seen the light! :)
Hello. Sorry if this is off-topic, but does the Mushi arcade stick click? I just bought Futari (and DS) a few days ago, thinking of getting a good stick for them.
Also, does anyone know of other, cheaper sticks for the XBOX 360 that don't click?
The only proper sticks that don't click are the Sanwa Flash and the ASCII. They are optical sticks and run at about £100. Just for the stick. No buttons or case.
They are lovely to use I have one for shooters and fighters and could not go back to a microswitched stick now.
There is also the Happ P360 but they have a bat top and are not very accurate in my experience.
Quote from: AlephNull on December 23, 2009, 03:15:39 AM
Hello. Sorry if this is off-topic, but does the Mushi arcade stick click? I just bought Futari (and DS) a few days ago, thinking of getting a good stick for them.
Also, does anyone know of other, cheaper sticks for the XBOX 360 that don't click?
I can't help but feel the association with "clicking" with not "good" is a bit of an insult... microswitched sticks all click, and it's a tried and true technology - there's nothing more accurate than knowing if you're on, or off, which is exactly what the clicks signify.
If you're -really- averse to having your sticks click, you're going into optical territory... which is quite a fair bit more expensive on principle of it being more complicated, and also a fair bit less accurate on average for games like shmups which expect digital "on" or "off" input. But I can't help but feel you're acting on prejudice rather than experience, and if that's the case, I'd give microswitched sticks more of a chance rather than write them off completely. There's a reason they still dominate the market.
I agree. A JLF or LS32 is a much better option for pretty much all players. Nobody that uses my Flash likes it. I think for shooters the switched sticks would have the edge no matter the skill of the player. In fighters however the Flash forces you to be more accurate with motions.
I just got an HRAP EX-SE and I love it. I'm noticing immediate improvement in my game ( almost took down the stg 3 boss the other night ). I've always played these games better on a cab ( my Gigawing 1cc was done at Chinatown Fair in NYC...couldn't do that with a joypad on MAME ) than at home, so having comparable hardware helps. Loving the Seimitsu stick.
Thanks for the replies.
StarCreator, by 'good stick' I didn't mean 'good in some sense with respect to all arcade sticks'. I have next to no clue about most arcade sticks :) I simply meant 'good for me', i.e. that I think I prefer a quiet stick. I've only owned one stick so far. It works for the PC but not the XBOX 360. It clicks pretty loudly, and when I play PC shmups with it the noise is pretty irritating. Whereas the sticks that I play with in arcade centers don't seem to click.
NR777, so is the HRAP EX-SE stick quiet? Also, does anyone know of a quiet, ball-top pre-built stick for the XBOX 360 that's going for under US$100? (Most online stores are selling the HRAP EX-SE at around US$130+)
The HRAP EX-SE clicks, so if this is a deal breaker for you...don't buy it? i get so into the game that I don't even notice it. Regardless, its a great stick with very solid construction. There was a deal going on at Amazon where you could get one for $90 with free freight.
Also, Game Centers tend to be loud. There's a reason you may not be hearing the click. I certainly can't hear it at Chinatown Fair, but I can feel it.
The Amazon deal is still on ATM for the EX-SE
Seconding the EX-SE... it's still $90 shipped on Amazon (http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-Real-Arcade-Pro-EX-SE/dp/B002FKYPU4/), and undoubtedly the best stick I've ever owned... and I paid over $200 to import mine before the US release existed.
Not sure what to say if you're really so opposed to the clicks, but for $90 it's more than worth giving it another shot IMO.
Yeah, I saw the Amazon offer as well. But they won't ship the EX-SE to where I'm at (Singapore). The other sites I've looked at are selling it at around US$130.
Perhaps my PC stick is unusually loud? The clicking is much louder than mouse clicks and it distracts me when I play. Mouse clicks never distract me, and I think all the mice I've used so far have been about equally quiet, so maybe we could use this as a comparison point? Are there any XBOX 360 sticks that are about as loud as mouse clicks?
To get quiet sticks you'll have to move away from microswitches. The only ones I'm familiar with used an optical mechanism but they don't exist for the 360. Maybe there is a quiet piece of crap out there somewhere but that would defeat the point.
I'd suggest getting used to it. If you're properly in the zone you won't hear the stick.
The NeoPad2 has a clicky stick which is easily drowned out by game music. I can't replicate my runs on it (nor a real full Seimitsu stick for that matter) like I can my Saturn pad though.
Also, jesus christ. Just play with whatever you feel suits you best.
Quote from: Megalixir on December 23, 2009, 11:35:49 PM
Also, jesus christ. Just play with whatever you feel suits you best.
This.
I made sticks for a long time and most people will prefer one thing over another.
And if the sticks in the cabs are not clicking then they are either broken, drowned out my the noise of the arcade or cheap weak switches.
You can dampen the sound by adding foam around the inside of the stick if it pisses you off too much.
Hope its OK to post pictures.
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/laurie47/DSC00330.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/laurie47/DSC00118cen.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/laurie47/DSC00288.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/laurie47/DSC00061.jpg)
Very nice sticks. :)
Wow, those are really beautiful sticks lam47. Thanks for the foam tip, I'll try that for my PC stick.
Thanks guys. I must have made around 40 sticks all in all.
The first one was for Superpang quite a few years ago. I miss making them and hope to try again in the new year.
Merry Christmas everyone :)
I'd be very tempted to buy one of those if you can do a 360/USB version.
I have done lots of 360 ones. Wireless as well as wired. If I do start to make some more in the new year I will post on here.
Can anyone tell me if 260mln in Novice Original is good or bad (counter was 40K at the end)? 1CC'ed it, since this is my first CAVE game I didn't know what to expect. Will start working on Original now.
"good" compared to who? The shmup freaks at STG?
Or the guys who played Raiden Trad a couple times when they were 14?
When I was playing a set of Futari, some of my buddies just stood around with their mouths gaped open like "wtf is going on...?" lol
They couldn't believe what I was able to do, and it was one of my worst gameplays..
If anybody here thinks that ANYONE can play bullet hells and score, you're fooling yourselves.
I'd say that any score into the 2-hundred millions shows that you're doing fine! ^^
Quote from: CastorKrieg on December 29, 2009, 04:08:19 PM
Can anyone tell me if 260mln in Novice Original is good or bad (counter was 40K at the end)? 1CC'ed it, since this is my first CAVE game I didn't know what to expect. Will start working on Original now.
I'll be honest, because I don't think it's productive to be disingenuous to people with sub-par scores and say "hey, you're doing great!". 260mil is not a good score in Novice Original (I'd say you'd need at least 300mil to have a "decent" score), but keep in mind it takes a lot of time to get good at these games. If you are relatively new to the genre, it takes even more time. But the enjoyment from these games comes from gradually seeing your scores improve, so keep working at it, and enjoy the process. :righton:
First thing I'd suggest is ditch the Novice modes entirely, and start working on 1.5's Original mode, which is the easiest of the original arcade game. Going back to the dumbed down, super-easy, autobombified console modes will just condition you toward easier difficulty levels, when you should be trying to condition yourself toward the opposite. These games are not as daunting as they appear, they just require practice and dedication. Expect it to take many months before you see marked improvements. If you don't want to put the time in, you most likely won't get any better.
If that was your first 1CC and you weren't aiming for a high score in the first place, the answer is always going to be "no, it's not". :P
At least that applies to games with scoring systems to speak of.
THx for answers, this was my first attempt in which I came to grasp with scoring system, so I guess the score was not that great.
Will start on 1.5 Original then, is there any change between Arcade and X360 apart from HD graphics, etc.?
I definitely agree with EOJ on ditching the novice modes. Played around with them myself after first getting the port so I could get into the scoring system, but it can introduce some very bad habits...like not bombing when it is absolutely necessary to do so. Consequently, I find myself eating shit in 1.5 many more times than I should be...though taking a fall on the ice and injuring my arm hasn't helped matters much...
question at the few people who never had a freeze at black label what's the size of the hdd you use?
i upgraded from a 20 to 60 gb hdd today and never had a freeze again.
with my 20 gb hdd i had 1 freeze every run at BL and now with the new one no freeze for 2 hours.
120GB here and never a freeze but I can't see why that would matter.
60GB, no freeze. :righton:
Good news. I have a 120GB hdd now, so hopefully it won't freeze on me when I buy BL this weekend.
120gb and it freezes from time to time.
Another myth debunked.
Re: the Novice modes, I think they made them unfortunately easy. So many posters on the shmups forum are boasting of beating them on their first try as if they've suddenly woken up to some new skills, but really guys, if every single person has done it how proud can you feel? If it encourages players to stick with the other modes, that's cool, but it really just emphasizes the worst part of the (ugh) 1CC culture.
At any rate, I decided to do a run with my eyes closed and made it past the 2nd stage mid-boss. Best part was no-miss/no-bombing the first boss. Just another feather in my cap.
Re: BL freezing, it's never happened to me and I'm on the 120 GB.
I remember having a little contest, ages ago, with the peeps on ikaruga.co.uk of playing blind in Ikaruga. I think someone made it to the second stage.
Quote from: Kaneda on December 30, 2009, 10:56:06 PM
Re: the Novice modes, I think they made them unfortunately easy. So many posters on the shmups forum are boasting of beating them on their first try as if they've suddenly woken up to some new skills, but really guys, if every single person has done it how proud can you feel? If it encourages players to stick with the other modes, that's cool, but it really just emphasizes the worst part of the (ugh) 1CC culture.
I completely agree with this. My first time playing Novice Original resulted in a no miss clear...and I am by no means "bragging" about that. I wouldn't, by any stretch of the imagination, consider myself a very skilled player...so the boasting I'm seeing online bothers me a bit. These modes just make it very difficult to die and instill false confidence in the player.
Just have to chime in how impressive I am with the port.
Yeah, I am very late but I went to Indonesia on vacation for a month, and my game came to my post box the day after I left... :P
Ordered it in August from PA and got the DLC card.
Im so impressed with the HD graphics, now even my old eyes can keep track of the bullets.
And all the screen options....very impressive.
Only bug I found was music stutter in last stage.
Off topic: I bought an Madcatz fightstick (sanwa parts) and is it only me or does it feel incredible slow to play with, I have to move my hand many millimeters before it registers movement in the switch.
What joystick arcade part should I get thats more sensitive...? :oogle:
(Hm, should we start a Joystick thread?)
Quote from: NR777 on December 31, 2009, 01:46:07 AM
Quote from: Kaneda on December 30, 2009, 10:56:06 PM
Re: the Novice modes, I think they made them unfortunately easy. So many posters on the shmups forum are boasting of beating them on their first try as if they've suddenly woken up to some new skills, but really guys, if every single person has done it how proud can you feel? If it encourages players to stick with the other modes, that's cool, but it really just emphasizes the worst part of the (ugh) 1CC culture.
I completely agree with this. My first time playing Novice Original resulted in a no miss clear...and I am by no means "bragging" about that. I wouldn't, by any stretch of the imagination, consider myself a very skilled player...so the boasting I'm seeing online bothers me a bit. These modes just make it very difficult to die and instill false confidence in the player.
true, it does instill some false confidence.
On the plus side, the Novice mode makes it more accessible to Shmup noobs and girls. :laugh:
Xbox elite,120gb,freeze.
Quote from: KOMA on December 31, 2009, 04:39:58 AM
Xbox elite,120gb,freeze.
1. How much free space do you have on your HDD?
2. At what resolution do you play (16:9/4:3)
3. What output do you use (HDMI, VGA, Scart, etc)
I think that the higher res in combination with not enough free storage makes the game freeze. There may be some buffering going on that uses virtual memory on the HDD.
I have a 60gb hdd, and have only installed DeathSmiles + MBL, DOJ BLEX and Futari + BL & 1.01. I do have some game demos + clips as well, but I think I have at least 70% of free space on my drive. I also use a VGA output @ 480p.
I have never had any issues with graphics nor stutter using this setup, but when running the game at a friends house with a higher res yet still on a 4:3 screen we saw big purple blocks on the second boss' body. Changed it to a 4:3 resolution @ 480p and no more graphical glitches.
Sorry if this is getting overly technical.
I have about 55gb left. I play Futari in 640x on a tate'd crt monitor. Theory busted.
I play at 4:3 on a 14'' CRT TV, with an Elite XBOX 120GB with 70 GB or so of free space, and I don't I have experienced any of those long freezes. The only thing close to it occurs when cancelling a lot of bullets when destroying a huge enemy, like the last big dragon on Stage 5. And yep, I also bought BL.
Somewhat related: BL is quite fun overall, I like the overall tweaks on every mode, except for the bosses. They are too sped up, and feel a tad bit "broken".
I have the original 360 with the 20 GB hard drive. I have not had any freezes and I have played Black Label quite a bit.
Perhaps it's a matter of having the Falcon 360 model or not..??
So the Ultra Arrange record is 8.1 bil now; he hits 500k on the TLB before taking a hit.
2nd is 5.something, haha
Quote from: cstarflare on January 01, 2010, 01:43:40 AM
So the Ultra Arrange record is 8.1 bil now; he hits 500k on the TLB before taking a hit.
o_0Sure want to see that. I hope somebody will cap that replay in foreseeable future.
Somebody probably already asked or wrote it somewhere, but i have the LE version with DLC card. Can anybody tell me where i have to input the DLC card code? I never used a DLC card before and can't find where i have to put the code in.
"Redeem Code" in the Xbox menu, I believe.
It works! Thank you very much :righton:
A guy by the xb tag of "ga key" has counterstopped Arrange Ultra mode at 9,999,999,999. Just watched the replay, he gets 7+bil on the last boss. :laugh: What a fucking broken game.
EOJ: when you say it's broken, are you saying that the game has been exploited?
He means the scoring system was horribly designed/balanced. Very silly scoring system, there.
Quote from: necpmf on January 02, 2010, 09:24:42 PM
He means the scoring system was horribly designed/balanced. Very silly scoring system, there.
Thanks, but can you give any examples as to why the scoring system is broken?
I feel bad now about my scores if they're achieved as a result of broken scoring... :-\
It's broken because you can get 7+bil on the last boss, which is over 70% of the maximal score for the entire game. On one boss. That's a textbook example of a broken scoring system.
Don't misunderstand: this does not invalidate or discredit anyone's scores in the mode. The mode itself is flawed in regard to scoring, but the scores obtained there still require skill and are legit. I.e. there are no glitches or bugs that make scoring easier. Make sense?
makes perfect sense now. Thanks EOJ <3
Quote from: EOJ on January 02, 2010, 08:31:03 PM
A guy by the xb tag of "ga key" has counterstopped Arrange Ultra mode at 9,999,999,999. Just watched the replay, he gets 7+bil on the last boss. :laugh: What a fucking broken game.
I knew this would happen when I saw his 8.1 bil replay
good shit
I just got a score of 2,994,565,009 in Black Label>Arcade>God>Reco. A few hundred million under my best on the PCB, but a pretty good run. Give it a download if you're interested, I'm currently 3rd on that ranking, missed second place by less than 3mil.
BTW I haven't had BL freeze on me yet after quite a few hours with it. No other modes show freezes either.
Looks like you forgot to upload your replay.
Any idea how well this game sold so far ? I bought my copy to support !
Thought I wouldn't enjoy it much without a keyboard or arcade stick but I do. Best STG ever in my opinion.
Quote from: Megalixir on January 03, 2010, 08:15:03 AM
Looks like you forgot to upload your replay.
Don't you have to upload a replay if you're in the top 10?
Nevermind, I was looking under 360 instead of Arcade.
EOJ, what video settings do you use for Arcade?
What's the difference between arcade and XBOX except for the graphics? It's annoying to have 20 different tables for the same game. I usually dislike not having a table with all characters already, but this makes it terrible.
Quote from: PROMETHEUS on January 03, 2010, 12:33:21 PM
What's the difference between arcade and XBOX except for the graphics? It's annoying to have 20 different tables for the same game. I usually dislike not having a table with all characters already, but this makes it terrible.
Agreed. There are no significant differences between any of the 360 modes and their Arcade mode counterparts. I wish there was just one scoreboard for both modes both in-game and on xbox live. This isn't Deathsmiles with the horrendously fucked up slowdown in 360 mode.
@Elixir: I have to play on my RGB monitor as I can't stand the slight lag from my hdtv (no matter what I do I can't totally get rid of it). I use 2x scanlines @ 24 Effect w/ smoothing off, and then adjust the contrast and brightness in the "Color settings" menu until it looks good to my eyes. It doesn't look as good as the PCB (which I have here and use as a benchmark when trying to adjust the x360 video settings) no matter what I do, but I can get it pretty close. Way closer than the craptastic PS2 Mushi and Ibara ports, even when playing those via the deinterlaced patch. When I watch replays, I usually do so on my hdtv, and in that case I set the scanlines to 4x sharp @16 effect, and it looks about as close to a CRT as you can get on an hdtv (but still not as good as the PCB on an RGB monitor).
Quote from: EOJ on January 03, 2010, 09:50:20 PM
Quote from: PROMETHEUS on January 03, 2010, 12:33:21 PM
What's the difference between arcade and XBOX except for the graphics? It's annoying to have 20 different tables for the same game. I usually dislike not having a table with all characters already, but this makes it terrible.
Agreed. There are no significant differences between any of the 360 modes and their Arcade mode counterparts. I wish there was just one scoreboard for both modes both in-game and on xbox live. This isn't Deathsmiles with the horrendously fucked up slowdown in 360 mode.
I noticed the scores are much higher on the 360 mode tables, so I guess I'll stick to that mode and ignore the minority who plays Arcade. That gets rid of the consideration of all the Arcade mode tables. Even the Ultra players seem to prefer the 360 version despite the sped up stage 1 pattern problem.
Quote from: PROMETHEUS on January 04, 2010, 07:16:38 PM
I noticed the scores are much higher on the 360 mode tables, so I guess I'll stick to that mode and ignore the minority who plays Arcade.
That's just because more people are playing with the fancy new graphics. Same thing happened with Deathsmiles MBL. Also, some Japanese players have said the 360 modes are slightly easier due to the bullets being sharper and thus easier to see, so this may be another reason why so many are playing this mode instead of Arcade. Why would you "ignore" scores done in Arcade mode? They're just as valid, of course.
Strangely, so far I find I do better in 1.5 Maniac 360 and BL Original 360, but I prefer BL God Arcade, BL Maniac Arcade, and 1.5 Original Arcade.
Quote from: EOJ on January 04, 2010, 07:39:12 PMWhy would you "ignore" scores done in Arcade mode? They're just as valid, of course.
Yeah they are valid but I meant that if everyone is playing 360 mode, and this 360 mode is close enough to arcade mode, it kind of solves the problem of having twice too many tables, because it's only a small minority putting their scores in the arcade tables. So i'll join in with the community on the 360 mode tables and won't bother logging on the Arcade mode just to check the tables, I guess.
It's interesting that they find it easier to play on HD because the bullets are clearer. I consider that an improvement on the game because to me the skills that a STG should reward is definitely pattern recognition and navigation, not ability to distinguish bullets. I think Cave thinks the same, since they have always moved towards best possible visibility with bright colored bullets.
I wonder why they have stayed on SD for such a long time in Arcades. Would the hardware necessary to display at least a higher resolution such as 480*640 have cost them that much more ?
By the way, I notice zero difference in graphics on my shitty TV between arcade and 360 modes. It looks exactly the same to me @_@ I'm surprised the game scales down the graphics so perfectly. Perhaps the game detects my TV can't display over 640x480 and displays low res graphics ? Maybe I would see the difference if I TATE'd it though, but I can't do that.
Quote from: PROMETHEUS on January 04, 2010, 07:51:25 PM
By the way, I notice zero difference in graphics on my shitty TV between arcade and 360 modes. It looks exactly the same to me @_@ I'm surprised the game scales down the graphics so perfectly. Perhaps the game detects my TV can't display over 640x480 and displays low res graphics ? Maybe I would see the difference if I TATE'd it though, but I can't do that.
Nah, when I first got this I only had a 13" TV to play it on, via composite inputs. I played it in TATE, and I could still easily see the difference between the graphics of Arcade and 360 modes.
Hm, I think this has been mentioned earlier?
But I just got a graphical glitch (1.5 360 mode maniac.).
The bugs that gives you power-ups, under their mouth is a big pink square. (Showed up quite often.)
I play in tate and with some zoom.
Yeah, graphic glitches happen in Maniac mode 360 sometimes. I've only experienced it once or twice (thankfully).
Also, sorry to plug another one of my replays, but I just got a 615mil ALL in 1.5>360>MANIAC>RECO. Number 6 on the overall ranking there.
It was probably my best run ever in terms of finesse, and the first time I finished with 2 spare lives left over. Also the best dodging I've ever done on Larsa's last phase, I nearly got through the whole thing with one bomb. Too bad my scoring was less than optimal (in regard to my current patterns) in many spots (particularly in stages 2 and 5, I really messed up a bunch of stuff). Anyway, maybe it could help some people working on 1.5 Maniac mode.
Quote from: EOJ on January 05, 2010, 01:29:39 AM
Anyway, maybe it could help some people working on 1.5 Maniac mode.
Like me. =D
Thanks!
dang, EOJ! you rock :o
I watched it,you know all the tricks.I dind't remember how 1.5 is hell compare to BL.
I discovered my first BL Original glitch. The Stage 1 boss' claw attack (left side) kept shooting for quite a lengthy period of time.. nothing huge, but it was definitely wrong.
Anyway, I'm beginning to grow tired of BL Original. I really want to churn out some good scores, but crashing into things is just irritating. So.. this is that high end scoring of Ketsui is like? I feel like I should be working on God Mode instead.
@Koma, Hive, Monouchi & others: Thanks guys. :righton: For your viewing pleasure I just did a 375mil ALL run in 1.5>360>Original>Normal Reco. #6 on the overall leaderboards, and a nice, clean no miss up until the second phase of the last boss. I got the counter to 60K just before Larsa.
Wow. Just watched hinohane's ver 1.01 Ultra mode vid. He gets to the last boss, and some of the dodging he does in the run is mindblowing. Wonder if this guy is SWY?
Also, anyone else find it odd that the MASTER VER string for ver 1.01 is September 2007? Ver 1.0 was October 2006, and the ver 1.01 rev for the 2006 Cave festival was done no later than December 2006. So why were they fiddling with this nearly a year after its release?
Quote from: EOJ on January 06, 2010, 05:27:20 AM
Also, anyone else find it odd that the MASTER VER string for ver 1.01 is September 2007? Ver 1.0 was October 2006, and the ver 1.01 rev for the 2006 Cave festival was done no later than December 2006. So why were they fiddling with this nearly a year after its release?
My money's on them forgetting to change the year. Unless it spilled over into that January or something.
Nice work EOJ ;) Asap I will watch the replay :righton:
Quote from: StarCreator on January 06, 2010, 08:43:00 AM
Quote from: EOJ on January 06, 2010, 05:27:20 AM
Also, anyone else find it odd that the MASTER VER string for ver 1.01 is September 2007? Ver 1.0 was October 2006, and the ver 1.01 rev for the 2006 Cave festival was done no later than December 2006. So why were they fiddling with this nearly a year after its release?
My money's on them forgetting to change the year. Unless it spilled over into that January or something.
Not sure what you mean, what year do you think it was supposed to be?
Just a quick thought now when I was playing some maniac.
Why doesnt cave make the backgrounds in HD??? (It was the same in DS)
Quote from: Monouchi on January 07, 2010, 10:24:43 AM
Why doesnt cave make the backgrounds in HD??? (It was the same in DS)
Time, money.
I would speculate the character assets are rendered in high res then downscaled for the PCB whereas the backgrounds are drawn that size on day one.
Ehrm, am i smoking something or is picture setting: Preset E a 3D setting?
...so I have to go and find my old 3D glasses. =D
Yeah I've been keeping my eyes peeled for some blue/red 3d glasses to try this out but haven't seen any, and don't feel like specifically ordering a 50 cent piece of paper off the internet. I really am curious though.
I've played this for hours and hours (and hours!). 1.5, Black Label, 1.01, all modes and variations. Not a single freeze. Maybe if you get good scores it doesn't freeze on you. :laugh:
Quote from: EOJ on January 08, 2010, 07:40:12 PM
I've played this for hours and hours (and hours!). 1.5, Black Label, 1.01. Not a single freeze. Maybe if you get good scores it doesn't freeze on you. :laugh:
I can personally debunk that new myth. :'(
Not sure but something very low.
But no freezing! :righton:
I've had a lot of freezing on all versions. Like one or two per run.
you guys are saying that the game just completely freezes on you?
In that case, what can you do? Just reset? ..... this is disturbing
No, that isn't what they mean. They're talking about a momentary freeze, something like half a second, maybe less.
I have yet to see any freezes. I don't have 1.01 but I do have Black label.
My xbox is a jasper and my game is installed on a 120hd.
On a side note deathsmiles does freeze all the time if I try and download a friends reply (EOJ) And sometimes just if I flip through the menu quickly.
Sounds more like some type of hardware issue. If it were in the software I should have experienced it at least once by now, I'd think.
Quote from: bcass on January 10, 2010, 03:47:46 PM
No, that isn't what they mean. They're talking about a momentary freeze, something like half a second, maybe less.
oh, thanks for the response. now I feel silly.. :P
Futari with 1.01 and BL installed on 20Gb HD. (J360)
Plays all modes and versions (Mostly 1.5 Maniac).
No freezes.
Quote from: EOJ on January 10, 2010, 04:05:35 PM
Sounds more like some type of hardware issue. If it were in the software I should have experienced it at least once by now, I'd think.
That's very true. I cant figure out what's doing it. It has an xclamp mod of course and has a few small case modifications for air flow but this seems network related.
I may see if it does the same if I use Ethernet rather than wireless.
have any of you shot an email to Cave regarding the hiccups?
It may influence them to provide a patch! :righton:
They know about it, and are researching the problem. If it's in the software, they've said they will make a patch ASAP. So far, no word on the conclusion of their study.
Quote from: EOJ on January 11, 2010, 03:59:21 PM
They know about it, and are researching the problem. If it's in the software, they've said they will make a patch ASAP. So far, no word on the conclusion of their study.
thanks! I'm so glad they're aware of the problem and are looking to solve it.
I sure do love the way Cave isn't so shy about releasing necessary patches, and such!~
I'm encountering something strange at the stage 3 midboss:
I shoot it with the C shot when it's energy is low, then switch to A when the bar is red and kill it. But instead of increasing my gem counter I cash in my gems. This happens to me every time I do it. Is this a bug?
That's the way it was in the arcade game. I don't think it's a bug. The stage 4 midboss is also a bit peculiar in Original/Ultra, in that you always have to kill it with shot for maximum gems.
If you kill it with laser (A) when the chaining bar is red, you cash in on gems and also get to absorb large gold/green gems afterward. If you kill it with laser (A) with no chaining bar, then you just cash in on the gems. You need to kill it with shot (C) when the chaining bar is red to get gold/green gems.
I see, thanks for the info.
Had about a quarter of a second freeze today on the first level of 1.5 manic.
I just did my first CAVE game 1cc.....Futari BL Original (360)
Heard it was easy and it was my first try, it feels good to finally 1cc a cave game. :P
Now back to work on 1cc?ng 1.5 Maniac. (That stage 4 is eating me...)
Quote from: Monouchi on January 14, 2010, 07:10:39 AM
I just did my first CAVE game 1cc.....Futari BL Original (360)
Heard it was easy and it was my first try, it feels good to finally 1cc a cave game. :P
Now back to work on 1cc?ng 1.5 Maniac. (That stage 4 is eating me...)
Nice one. I did my first in Deathsmiles the other day :) Its a good feeling.
In case anyone was wondering, some dudes on 2Ch are saying the 360 version of Ultra mode also counterstops at 3,999,999,999.
Cool. I'll have to try that.
I wish CAVE learnt the meaning of Restart. I hate having to exit to the menu and then enter again because it will only restart at the stage you're in; and even if you restart stage1, it will not count for a replay or the scoreboards.
It kind of sucks when you restart from stage2 for practice, only to then do the best God mode run of your life (2.9 bill dying halfway through the Larsa battle) D:
Quote from: GaijinPunch on February 02, 2010, 06:19:25 PM
Cool. I'll have to try that.
lol
I was just playing Maniac to try to get that 300m achievement and ended my run with 301...and nothing unlocked. Boo-urns.
I was saying Boo-urns.
Quoteand even if you restart stage1, it will not count for a replay or the scoreboards
Tell me about it...not knowing this, I restarted in stage 1 and finished my first 1CC of MBL at 320+ million points - I almost had a stroke when I didn't get the option to save the replay as I had no-missed to stage 5.
Quick questions:
1. In the leaderboards, are you not supposed to see a replay icon (paperclip) next to your name at all? I get confused because it makes me forget whether or not I uploaded a replay.
2. When you get a top 20 score or higher on the leaderboards, there's an extra long dialog prompt that appears when you upload your score. What does this say?
I have a quick question too.
Is there a way to display the overall top scores table instead of today's top scores?
The bumpers toggle what scores you see.
Any news on the BL Patch? Is Cave/M2 working on it? Will it even come?
I switched from my 20GB harddrive to 120GB today but the freezes are still in place :(
Just chipping in my experience, after I downloaded black label (from my own Aus region account) the game froze once but never again afterwards. I've got the game installed to a 120gb HD.
Quote from: Monouchi on January 14, 2010, 07:10:39 AM
I just did my first CAVE game 1cc.....Futari BL Original (360)
Heard it was easy and it was my first try, it feels good to finally 1cc a cave game. :P
Now back to work on 1cc?ng 1.5 Maniac. (That stage 4 is eating me...)
Finally I got my first Cave 1cc in BL maniac 360, I dont count the earlier one cos I think BL original was too easy.
Strange, I just sailed through stage 4-5 but had to fight like a dog on stage 3. (And Larsa of course.
I missed the 1up cos I was to scared to go up through the bullets. :-[
I played for survival but too many times my eyes went to the bar to se if it was red and it almost cost me a life.
Well, great experience to beat the game on one cred :righton:
Now I can move on to EspII.
SIN's top 3 Arrange mode scores:
(http://file.sinmoon.blog.shinobi.jp/10_02_21_1.jpg)
He writes some comments about them on his blog:
http://sinmoon.blog.shinobi.jp/Entry/178/
What are the highest Original and Maniac scores for Arrange mode on the leaderboards? Would be nice if I could add them to the WR score list.
Quote from: EOJ on February 22, 2010, 04:26:31 PM
SIN's top 3 Arrange mode scores:
(http://file.sinmoon.blog.shinobi.jp/10_02_21_1.jpg)
He writes some comments about them on his blog:
http://sinmoon.blog.shinobi.jp/Entry/178/
ultra arrange for me i made it to stage 5 boss 2nd form
and 1080313628 is the best i got out of 3 trys
but 10 9's, whoooa
i guess i need to play more. :laugh:
Quote from: Plasmo on February 23, 2010, 06:57:43 AM
What are the highest Original and Maniac scores for Arrange mode on the leaderboards? Would be nice if I could add them to the WR score list.
Original: 6,417,732,346 - ALL - Reco - SIN
Maniac: 8,274,774,119 - ALL - Reco - SIN
So he is THAT awesome! ^-^
Thanks for letting me know! :righton:
Well of course, I wouldn't be posting his scores unless they were tops. ;)
Quote from: EOJ on February 23, 2010, 02:10:04 PM
Well of course, I wouldn't be posting his scores unless they were tops. ;)
I'd be more fascinated to see bottoms :lol:
I must admit im a little slow... :-X ...but I finally figured out how to cash in on the multiplyer. (BL, Maniac:)
And my god how much more fun the game is now, (And I thought it was really fun before.)
And by just letting the button go the meter dissapears!
...so my scores suddenly got alot better. :P
I am so lucky that my EspII is delayed at the post office...needs to play more Futari.
Quote from: Monouchi on March 04, 2010, 11:18:51 AM
I am so lucky that my EspII is delayed at the post office...needs to play more Futari.
Man, Futari is great. My copy of EspII arrived two days ago and I keep going back to playing futari.
I asked this question before but got no answer...
This time I have a screenshot and was wondering what this prompt is saying:
(http://i969.photobucket.com/albums/ae175/mrerdat/top20.jpg)
I already said yes to saving a replay and uploading a score so I don't know why it's asking me a third time. I just know it has to do with getting a top 20 score. Anyone?
It says "you entered into the top 20 ranking. In order to record your score, you are required to upload your replay. Will you upload your replay data and record your score?" A=yes, B=no.
Basically you aren't allowed to post your score without uploading your replay if you made it into the top 20. I wish they had this feature for Deathsmiles and Espgaluda 2. There are some great scores there where the players decided not to upload their replays. :whyioughtta:
Ah, that's smart of them. Thanks for the info.
I've got BL & 1.01 installed and have been playing on a standard edition, If I got a limited edition could I just pop it in and have those modes in the menu or would I have to reinstall the disc and download those modes again?
I ask because I let my woman borrow my copy of the game and she panicked about some small mark on the disc and got it resurfaced (without even telling me) so now it looks like shit and I plan to get another copy and give her the one she ruined. I wouldn't mind getting the ltd ed but not if I have to get another 1200 points for black label as well.
You should be fine - the standard and limited edition discs should be exactly the same, software-wise - they just have different silkscreen art.
Thanks for your words of encouragement, I got the LE last week and my install and DLC were all good :)
I have something to report that may interest you guys :lol:
The Xbox 360 is going to be getting 3D support in the future,
and if I remember correctly, Futari has a 3D mode as one of its many features (thanks to M2!).
SOURCE: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/microsoft-takes-gaming-battle-3d-with-upgrade-to-xbox-360-1971324.html
I just can't wait to go blind!
Futari had an option called "Old Projector", which put wrong colors on screen and made the picture look weird. If I remember correctly someone mistook this option for a 3D option but it isn't. I tried it out with 3D glasses (the old red/green ones) and it looked the same.
I have just gotten an ASIA XBOX 360 Slim.
I've successfully become a member of XBOX Live.
My version is is the Limited Edition version i.e. Japanese region.
When I try to buy the Black Label package I get some kind of message
stating the possibility to press either the yellow or red button. Pressing
yellow lands me in the Marketplace but I'm not able to select or do
anything there. It says that nothing is selected. if I select continue it just says
that an error occurred and I should try later.
Have I missed something obvious ?
I also got the DLC for 1.0.1 Futari but how do I enable that ? I got
some kind of code which I am supposed to enter but where ?
Any hints or tips would be greatly appreciated!
Did you register your real location when you signed up for Live? You'll need a second gamertag registered to any Japanese address and with a different email address. Buy your shit via that, play it with the other one.
Quote from: rtw on August 16, 2010, 01:01:17 PM
I also got the DLC for 1.0.1 Futari but how do I enable that ? I got
some kind of code which I am supposed to enter but where ?
Any hints or tips would be greatly appreciated!
Press the XBox Button, go all to the left and select "Reedem Code".
Thanks for all your tips, 1.0.1 is now installed :D
As for the second gamertag stuff, how would I buy Microsoft points ?
If I register at a Japanese address and have a non Japanese credit card
how will that work out ?
And will content downloaded to my console be available for all gamertags ?
Where is a good place to find a Japanese address ;)
Buy point cards from NCSX or someplace similar. Usually they will e-mail you the scan of an unused card. You can also use GP or someone in Japan that will do the dirty work for you.
They never see a credit card if you do this.
Once DLC is downloaded to an Xbox it's available to any gamertag.
Go online and find a business address. I used a popular gaming company. :)
You don't have to import points to buy Futari Black Label - it's available in all marketplaces worldwide. You do have to resort to some trickery to find it though - the easiest way is to press the guide button with the game running and move one tab to the left, and it should be right there at the bottom.
When you make a purchase, any gamertag loaded onto the 360 you made the purchase on can use the content, online or offline. Additionally, the gamertag that made the purchase can download it an indefinite number of times, but only that gamertag will have access to it when downloaded to a 360 other than the one it was originally purchased on - and in this case, the gamertag MUST be online.
Quote from: rtw on August 16, 2010, 02:14:24 PM
Thanks for all your tips, 1.0.1 is now installed :D
As for the second gamertag stuff, how would I buy Microsoft points ?
If I register at a Japanese address and have a non Japanese credit card
how will that work out ?
And will content downloaded to my console be available for all gamertags ?
Where is a good place to find a Japanese address ;)
I'm sending you a PM.
Quote from: StarCreator on August 16, 2010, 03:34:59 PM
You don't have to import points to buy Futari Black Label - it's available in all marketplaces worldwide. You do have to resort to some trickery to find it though - the easiest way is to press the guide button with the game running and move one tab to the left, and it should be right there at the bottom.
I can confirm this. I bought my BL DLC that way. If you're looking for it under the Games Marketplace go to Game-Addons > Browse all > press right to sort by Genre > Shooter > Scroll to the bottom and find the Kanji. (This is all from memory. Actual directions may vary)
Thank you all for all the tips and hints :D
I have now been able to install MFBL by going to the marketplace and add-ons.
However I am not able to find any downloads for Raiden IV or Deathsmiles on the add-on marketplace.
So it looks like I will have to create a Japanese gamertag to get the last pieces. Thank you to all who have posted guidelines on how to do this.
Quote from: rtw on August 17, 2010, 03:58:47 AM
Thank you all for all the tips and hints :D
I have now been able to install MFBL by going to the marketplace and add-ons.
However I am not able to find any downloads for Raiden IV or Deathsmiles on the add-on marketplace.
So it looks like I will have to create a Japanese gamertag to get the last pieces. Thank you to all who have posted guidelines on how to do this.
To my knowledge Raiden IV content is only on the US, CDN and JP marketplaces and even then it took months to get it on the Canadian one. You'll need to make a gamertag in one of those regions and buy points from that region to buy the content. Same deal for Deathsmiles only it's JP only.
Looks like a platinum collection version is coming 11/11, according to one retailer:
http://gmstar.com/xb360/mushihime2.html
Quote from: EOJ on September 03, 2010, 02:05:44 PM
Looks like a platinum collection version is coming 11/11, according to one retailer:
http://gmstar.com/xb360/mushihime2.html
with the possibility of 1.1 DLC Card content included?
It should at least include BL. I'm hoping 1.01 is included too.
I wonder if Cave's "no more region free games" thing would apply to a re-release?
Since I don't have either BL or 1.01 yet, I'd definitely buy it if it has those. Rather have a physical copy with both of those there than DLC versions. Plus it'd save me the hassle of trying to get a card off of Yahoo Auctions JP using a middleman service or trying to find one for sale outside of there.
Quote from: njiska on August 17, 2010, 05:50:32 AM
To my knowledge Raiden IV content is only on the US, CDN and JP marketplaces and even then it took months to get it on the Canadian one. You'll need to make a gamertag in one of those regions and buy points from that region to buy the content. Same deal for Deathsmiles only it's JP only.
Raiden IV is also available on the Asian Marketplace. Cheaper than it is on the JPN Marketplace too IIRC.
Cover art for the Platinum edition. No longer has the fugly borders, instead it has a fugly symbol in the right corner. Not too bad for $30, though!
(http://news.dengeki.com/elem/000/000/310/310678/c20101013_platinum_02_cs1w1_453x640.jpg)
http://news.dengeki.com/elem/000/000/310/310678/img.html
What will I find in this version?
1.5 + Black Label?
Quote from: Third_strike on October 18, 2010, 08:55:53 PM
What will I find in this version?
1.5 + Black Label?
I don't think BL has been confirmed.
I think I'll buy the platinum release, especially if it has BL in. 30 bucks is a steal even if you have the game already.
I hope it has 1.01. You can buy BL, but you can't get 1.01 without a DLC unlock code. Hopefully they just unlock this from the start in the platinum edition.
I think this hasn't been posted here yet. Someone from triggerzone.de found out how to avoid the BL freezes:
Format a USB stick in your XBox and copy the BL content to the stick. Then delete BL from your HDD.
I haven't tried it myself yet but someone from another german speaking forum confirmed that it worked for him too.
Quote from: antares on October 19, 2010, 10:57:34 AM
I think this hasn't been posted here yet. Someone from triggerzone.de found out how to avoid the BL freezes:
Format a USB stick in your XBox and copy the BL content to the stick. Then delete BL from your HDD.
I haven't tried it myself yet but someone from another german speaking forum confirmed that it worked for him too.
It's so strange that some people got this, some didn't.. and it's not something Cave ever addressed. I never had mine stutter or freeze and I play from HD. The engineer in me doesn't like the random nature of that bug.
I had the freezes on my old 20GB HDD then switched to a 120GB one in the hope they will be gone but the freezes are still present.
Shame on me I haven't played Futari in weeks (months?) but I'll soon try this, just need to get a cheap USB stick.
Quote from: antares on October 19, 2010, 11:15:02 AM
I had the freezes on my old 20GB HDD then switched to a 120GB one in the hope they will be gone but the freezes are still present.
Weird. I get no stutters on my 120, but they still occur on my 20, even if there is nothing else on the drive.
I got the stutter on my old 360 + 60GB hard drive - maybe once every session.
I've had a 250GB slim for a couple of months now and it still occurs on that just as frequently but the actual stutter itself is a little less apparent - just the briefest of glitches but still noticable ???
I'll try the USB stick trick soon.
*Hopes for Bl being included*
Seeing how the DS platinum release had MBL on disc i'm pretty sure this will follow the same trend. And while they are at it, there's no reason not to add 1.01. Plus if they wouldn't add anything the only thing we would get is a price drop which is cool, but when selling a re-release one would aim to stuff it with extras, so even those who have the original disk(like most of us here ;) ) will have a reason to buy it.
Anyway 30 bucks is a steal for mushi, so no matter what they include ( or not), im buying it. :laugh:
DS Platinum retailed for $10 more than this, which makes me think BL is not included in Futari Platinum. Plus, JP retailers listed the DS platinum with the info that MBL was included, while we see no mention of BL in Futari's platinum listing.
Quote from: EOJ on October 19, 2010, 02:19:31 PM
DS Platinum retailed for $10 more than this, which makes me think BL is not included in Futari Platinum. Plus, JP retailers listed the DS platinum with the info that MBL was included, while we see no mention of BL in Futari's platinum listing.
Hmm i didn't know that :-\
But we can always hope....
Once Platinum is released and it doesn't include 1.01 I'm going to email cave and demand that 1.01. C'mon.
Quote from: Aquas on October 19, 2010, 06:40:33 PM
Once Platinum is released and it doesn't include 1.01 I'm going to email cave and demand that 1.01. C'mon.
Ehh, you're not exactly missing much IMO.
1.01 is awesome! It's tough as nails (Ultra is literally impossible), and the scoring is simplified and more old school.
And it's got the fucked up blur/glow effect. Looks so cool.
Quote from: njiska on October 19, 2010, 09:39:43 PM
And it's got the fucked up blur/glow effect. Looks so cool.
My thoughts exactly.
Yeah, the blur effect is cool. It was in Mushi 1 too, right? Seriously, Original's my favorite mode of Futari and 1.01 sounds more like Mushi1 style Original mode (which I also loved.) I demand that 1.01!
1.01 is my favorite version of Futari. If I had the money to throw around, I'd add a Futari 1.0 to my collection, but I don't think that will happen.
I really wish I had 1.01 just so I could try it...and I'm interested in seeing something even more difficult than 1.5 Ultra.
You'll probably only like it if you want less scoring and more challenge.
Black Label doesn't appeal to me at all, and I probably shouldn't have bought the DLC, but I guess it's nice to have it.
I love Black Label...but I'm a fan of hardcore challenge, as well.
Quote from: NR777 on October 21, 2010, 01:17:18 PM
I love Black Label...but I'm a fan of hardcore challenge, as well.
If you want a hardcore challenge, go for a high score in Ultra. =P
Quote from: Hive on October 22, 2010, 05:13:52 PM
Quote from: NR777 on October 21, 2010, 01:17:18 PM
I love Black Label...but I'm a fan of hardcore challenge, as well.
If you want a hardcore challenge, go for a high score in Ultra. =P
I think scoring in BL is plenty hardcore, particularly in Original Mode. For starters, try hitting 1.5 billion while not losing your sanity.
I think BL Original sucks ass, because the scoring system is terrible. Ver 1.0(1) and 1.5 Original Modes are way better.
BL Maniac is pretty awesome and so is God Mode. I have not played Ver 1.5 Maniac properly yet, but I think it's even better. It needs tons of more skill and strats to keep the meter in the redline.
Yup BL original is very unforgiving when it comes to high scoring, but if you don't aim for a super high score its pretty awesome. The fact that you don't have to change shots all the time ,as in 1.5 is what i like most.
Quote from: lillin on October 22, 2010, 08:29:23 PM
Yup BL original is very unforgiving when it comes to high scoring, but if you don't aim for a super high score its pretty awesome. The fact that you don't have to change shots all the time ,as in 1.5 is what i like most.
That's the best thing about 1.5. BL is too pedestrian.
BL maniac and Vers 1.5 original are the best modes. Nice score system and a lot of strategies. Also God is quite good but there are too much bullets to dodge. In maniac mode you can reach a good score in one or two weeks with no problems.
Just wanted to say the USB stick trick worked for me. I finally tried it today and played God mode for 2 hours without any freezes :righton:
Has anyone discovered if the Platinum collection contains Black Label and 1.0.1 ?
It appears to be the the same on-disc content as the original release. BL and 1.01 are definitely not there by default.
Quote from: njiska on December 06, 2010, 02:37:39 PM
It appears to be the the same on-disc content as the original release. BL and 1.01 are definitely not there by default.
Thanks!
Just got 1.01 for this game. Jesus damn, these modes have a lot more bite to them, everything seems a lot more vicious and out to kill you. Didn't pass stage 3 in my first credit with Original or Maniac, haha. I'm enjoying it quite a bit so far. =D
Hi, I'm a little confused. Are all the modes contained on the disc. I just ordered the "Platinum Collection" release of this game (haven't received it yet) but will I need to create a Japanese XBLA account to download DLC or something?
Game modes on disc: ver:1.5, arrange and novice
DLC: Black label and ver 1.01
And yes you will have to create a live account (any region) to download black label. Ver 1.01 was only available via a DLC card, which came with all first print SE copies and all LE copies of the game.
Thank you. I read several pages back but nothing jumped out at me pointing out which was DLC and which wasn't.
Sadly, I haven't played anything Cave since the DDP3/ESPGaluda/Mushi/Ibara run on the PS2 and last year I asked for recommendations. ESPGaluda II or Mushihimesma Futari. The money reserved for my purchase disappeared and a year later I got the Platinum version of Futari.
EOJ gushed over Futari and *finally* getting to play it, I can see why. With no PCB to compare to, I don't really care how accurate it is...this game Effin' Rocks! My first playthrough was, "This is pretty cool..." but with each subsequent run, I liked it more and more. 1ccing Arrange mode on Original may not be a great accomplishment but it was fun as hell! So many modes, so intense at times, a phenomenal balance of risk vs reward, amazing visuals...The music is growing on me as well, though there's nothing that comes close to "Like a Night of Shooting Stars" from the first Mushi. The options are all there, this game has it all!
I'm still so eager to play ESPGaluda II, as well as DFK, etc. but with baby #4 (and final) arriving in a few weeks, $75 on a game is just not realistic. Even EOJ's article on why I should buy a Japanese 360 makes perfect sense...but man, that money thing.
Sorry for the long post, I can finally contribute to a 30-page thread with something of substance, even if it's just me saying Futari is utterly amazing.
Quote from: slateman on February 25, 2011, 07:19:04 AM*snip*
Similar story to me. Have been umming and erring getting a 360 ever since I saw this on the verge of being released for the 360. Straight away, there was something about the colours, music and style that immediately caught my eye.
Bought the the game ages ago but only just bought a 360 2 days ago. Was worth the wait - this game is FANTASTIC! Currently umming and erring as to whether I should invest in a PS2 swap magic disc and buy the first game now.
Quote from: Terramax on March 06, 2011, 02:51:38 PM
Currently umming and erring as to whether I should invest in a PS2 swap magic disc and buy the first game now.
Not really worth it unless there are other games on the system you are interested in playing. It's a lousy port, and Futari is a far better game.
I'm not sure just how much I can discuss emulation, but you might be interested to know that Mushihimesama can be emulated if you have a "lucky" computer (some configurations work pretty badly on this game, but others will allow you to get much better graphics than you could on an actual PS2... though the port is still suboptimal, of course). The first Mushi is fairly different from Futari, so you might want to give it a quick try first.
Thanks for the tips guys. I'm looking into buying a few other PS2 shmups released solely for the PS2 should funds allow it.
I haven't got a very good PC when it comes to emulation. It just doesn't seem to like any kinds of emulators, sadly.
Wanted to download Black Label today but, after the game connected to Marketplace, it informed me that no content was currently available.
Did the DLC get pulled?
You need to download the DLC from the Live marketplace itself and not from within the game. If you sort by name, it will be the last entry on any non-Japanese marketplace (and the transcription will be something like Hutari Black Lavel).
Quote from: Aliquantic on March 18, 2011, 11:07:30 PM
You need to download the DLC from the Live marketplace itself and not from within the game. If you sort by name, it will be the last entry on any non-Japanese marketplace (and the transcription will be something like Hutari Black Lavel).
Thank you, but I since I live in Japan, I only have a Japanese Live account. Sorry, I should have specified this earlier.
When I search the Marketplace under む I get the exact same message, "No content available at this time. Please check back later." I even checked under ふ just in case, but nothing.
This (http://marketplace.xbox.com/ja-JP/Product/%E8%99%AB%E5%A7%AB%E3%81%95%E3%81%BE%E3%81%B5%E3%81%9F%E3%82%8A%E3%83%96%E3%83%A9%E3%83%83%E3%82%AF%E3%83%AC%E3%83%BC%E3%83%99%E3%83%AB/00000000-0000-400c-80cf-0002435a07d7) is the link for the DLC on the Japanese marketplace and everything seems to be fine. I'm not sure how you'd browse for it on the 360 itself though, but the website at least should work unless I'm missing something.
Downloading from the web worked. Thanks!
I was playing this today and tried to check out the online leaderboards, but they would not load up. Maybe they've finally been removed? If so, it was a good run of about 13 years.
Microsoft store all the leaderboards for all Xbox games on their servers (not individual companies), and there's no precedent for them ever removing leaderboards on any Xbox system from the X360 onwards. Plus, all the other X360 Cave game leaderboards are working fine. My guess is that there was some automated server maintenance process that has probably caused Futari's leaderboards to become inaccessible.
Checked again today, and still no leaderboards (score uploads also do not work). Whatever the cause, it seems they are gone for good.
Looks like the leaderboards are back up !