Akai Katana - Arcade/Zetsu/Shin [strats]

[tiobilli]

Any akai katana guide somewhere?

[Special World]

No reason we can't start one here. Been playing Zetsu all night, here's how it works, as I understand it. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong.

1. Build up ninja meter by collecting green orbs
- Green orbs will grow larger if you hold them out using A-shot and hover them over enemy bullets (possibly enemies too?)
2. In ninja mode, bullets will turn to gold when you kill a nearby enemy with A-shot
- Close proximity kills with C shot will cause some enemies to spawn suicide bullets
3. In ninja mode, using C-shot or holding nothing at all will let you knock bullets around
- Knock bullets toward enemies, then cancel them by using A-shot to kill an enemy when they're nearby
4. Your hit counter acts as a multiplier
- I do not know the limit to this
5. Eventually your circling gold will turn red, this is your cue that you must suck it in or it'll disappear
- If you have meter left, you may continue your chain by immediately re-entering ninja mode and canceling bullets
6. Losing lives will permanently lengthen your ninja meter
- I assume this means you'd always want to be running on your last life if you want really high scores

[EOJ]

Quick energy orb regeneration technique (for Arcade/Zetsu modes):
-Hold A+C with your option on an enemy, and when you see energy orbs come out from the enemy let off A and then rehit the button. Do this in a slow rhythm (about once every second) and you will get more orbs in a shorter period of time. Do it too fast, and you'll suck in the orbs. This is the trick all the top replays use, if you watch closely you'll see their shot change from A to C and back to A over and over until a large amount of orbs are present.

Boss bomb item scoring technique (for Arcade/Zetsu modes):
-Like in DFK BL, it's best to let the bomb item float around the screen until the boss starts shooting bullets. Don't collect it in Fighter mode. Instead, you should change into Ninja mode, reflect some bullets, then collect the bomb item. You'll get a gold ring with a high hit count, which you can cash in for at least a few million points.

How to use lasers for score (again, just for Arcade/Zetsu modes):
-Every time you ram into a laser in Fighter mode you get a nice chunk of energy. It's useful to do this on purpose for score if your meter is empty, especially if you're coming up on an extend soon - the extend will give you a full new life block and regenerate the block depleted from the laser hit(s).
-On bosses, defeating them in Ninja mode turns any lasers on the screen into large point items, while bullets turn into smaller ones. So try and save the final blow for the moment when lots of lasers are on the screen (don't try and ram these lasers, it will turn their stream into bullets, which don't give as many point items).

- I assume this means you'd always want to be running on your last life if you want really high scores

Nope. None of the top scorers does that. Some suicide at the very start of the game for a little extra meter, but that's about it. If you know what you're doing you can score just fine with the default meter, it just requires expert energy regeneration techniques. Plus, you get 8million per spare life at the end of the game.

[lam47]

Great advice EOJ. The energy orb regen trick is a game changer!

[EOJ]

For those curious about Shin mode scoring limits, SIN says he's been practicing the stages and has gotten a total of 5.7 billion on them with Type B in training mode, but he doesn't think much more than that is possible. He thinks he should be able to whip out a 5+bil run for the leaderboards pretty soon.

BTW he gets 2.2 billion on stage 5 alone.

[ohfivepro]

Shin Mode - getting the 1st extend on the stage 1 mid-boss - Type B ship

This mode seems to cause a bit of confusion and even when I thought I was doing much the same thing each run I could end up scoring hugely differing amounts. Here's an idiots guide to the basics of what to do to get you started on stage 1. After that you're on your on your own

1. Fly through the 1st helicopter and head downwards. Start firing when your Option is on the ememies to get the most amount of Hagane orbs. Fly up the screen and take out the tanks. Sit on the front of the screen and take out the tanks on the top road before they enter the screen. Fly downwards so your Option kills the small gun turret / smoking chimney. Enter Ninja Mode.

2. Let a few bullets get close to you then release your Hagane so the hit the next small turret + some of the mid-screen helicopters. Focus shot any tanks / remaining copters to increase your Katanas and move up the screen a bit. Don't be too quick here as you want to keeps some smaller enemies alive if possible to help keep your chain counter alive.

3. As the brown laser plane flys in hold off until it shoots its laser then fire your Katanas slightly downwards. Follow them down the screen so you generate a big gold green fog of points items. You should kill the plane, the big turret, the small turrets and the coptors at the bottom of the screen. Score should be 28-40mil. I find it easier to let the small green plane that comes in from the top of the screen live.

4. Laser the plane (ideally with your Option) to get some big E items then move to the bottom right of the screen and use shot to generate Hagane items from the off screen tanks. When the 2 green planes fly on move up and laser them with your Option (drag it over them to get the big Es) Kill some more tanks with shot and point blank the 1st green plane. Move back a bit and when the next green plane appears fire off your haganges. You should kill that plane and the next one that comes up, without killing too many of the diagonal tanks.

5. Fly up to the top of the screen and focus shot the helicopters to get more Katanas. Move to the middle back of the screen and when the 2nd batch of helicopters is touching you fire off the Katanas. The should kill a load of the tanks (the main bulk of your scoreO) whilst grinding through the mid-boss. Sit on top of the mid-boss as the Katanas grind through it and by the time they pass through and kill him you should have topped 100mil.

6. Worst case scenario is you killed a few too many tanks or dont have enough katanas through point blanking enemies but you should have at least 80mil or so and will easily get the extend by the start of the boss fight.

[EOJ]

I think Arcade mode has rank based on how long you go without dying. Stage 5 on phan's superplay looks like it has a lot more bullets than when I play through it in my runs.  Having more bullets on the screen makes scoring easier (and creates more scoring opportunities), so I guess I need to play without dying in the first 4 stages.

[EOJ]

After playing Arcade mode (PS4 port) more in-depth, I can confirm no-miss rank begins at least as early as the start of Stage 3 (not the start of Stage 5). But, if, for example, you die on the Stage 2 boss, and no miss to the start of Stage 5, the bullet patterns in Stage 5 are close to those you would see after no-missing the game to the start of Stage 5. Perhaps not quite as dense, but certainly denser than if you die on the Stage 4 boss and start Stage 5. Typical Yagawa-style, the longer you survive without dying, the greater the rank becomes.

The number of lives in stock may also play a role. For example, starting Stage 3 with five lives in stock instead of four or three.