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Post by Xeogred on Jun 8, 2019 18:12:34 GMT -5
R-Type Leo: I've played a few credits of this, and it seemed alright, but... it also felt very un-Irem. That might be appealing to those that don't like memorization-heavy games, and the game still seemed decent from what I remember, but it also felt somewhat generic, and it was way too easy for an R-Type game. I might give this one a credit or two anyways this month, just to see if my opinion might change, but as of now I'd rank it lower in Irem's shmup catalog, though thats more a testament to how good their other games are, rather than an outright knock on Leo. Just knocked this one out in a casual 9 credits run, 23 minutes. I am the second person to log this on HLTB, the other user had this at 4 hours. I'd guess that is maybe a legit log and how long it took that person to 1CC this. Really doesn't seem too hard to do after a few runs. As usual with R-Type, in my experience at least, it's the sections with moving parts in a level that get the trickiest and would be hardest to memorize. Two bosses had a near full screen sized blast that comes out pretty fast too. It was always easy to get back your Options after death though.
+ Decent graphics + Co-op R-Type? Could have been fun with a friend at the arcades
+ or - ... insanely easy, some bosses were pathetic, instant respawning which I mentioned pages back is what I prefer nowadays, but as dunpeal says here I'd agree... this makes this one feel very weird and un-R-Type.
- one of the most average shmup OST's I've heard in a bit. - I didn't like the homing attack your Options do instead of being able to power up a huge blast
Yeah I don't know, was fun for a 20 minute romp I guess and seems like a fine game. lol, but I'll probably forget about it tomorrow.
I think the fun/tough thing about the other arcade R-Types, is that the checkpoint system makes even credit feeding not exactly work. I remember checking out R-Type II last year and got stuck in one section for a good bit, then just gave up. I think I'll take another swing at it today though since it seems awesome anyways and I guess one could argue this might be better than Super R-Type in ways, as the true second game. Super is still great though, so I wonder how much they differ.
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Post by Xeogred on Jun 8, 2019 19:14:57 GMT -5
After burning close to an hour and 25+ some credits on stage 5-6 in R-Type, I'm done for the day on this one. Don't want to break my Buffalo controller in half. Things I hate about R-Type: - bad checkpoints, getting stuck in those atrocious loops - SPEED. You start off TOO SLOW. You accidentally get one too many speed power ups and you're TOO FAST. - homing missiles take forever and often lock on the wrong target. Thanks! - the powerup enemies are annoyingly fast and often get away from you, or end up killing you if you accidentally ram into them
Think this is the loop I was stuck on in stage 5, then when I saw stage 6 being one of those moving level types, I threw in the towel quickly after. Now looking forward in this video I'm glad I did, stage 6 looks disgusting.
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Post by toei on Jun 8, 2019 21:57:58 GMT -5
Xeogred The Japanese version of Leo has checkpoints instead. Also, you need to hold the attack button for a moment to send out the pods instead of having a seperate button that can send them and recall them. I like the method in the overseas version better myself. I don't love Leo, exactly, but at least it's more approachable than most of Irem's shooters, and I like that speed isn't an issue. The default speed in R-Type is unbearable. Cosmic Cop is one of their only shmups where your ship can always go fast, but it's big and unwieldy and the sections where you have to navigate narrow corridors and move between shots are a nightmare. And I was actually going to post some of the Leo music since I really like the first level's theme. A lot of Irem games feature pretty mediocre soundtracks (seriously, try Image Fight 2), but this is really good in my opinion. Would have fit well in a Streets of Rage. I agree not everything on it is as good, though.
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Post by Xeogred on Jun 8, 2019 22:38:13 GMT -5
I recall that track making a good initial impression, first level and all... but after that yeah it just all blended in, lol. Leo has a nice bright color palette at least. The other R-Types are a lot of dark neutral colors.
That's what I meant with the homing pods/options attack. Easy screen clearing. But from what I gathered, I don't think you can charge up your normal attack in this one like the others, so instead you get this homing attack, which is arguably even better. But firing off a charged blast in the others is always satisfying.
I saw you guys mention the Japanese version having checkpoints, that does sound cool. I'm too lazy to dig through other sources to get it right now though, just have the World rom on me. I checked to see if one of the dip switches could change that but no go with this version.
Another plus I'll give Leo, I liked the green weapon, which fires green lasers that track enemies vertically when it hits their axis point or whatever, if that makes sense. After playing some R-Type 1 again, I like the green lasers a lot more than the yellow weapon in the other games, which just sends some beam spread directly up and down that tracks along the walls and floors. I bet this makes no sense on paper.
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Post by Xeogred on Jun 9, 2019 9:58:57 GMT -5
WTF IS THIS? Imagine dying and trying to navigate this level with no powerups and these two colored block generating enemies cover the screen.
R-Type... RAGE-TYPE!
I know it's basically best to learn these games and 1CC them. But man, the Gradius powerup system is just way more fun and rewarding or something.
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Post by toei on Jun 9, 2019 10:21:19 GMT -5
Xeogred Bro, this is how I felt about 90% of the Irem games I've been playing for the past week, but everyone seemed to think I was imagining things. Once you get further into them they're all stuffed with moments like that that seem specially designed to make you rage. And even if they don't seem too bad once you've finally learned them, you're going to spend most of your time with those games actually learning them, so if that's almost never fun and constantly enraging, what's the point? I honestly hate most of their games now. They were more reliant on troll design than almost every other developer, even in the late '80s, and then they never really evolved in terms of overall balancing. Look at a game like Holy Diver. Castlevania or Ninja Gaiden didn't have infinite enemy waves bugging you at all times, because the industry had moved past that (mostly because it's annoying as hell), but Irem kept right on with it in their side-scrollers like it was still 1984 and it was still all about Spartan-X / Kung Fu Master. Ninja Spirits had a cool weapon and power-up system; it could have been a really good game. With better balancing, it could have sparked a popular side-scroller series. Up until the last moment, their shooters were still on that sluggish, ultra-frustrating R-Type / Image Fight shit like it was still 1987. But gamers had moved on from that nonsense. That's why all their major hits (all three of them) were in the '80s, and also why the original Irem Corporation pulled out of the video games business in 1994.
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Post by Xeogred on Jun 9, 2019 10:34:18 GMT -5
Xeogred Bro, this is how I felt about 90% of the Irem games I've been playing for the past week, but everyone seemed to think I was imagining things. Once you get further into them they're all stuffed with moments like that that seem specially designed to make you rage. I honestly hate most of their games now.
Man, well I look forward to doing a "tour" run of Super R-Type with save stages and maybe R-Type III. No shame here, I legit beat Super all the time as a kid. I was at least able to see some different bosses/levels playing through R-Type 2 Arcade. Guess stage 5 is second to last, but I rage quit pretty quickly. I got stuck on the checkpoint near the stage 4 boss last time I played this, but finally beat that easily this time... only to run into the annoying stage 5.
Like you said above toei, the default ship speed for R-Type drives me insane. So... once you die, it's such a nuisance trying to get back into gear. I know in Gradius the default speed is pretty awful too, but I feel like most checkpoints in those start you off plenty of power up drops. I've beaten the whole Gradius series legitimately outside of two entries, the arcade version of 3 I'm iffy on and I still can't beat Treasure's balls to the walls 5. Think there's some like the GBA and Wii game I still need to play. I guess what I'm getting at, is that revisiting R-Type just reconfirms how I got more into Gradius and other shmups over the years. Still wouldn't call R-Type bad but it's definitely not favorite material. Kind of funny that it looks like Super might be my favorite still all along.
I have to say I'm surprised at how unremarkable the music is for R-Type too. Leo had that one good track, I can't remember anything in the first from yesterday, and this track from 2 I liked a lot, but it's like a 12 second loop practically.
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Post by toei on Jun 9, 2019 10:39:12 GMT -5
R-Type III was made by their sister company Tamtex, so it might be more forgiving? Not sure, though. They were much more varied in terms of balancing; Metal Storm is really hard, for example, but Perman is super easy; the Game Boy Kid Niki is mostly easy, but their GB Hammerin' Harry games get super hard. And yeah, Xeogred , nobody really talked about music much in this thread but my impression from trying out literally 35 games or so is that Irem's composers were mostly really mediocre. They had a bunch of talented artists, and it seems like they put most of their focus into graphics, but music must have been an afterthought for the company as a whole cause I've heard very little worth bringing up (though I do like some of R-Type Leo's OST). This is a quote from this interview on shmuplations: "Other game developers see sprites as a mere means to an end, a symbol that you just move around on-screen; at Irem, however, we focus a lot on what we want the player to seeāthat is, graphics and visual presentation." Obviously, there's nothing wrong with striving to have the best visuals possible. But if it's true that they focused significantly more on that than other developers, as that Irem employee claimed, then that might explain why their controls are almost never smooth (seriously, even their turn-based RPG Sol Moonarge has bad controls, how do you mess that up?) and their level design so often frustrating. I feel like this quote is a great epitaph to Irem Corporation, cause that was really their biggest strength overall. (The later Irem Software Engineering didn't seem to put that much stock in graphics, as Ex pointed out in relation to Disaster Report, but focused more on original game concepts).
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Post by Xeogred on Jun 9, 2019 10:43:48 GMT -5
R-Type III was made by their sister company Tamtex, so it might be more forgiving? Not sure, though. They were much more varied in terms of balancing; Metal Storm is really hard, for example, but Perman is super easy; the Game Boy Kid Niki is mostly easy, but their GB Hammerin' Harry games get super hard. From my past experiences back in the day, I recall only getting like one or two levels into R-Type III and my memory still says it's one of the most insane shmups I've ever played. So... yeah lol, I'll have to check it out again soon and see what it's like.
I'm still looking forward to Metal Storm.
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Post by toei on Jun 9, 2019 10:57:35 GMT -5
Metal Storm is really a puzzle-platformer, with an emphasis on puzzle, from what I've played. Approach it like that and you'll probably get into it more.
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