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Espgaluda 2


spatular
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i wasn't sure if i should start a thread for this as i know illdog is waiting on it (anyone else?) and i don't want to put a downer on it before he tries it :unsure: so i'll start off by saying i got the arcade version of this over a year ago, and absolutely loved it, thought it was the best thing ever :wub: it's great how you collect gems from enemies and can use these to go into a slowdown/bullet time mode to get out of tight spots - just like the first espgaluda. this is playing by mostly ignoring scoring.

then i tried to get a hang of the scoring and it just hurts my brain and makes me not like it, i understand the basics behind it, but regarding knowing what mode to use at what time there's so many options it's hard to know what to do - but i really want to give it another go now the port is out - i'm going to be downloading a lot of replays and just try and pick up some good ideas.

here are the basics of the system for the arcade and 360 modes i tried to explain on another site:

"in normal mode shooting enemies gives you green gems, you need these to go into the first slowdown mode (i don't know what they're called - the one where you tap the button),

in the first slowdown mode killing enemies gives you gold from their bullets (like in espgaluda 1), to go into the second slowdown mode (hold the button) you need both gold and green gems,

in the second slowdown mode when you kill an enemy, it's bullets dissapear briefly then double and head towards you and give you a big score multiplier (or something like that) - this is where you get all the points, or not in my case.

in both slowdown modes i think you automatically use some of your bomb/barrier instead of dying, and there's the over mode where the bullets go faster, which happens when you run out of gold/green gems in the slowdown modes."

if you're going for survival you can just ignore the second slowdown mode, although it's a good idea to use it on some bosses for points to get the extends - like the last pattern of the level 2 boss - it doesn't make the bullets follow you on the bosses either.

The port also has a load of other modes - black label, arrange, omake, and some novice modes. i tried most of them:

Arrange has different colour bullets (blue and red) you can cancel by using shot/laser (little bit like ikaruga), i didn't fully understand what was going on but i really liked what i played of this mode :)

Omake needs to be unlocked by finishing one of the other modes (by credit feeding in my case), this also has some bullet canceling but it's based on proximity, the bullets close to you turn red and when you swap between the normal and slowdown mode these disapear, they also disapear when you're in some sort of powered up mode - i think when you get full jems and gold and you shoot something? unclear. anyway i liked this mode too although again didn't fully understand it.

black label i didn't really like but maybe that's because i understood it even less, in the normal mode - enemy bullets turn into gold when you kill the enemy they came from, and the slowdown modes seemed to make it harder rather than easier, and there was some sort of forcefield around your ship so you can push bullets that are really close to hitting you out of the way but this seems to run out - i really hadn't a clue what was going on in this mode :unsure:

i hope i've not got any modes mixed up as i just gave them all a full run through last night.

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i wasn't sure if i should start a thread for this as i know illdog is waiting on it (anyone else?) and i don't want to put a downer on it before he tries it :unsure:

I am, consider me downed :(

seriosuly though, some good info in there cheers! hopefully mine will be here any day now! did play it on PS2 but that was many years ago so I can't remember alot about it (except that I thought it wasn't quite as good as Mushihimesama or dodonpachi, so I'd play those instead) didn't give it the attention it deserved then so i'm looking forward to playing it properly now!

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How come you got yours so quick Spatular? Did u play-asia it and pay for extra speedy delivery?

i'm not sure, the package said "signature required" so i think they might have upgraded the shipping for free on limited edition orders or something, because i didn't pay any more and there's still no sign of the standard edition :unsure:

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had a bit of a breakthrough with this tonight after hitting a brick wall with the scoring a long time ago, been watching some replays downloaded from the leaderboard, trying to get some scoring tips, mainly for the first 2 levels but i'm just not getting it on thoes levels and get a bit frustrated, people can get 50+ million on the first stage and i usually get between 2 and 5 million! but i did manage to get some more ideas for stage 3 and a little part of 4, which helped me smash my old (admitedly rubbish) high score, although a new high score of ~100 million is still rubbish but i was happy anyway :D

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  • 2 weeks later...

Finally arrived, finally. Finally. No custom charges either.

My first playthrough was dissapointing for two reasons. First i didnt know what the fuck i was doing. Second i was playing with an Arcade Stick and ive come to the concusion i just dont get on with Arcade Sticks.

So i was up early this morning and itching to give the game another crack so i pulled out my trusty Hori Pad, put the game on 360 Novice and had a much better time... although i still dnt really know what the fuck im doing. Ive read spatulars original post again and im going to have one more crack on Novice before i up the ante again.

As i understand so far...

You shoot enemies and green gems appear, which you then absorb. If you hit the B button, that shield appears and the bullets turn and nthats when you get gold instead of green gems. This mode depleats your green gem counter but this seems to be where the massive points are.

Whats the R trigger for? Guard deflect or something, is it this games eqivalent to a bomb (only much less powerful)?

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nice one illdog, good customs avoidance too!

As i understand so far...

You shoot enemies and green gems appear, which you then absorb. If you hit the B button, that shield appears and the bullets turn and nthats when you get gold instead of green gems. This mode depleats your green gem counter but this seems to be where the massive points are.

Whats the R trigger for? Guard deflect or something, is it this games eqivalent to a bomb (only much less powerful)?

yeah that's pretty much right... the "shield" is just a circular bar to show you how many gems you have left when you're in the slowdown mode. and the first slowdown mode isn't going to get you massive points, for that you need gold and gems to enter the second slowdown mode (hold the button down) which makes things go crazy, watch some videos from the leaderboards might give you some ideas, i'm pretty rubbish at it.

the bomb equivelent (called "guard barrier" i think) has a meter at the botom of the screen, sort of works like a shield while you hold the button down, then release it to unleash laser death, its strength depends on how long you hold the button down for. if you're in one of the slowdown modes this is automatically used if you get hit, but depleats faster than normal, think it takes half a bar if you get hit?

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Fuck, where do they come up with this shit?!!

OK, so i need to be holding down the B button, but that depletes both gems and gold. Cool, cheers spatuloso, i shall try all this when i get home.

Novice mode really is easy, the step up to Normal mode is huge! I think im gonna finish Fallout 3 before i put any real time into this. I should never have started it actually, these shoot em ups are stupidly addictive. Its that quest to do one bit better than last time, always drags me back.

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What mode do you play this on spatular?

Ive been mostly playing Arrange and i think im starting to get the hang of it, at least i can get to the last level without continuing now whereas before i would use a continue per level. Im still not too sure what gives me the best score, i think its when you press B when you have gems, this makes the bullet patterns much more dense but slows them down and when you destroy the enemy all the bullets turn to gold. My high score is on 67 million though which is way off the mark, the guy im above by one place on the leaderboard got his score by level 4, mine was on 6.

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i've hardly played the other modes, i find the main mode (arcade/360) pretty confusing still (understand all the concepts but don't know when to use them, need to watch replays more) so i just stick to that trying to get the hang of it, as the other modes look pretty confusing too i don't want to get mixed up, not played this anywhere near as much as i'd like.

there's some info on the other modes here but you'll have to do a bit of digging to find out how to score well, one of the modes (not sure which one) you're supposed to crash into stuff to activate the guard barrier to score highly!:

http://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=6281

http://www.cave-stg.com/forum/index.php?topic=823.0

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surprised there's a thread for this, and i'm getting tips from myself as i'd forgotten some of this stuf.

 

also surprised i was a bit down on it in the opening post, it's a really great game, i just don't get on with the scoring system, but thats fine, trying to stay alive dodging all the bullets is great fun, and the slowdown mode is cool. the main arcade game is pretty hard. there's loads of other modes that are easier though. i tried the omake mode and finished it first go. one of the other modes has different colour bullets which you can cancel using different shot types, sort of like (but not that much like) ikaruga. i've been playing it a bit and enjoying it again because - 

 

this recently came out on the switch, and over here too, not limited to Japan or whatever. so that's pretty cool. it's a port of the 360 version so has all the extra modes, think there's 5 or so different modes (arcade, novice, black label, arrange, omake, original (this is the arcade mode with higher res graphics), and there might be a black label novice too?). and it's £15. crazy bargain.

 

apparently it has good tutorials for the different modes which i've never bothered to look at before because in the 360 version they'll be in Japanese, so i need to have a look at those now they've been translated.

 

here's a youtube video because people like those right? bit odd the name of the video is about acuracy but the result is the guy doesn't know if i's accurate, but whatever, it's good that there's videos about this stuff, and it's a decent introduction to the game:

 

 

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