Classic of the Month - Time Crisis

Manufacturer:	Namco
Genre:	Light gun
Board:	System 22
Year:	1995

The year is 1996 and I am failing my degree in computer science.  There are a number of factors contributing to this disaster, such as I lived 17 miles from the uni and spent a lot of time commuting; the course was fluffed up with irrelevant modules such as European History and German that did not interest me; I was drinking too much, relying on mid-afternoon lectures to sleep in and sober up.  Between lectures I sought solice in a number of off-campus locations, which included a Namco Station arcade situated in the old market square in Nottingham city centre.  The Namco Station was the best arcade in the city, with such modern classics as Sega Rally, Tekken II, Puzzle Bobble, Sonic Blast Man and Namco's own Time Crisis.

The plot for Time Crisis was familiar stuff.  Fallen royalty, Sherudo Garo, employs mercenary Wild Dog to kidnap the president of Sercia's daughter, Rachel McPherson, in exchange for military secrets.  You play as VSSE agent Richard Miller--known as the One Man Army--who is sent into Garo's castle to gun down every henchman and minion you see and rescue Rachel.

There had been on-rails shooting games since the earliest days of coin-op gaming, but Time Crisis's combination of a gun with recoil and a cover system made it feel like the most immersive yet - even if the gun was bright pink, thanks to its origins with the Point Blank series.  The cover system was a stroke of genius.  Appearing more than a decade before Gears of War, the cabinets had a foot pedal, which the player had to stamp on to take cover behind whatever they were stood behind at the time, be it a crate, a wall or a pillar.  It gave players a sense of control that games like Taito's Operation Wolf (1987) and Atari's Area 51 (also 1995) simply didn't provide.  The two player mode was great too, because rather than have your characters stand side-by-side, you took up different positions on the map, so you were still taking down the same enemies, but from opposite sides of the room.  This crossfire created an additional peril, as it was possible to shoot each other, providing a great opportunity to grief your mates - if you were that way inclined.

The game was a huge success, spawning ports to home consoles and a whole industry of 3rd party light guns.  I can remember back in 1998, buying it for my Sony PlayStation, along with a light gun that actually had a recoil (unlike Namco's official G-Con gun).  I played a couple of games, then let my 10 year-old nephew have a go.  The light gun caught fire in his hand, which he quickly dropped before he got burnt.  It scared the crap out of us all and needless to say, when I took the melted mess back to the shop I did not have a replacement.

Over the years Namco produced numerous sequels, with increasingly elaborate light guns, but none recaptured the magic of the original. Let's take a look, shall we?

MTW

Sega what have you become

Over the past month and a half I have been travelling up and down the country a lot visiting my wife's family in Scotland.  On my travels I've noticed arcade games have even disappeared from the majority of motorway services. I guess why would kids want to play a 15 year-old Time Crisis or Daytona USA machine when they've got DSis, PSPs and smart phones in their pockets. However, Sega (who I voted my favourite arcade manufacturer only last month) still has the a strong presence, but only in the form of prize machines, such as Sega UFO Catcher and Key Master.

They all have proper (bat-style) arcade joysticks, which I can't help looking at and thinking, "You used to be used for Shinobi, Golden Axe and Virtua Fighter. You used to control PROPER GAMES!"

Like the true journalist I am (ahem), I decided to try these latest "amusements".  It felt good to be using a proper arcade stick again, but much to my dismay, the games themselves are incredibly challenging and addictive.  Key Master looks deceptively simple, but success is not only difficult, but also requires genuine skill, unlike traditional grabber machines.  I sunk a couple of quid into one machine trying to will something for my son.  I could have spent more, but I still hate the things.

MTW

Boss Fight - Mothership (Phoenix, 1980)

For my new Boss Fight feature, I wanted to talk about the game that kick started the whole thing. Unfortunately there is some debate about which was the first arcade game to feature a boss, as I said in my 'What is a 'Boss Fight'?' post. So of the three main contenders, I've gone for the most famous, the Mothership from Taito's Phoenix. This brute turns up on the fifth level of the game and in true end of level guardian style, it's tough and a little bit cheap.

The challenges facing the player were the swarms of minions who attack you, the thick, protective undercarriage, which requires a shed load of bullets to penetrate, the scrolling purple shield, which you either had to survive long enough to blast apart or have the skill to always hit the same spot when it went past -- and all the while avoiding missiles from small alien target sat in the middle. However, if you can land a single hit on the alien, the whole thing blew up and the game started again -- only harder. It's as tough a boss fight as you'll ever face and a great place to start if you want to test your mettle against gaming's most icon bosses.

MTW

What is Bullet Hell

"Bullet hell" ("danmaku" in Japanese) is a term used to describe a sub-genre of manic shoot 'em up. The screenshot below is from Cave's 2001 game, Progear, and summarises the genre pretty well.

Progear (Cave/Capcom 2001) - 2nd Boss "Gabriel Hammer"

As you can probably tell, bullet hell shooters are above and beyond your usual shmup, with intense and complex enemy bullet patterns that require skill and nerves of steel to negotiate.  Talking of Cave, they are the bastions of the genre and continue to make arcade games to this day.

MTW

Homage Review: Satazius (PC)

Capcom enters the indie scene by backing a cracking Gradius homage.

The indie game scene is thriving these days and it's not surprising that most of these bedroom developers are making modern versions of classic arcade games. One genre that is benefiting the most is the shoot 'em up, which is great, because I love a good shoot 'em up (in case you didn't know).  Now coin-op legends Capcom are promoting these small, independent developers and one of the first games they've published is Gradius-inspired shmup Satazius, by Astro Port.

The set up for the game goes as follows: The battle cruiser Agano is on patrol near the planet Satazius when it's attacked by pirates, intent on stealing the assault ship 'Trafalgar' being transported aboard the battle cruiser.  As the Agano crashes to the surface of Satazius, the Trafalgar blasts off to take out the pirates.  While that's not much of a plot, it's all a game like this needs.  There are bad guys in spaceships, you have a flying cannon, so get out there and blast 'em!

The presentation in this game is a bit of a mixed bag.  The audio is spot on, with its hyper-active, melodramatic music, sizzling laser blasts and shuddering explosions.  However, the game has 16-bit art style and a native resolution of 640x480, which, when stretched out to a typical modern resolution, really does not scale very well.  Astro Port would have been better either upping the resolution of the artwork or just going full-on retro and create something that looked more 8-bit.

In terms of gameplay, it may not be particularly innovative, but it is very well done.  A rarely-seen feature of Satazius is that the weapon load out you choose at the beginning of the game (a la Gradius) you get to keep all the way through, even if you die or continue.  Instead of changing weapon types mid-game, each one can be powered up 8 times, with death taking each active power up down a notch.  When you continue you get to reselect your weapon load out, which means you can either choose something different and or use the same load out as before, which may still be partially powered up.  Unlike a lot of these games, you still feel powerful with a basic set of guns.  Don't take that to mean it's easy.  It's actually really tough, but it's not a bullet hell shooter in the vain of a Cave or Treasure game.  Instead it's challenge comes from great level design and an emphasis on environmental obstacles, much like the game that inspired it. Likewise the boss encounters will be familiar to anyone who's played a Gradius game, although generally speaking you do not have to target a "core" as you would in the Konami games.

In summing up Satazius I find myself in a tricky position. There is very little originality to be found here and if you're the sort of sneaky person who plays arcade games on MAME you will find better games, however there's a charm and accessibility here that find highly appealing. There's a demo available through Steam which will give you the first level, so give it a go, you may be surprised.

Plays like

• Gradius 
• Darius

Highs

• Having a full arsenal from the get-go is incredibly empowering and encourages you to keep playing even after you get a kicking.
• The combination of unlocking and upgradable weapons eggs you on too see what else is available and how new weapons will then work on subsequent playthroughs.
• Gameplay focuses on environmental obstacles and does not resort to cheap bullet hell tactics.
• Incredibly satisfying shoot 'em up action.

Lows

• Native resolution is only 640x480 and the artstyle means it does not scale well.
• Only support analogue joypad input, despite ship movement being digital, but this can be overcome using JoyToKey.

Satazius is available from Steam priced £4.49.  For more info check out Gamespot's review.

MTW

Hello 2012

Hello and welcome to Arcade Throwback 2012 Edition.  I hope you've all had a good Christmas and New Year and you're ready to face the next 12 months. And yes, I know it's the 2nd, but my daughter's birthday is on the 1st of January, so you're never going to see a post that day, so tough.

Over the next twelve months I hope to keep up the snippets of arcade news I've been posting, as well as my features I introduced last year.  But wait, there's more, I some new have ideas for 2012, including a look at games that spawned new genres and a new regular feature about famous, interesting or downright bizarre boss fights (inspired by last month's glossary entry about bosses).  Hopefully I'll have time for everything.

Oh, and Happy New Year.

MTW