I don’t think that game will click with most people, that game is pure unforgiving hell lol.
You named some classics but I played every last one of those already except Ketsui, I’ll check that one out. Glaylancer had a nice soundtrack from what I remembered.
It wasn’t about the difficulty but more on the mechanics (don’t like much the switching weapon mechanic) and also the movement speed is a little funky (diagonals goes faster then cardinals).
Difficulty is relative most of the time, and this type of shooters are very memorization heavy more then anything else…that’s why I tend to prefer “cave style” and danmaku in general more! 
Did you play DaiOuJou?
If you want to get into the genre my suggestion is to focus on 1 game to try to clear it, the first one will be very challenging but the next ones will take less and less!
Gaiares is a good start!
I think the weapon switching is why I like it, makes for different play styles like Thunder Force IV in a way.
I have actually. Cave shooters are cool but probably my least favorite among the shmup genre especially the games made between 2002-2005. They all started looking the same to me.
Oh no I’m definitely not new to this, been playing these shooters since the late 80s/early 90s, just gotta get my reflexes back up lol. I’ve just now been going after the games I missed out on during that era like these two games I brought to your attention. Not just shmups either but I’ve been digging for all types of genres on various systems that I missed out on especially now since I get no excitement from modern new games with the exception of a indie game here and there.
That’s true! but Thunderforce does things soooo very well and the ost is actually nuts! 
They might look similar at first but when you dig in they play surprisingly very differently:
doj, progear, espgaluda/esparade, mushi, gwange, deathsmiles: they all have very different mechanics gameplay!
The only problem is that they are relatively difficult and so the process to get “into” them is not very soft 
A nice way in is Batsugun Special: is the last Toaplan game (before they went broke) made from people that went on to work for Cave (and Rizing!).
Taking on Gleylancer now huh? Can’t go wrong with that. I had a lot of fun playing that one.
Yeah I cleared it yesterday!
it was a fun ride, graphics and music on a very good level, it plays really well, checkpoints are good and recovery is not an issue, I played it on normal difficulty and it was a little on easy side: I cleared the game with 6+ lives in stock. Maybe hard mode is the way to go, bullets go a little faster but the game don’t change too much from the little I tried.
Recommended!
Nice. I always go for the “auto seeking” type shot and always get the “needle pin” looking type power up during gameplay, I breeze through the game with that selection lol. Definitely a fun play and not too hard.
Nice!
The game is fun just with few of the first levels being a little “slow”!
Enjoy the ride and the soundtrack!
Seeing that this is also the unofficial shmups fans thread, I challenge both of you to 1cc this game.
US Turbo-Grafx 16 SuperCD-ROM² version.
Gate of Thunder as well in any order.
Lords of thunder probably one of the best for pc engine and pc engine has a lot of shooters!
I might sound like a broken record but the ost is just something else! 
I recently finished the (much easier) Mega CD version
You specified US version: are there any differences to the Japanese one (I played that one few years back)?
I’m not sure off hand but I think the intro might have some Japanese speech. I just specified the US version because that’s the one I have and played so I was just trying to a) be consistent and b) introduce you and @sonkun to partake in the experience in the most definitive way possible if you hadn’t already.
I finished that as well a couple days ago but I died a couple times, wasn’t really taking it seriously but I reached far enough so I just played it through. At times it felt as if luck was on my side especially in the last level but there were certain things that I just did better like collecting hard to reach power ups, which definitely made a difference.
It also took a very long time between mastering it as a teen and revisiting it as an adult and trying to master it again. Back in the day I could beat that game on the hardest difficulty with 1 life.
As a matter of fact, it was common practice for even decades after for me to turn off the game as soon as I died. I’m glad I can still enjoy the game without having to resort to that though.
I kinda still do that sometimes with Street Fighter II Turbo Hyper Fighting but not as much anymore.
I’ve beaten Blazing Lazers as well, I found that one to be awesome but not too difficult.
Super Star Soldier on the other hand, if you haven’t delved into that one, it’s actually just as good as Lords of Thunder and Gate of Thunder, including in the sound and graphics department. It’s length and degree of difficulty is painful.
In my younger years, I had only beaten it a couple times but I’m yet to sitdown and play it through completely as an adult.
It’s really tough restarting some of the later stages with no power ups if you continue so it really takes some mastery to be able to reach far in the game with the amount of fire power you actually need to play it through comfortably.
As for Soldier Blade, the graphics and sound track are second to none but I still prefer playing Blazing Lazers and Super Star Soldier for some strange reason. I’ve never played through Soldier Blade from start to finish. I did use a code though, which allowed me to reach the last boss.
Another tough but great one is Aero Blasters, I know I reached the last level some time ago but I can’t remember if I beat it anytime recently.
I used to beat that with impunity back in the day.
Anyway, don’t want to take over your thread with too much shmup stuff.
In case you didn’t know @bactino, you have to double tap Button II if you want to change the shooting direction of your satellites.
Another tip I would share is to be proactive and aggressive, the less time the enemy has to shoot, the better for you.
@Cyber
So,I went back to Lords of Thunder to do just a few runs…then the game just hooked me in again with the OST ( 
) so I clear it again (this time USA version, didn’t catch any differences, but I played the japanese version long time ago…)!
Here the replay if interested
Played with: Beetle PCE (v1.29.0 96a654a)
Such a nice ride!
If anybody want to get into the game in an easier fashion I reccomend the Mega CD version!
@hunterk Sorry to bother you, would it be possible to split this thread into another one dedicated to shoot’em ups?
if possible, starting from this post:
https://forums.libretro.com/t/haris-1080p-shaders-presets-screenshots/43734/58?u=hari-82
Nice selection of games. I’m not sure how this thread became the unofficial shmup thread but I’m here for it lol.
Here’s a couple uncommon curveballs, first game is Curse for Mega Drive:
By the time you get to the middle of the second stage in this game good luck finding your ship on the screen because the enemies start throwing bullets at you relentlessly. That last pic I took was the beginning of the craziness just getting started. Cool game with nice weapons though.
Next game is Steel Empire also for Mega Drive:
This game has this steam punk/early industrial revolution aesthetic that I like and has amazing parallex scrolling. That pic with the clouds I counted about 8 or 9 layers of clouds moving, looks amazing in motion. Gives you the choice between a plane or blimp with different strengths and weaknesses, you can also shoot forward or backwards.
This game could be a sleeper hit, haven’t gotten too far in it, I still haven’t even beaten Gaiares lol but I’m always looking for new games to play. Maybe you guys can check those out sometime.
To not be easy is the point and is what gives you that adrenaline rush and satisfaction when you survive!
Yes! that is correct and that is part of the charm of the genre!
…but difficulty is very relative, depending on many factor, so for someone to get the “feet wet” is not a bad idea to start with something more approachable!
I tried couple of runs at Gates of Thunder, got half way through ( it’s around 30 mins long), the game have a high pace and sometimes feels a little chaotic but seems fun! Also can see some small similarities with LoT just more rough around the edges and less refined.
One question: the music/sfx mix feels way off (played with beetle pce) sound effects cover most of the music, is it normal?
@hunterk thanks!
That’s something I noticed the first time I used Mednafen eons ago. I never noticed that with real hardware and I played primarily on a Sony Hi Fi Stereo System. In addition to that, I used to spend an inordinate amount of time playing the music in the Options menu and at times I used to play the samples and sound effects over the Music. I never noticed anything strange there.
Years later, I never noticed any issue with audio when I used to use Magic Engine.
So what I do now is simply adjust the audio levels myself in the Core Options.
So far, I haven’t gotten settings that work well for every CD-ROM² game so I save different Game Core Option for different games. So I have different settings for Gate of Thunder, Lords of Thunder and other games, a separate setting for Dracula X and I recently updated my Cores and that seems to reset the audio settings I think so I made a new setting for Ys Book I and II because I felt like the PSG audio was too low using my custom setting for Gate/Lords of Thunder.
So just adjust it so that the CD Music is prominent and you can hear the ADPCM samples clearly above the CD Music. For Gate of Thunder/Lords of Thunder you can probably leave the PSG at 100, set the ADPCM at 180 and set the CDDA at 200. Or you can swap the CDDA and ADPCM levels. I let my ears be the judge and use what’s most pleasant to me.
