Share your hidden gems and insider tips

IanDaemon

I have to say Juno First is an awesome game that I never heard of before playing it through MAME.

Super Gem Fighters Mini Mix released in the U.S. as "Pocket FIghters" is a great cartoony one-on-one fighting game.

Espgaluda was a "hidden gem" personally as I'd never got to play it before.

thelostsoul

I also discovered Juno First while doing this thread. The game is from 1983 at it is awesome. I love the sound and graphics style. Imagine that for its time back then.
Espagaluda was seen as a sort of indirect sequel to Esprade and seems to be highly respected in the shmup community (a friend of me was there).

IanDaemon

@thelostsoul Just my opinion: Esprade is OK. For CAVE shooters I love :

DoDonPachi (faster and more complicated than DonPachi)
Espgaluda (great to have something other than 'screen clearing bomb' in a Danmaku game)
Ketsui (lovely graphics)

thelostsoul

@IanDaemon Oh ok, I see you know these games. I only played DoDonPachi (love this game) of them and tried out DonPachi. Both are great games, prefer the sequel too. By the way, I am not an expert here by any means and want try out the other games too (more than just testing if the games are working). Your opinion is much appreciated.

May I ask you which system and computer you use to play these? On the PC there wouldn't be any issue, but I concentrate on Raspberry Pi. I have the Cave games using under FBA emulator and they seem to run just fine. If you run under same environment, do you experience any problems?

IanDaemon

@thelostsoul I run all of my retro stuff on a Raspberry Pi 3B+. I was given the shell of an old Golden Tee 2005 cabinet (basically just an MDF box) so I put a TV and a Raspbery Pi in it with an X-arcade Tankstick. I'm running RetroPie 4.4, EmulationStation, and have multiple emulators installed (AdvMAME, FBA, MAME 2003, MAME 2010). I play around and see which one works for which ROM.

Sometimes tinkering is not my friend. I've lost sound before and couldn't get settings to save, but I have all of my ROMs backed up so I could reformat the SD card and re-install the machine in an evening.

I still have to sand and paint a board to replace the kickplate area and the holes for the coin door and dollar-bill acceptor. Last week I made a custom panel to replace the "tournament rules" insert that sits between the speakers. Oh, and I wired the speakers with a new amplifier to use the original speakers with the TV output.

thelostsoul

@IanDaemon That sounds like an awesome setup. I also utilize M2003 and 2010 and FBA, but not AdvMAME for now, but I use a pc monitor sadly 480p instead of 240p and use an arcade fightstick for arcade games, and a snes like gamepad on consoles. I decided to go this way, because its easier to setup than real tv and old crt tvs in Germany only accept 50Hz, which can cause problems with NTSC games. Whatever this is a different story for a different day. You are so lucky with the Golden Tee cabinet. In Germany the situation is very bad and almost no arcades (it is forbidden for kids since always).

IanDaemon

@thelostsoul said in Share your hidden gems and insider tips:

@IanDaemon That sounds like an awesome setup. I also utilize M2003 and 2010 and FBA, but not AdvMAME for now, but I use a pc monitor sadly 480p instead of 240p and use an arcade fightstick for arcade games, and a snes like gamepad on consoles. I decided to go this way, because its easier to setup than real tv and old crt tvs in Germany only accept 50Hz, which can cause problems with NTSC games. Whatever this is a different story for a different day. You are so lucky with the Golden Tee cabinet. In Germany the situation is very bad and almost no arcades (it is forbidden for kids since always).

I was actually sitting with a guy at work and he said "so would you be interested in an old arcade cabinet?". The thing was just being stored. It's really big and heavy as heck. I actually found some old leaves in the bottom, but started putting things back together. I'm using a smaller flat screen television instead of an old CRT monitor due to convenience (and not having one), but I'm in the small minority of not liking the scanlines anyway (even though there may be features in RA).

VictimRLSH

Galaxy Wars, 1979 Universal (MAME 2003) - A clever take on the space invaders theme, you guide a missile through asteroid belts and incoming fire into two layers of flying saucers at the top of the screen. The fire button launches your rocket and is also for thrust once you launch. If you can't find a suitable target by the time your rocket reaches the top of the screen, you can launch it again WITHOUT losing a life.

While appearing simple, the gameplay gets more complex as you have to figure out how to get your missile to the target through shots that are coming down too fast to dodge. You can hide in the rocks if you are careful not to run into them. If is also possible to 'thread the needle' between shots fired from the lower layer of enemies scrolling to the left, and the upper layer scrolling to the right, as the upper enemies will NOT drop a bomb over one of the lower ones.

This game also has some hidden secrets. While you get more score for hitting the exact center of the flying saucers, it is also more risky. All the scoring is based on risk. If you are cozy to the rocks, on the edge of the screen, or dodging many shots, your scores will be higher.

Another secret is similar to the "bulletproof necktie" on Berzerk that allowed a shot to travel through the gap between you player's head and body without killing you. In this game, if you can get an incoming shot to land EXACTLY on the tip of your rocket, it will not destroy your rocket.

thelostsoul

@VictimRLSH First I thought this would be a simple Space Invaders ripoff. But as soon as I saw the footage, I realized this is not true. The idea of a rocket under your control is quite interesting and adds another layer of skill.

VictimRLSH

@thelostsoul I spent most of a snowy night in a motel lobby in Ellensburg playing this one. It was the only game they had. My first impression before playing was "This looks lame, but oh well.."

I didn't get much sleep that night.

thelostsoul

@VictimRLSH When did this happen?

IanDaemon

@thelostsoul I played some "DoDonPachi: Dai Ou Jou" last night and it looks great, but...wow, it's hard! Maybe I just haven't played it enough.

thelostsoul

@IanDaemon Definitive. Those bullet hell games aren't easy, none of them. The graphics are so cool and the soundtrack also very pulsing. I love to play this game, just for fun. Oh, you talk about an another entry in the series. Need to test this too. :)

VictimRLSH

@thelostsoul That was when I was a kid, about 13 I think.

IanDaemon

@thelostsoul This person's playthrough makes it look easy.

Brigane

Since you guys are talking about shmups I feel like I should mention "Battle Squadron" for the Amiga & Sega Genesis (I prefer the amiga version). I wouldn't exactly call it a hidden gem but it's still quite a lot of fun to play.

thelostsoul

@Brigane An additional comparison page for Amiga and Mega Drive version.
http://www.retro-sanctuary.com/Comparisons-Battle-Squadron.html
The game itself looks fine, I tried the Mega Drive version of it. But I miss the appeal of Amiga sound and music design.

Clyde

@Brigane @thelostsoul Battle Squadron was one of my favourite Amiga games in my teens. I don't know how it compares with all other SMUPS for the Amiga, but I loved its art style, music, playability, and little details like the metallic tick sounds when shots hit an enemy, but didn't destroy it yet.

Clyde

Apropos, another of my favourite Amiga SHMUPS was Hybris:

edit: A nice feature was that upgrades made you bigger as well as more powerful, so you could get hit slightly easier, but the bigger shell also worked as a form of protection, if I recall correctly (I should play it again some time).

Brigane

@Clyde Hybris looks amazing. I should really set up my old Commodore Amiga 1200 for the full retro gaming pleasure when I try this out.