Shoot 'em ups?

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Anybody know any good entry-level shmups? I'm looking to get into the genre more but I know so many of these games are notorious for their difficulty. I'd prefer older games (2000 and earlier) but later games are alright too.

Well you could always start with some of the early, early titles, like Space Invaders and Xevious =)

I find the music in Xevious incredibly grating, though. Ditto to 1942.

Those kinds of games do take a lot of practice. I've managed to beat Contra (the NES version) without cheating, but it took a while.

There was one on the Sega CD that I managed to finish too...Robo Aleste I think it was? I know it was a Compile game.

Jets'n'Guns

To be honest, you're going to find very, very few games that would be called "entry level" in this genre.

Back in the arcade era these games were designed to take your quarters, and that meant high difficulty. Or in the case of old console games, they were designed to keep you playing them often despite being extremely short. Again, that's accomplished by keeping the challenge very high.

In modern games, they're designed to challenge those that are really into the genre... and that means even higher difficulty.

And to be honest, playing easier ones doesnt prepare you for the tougher stuff. It just doesnt. At least not too much. There's typically a massive difficulty spike between "easy" and "hard" ones.

And it also depends on what type of shmup you want. Traditional, or bullet-hell? Both offer unique types of challenges. Traditional uses fewer bullets, but they're much faster (in some cases, TOO fast, requiring memorization to dodge) and many of them will also have loads of walls and obstacles to deal with (particularly something like R-Type). Bullet-hell on the other hand doesnt involve any walls or obstacles in almost all cases, but that's because the screen is drowning in glowing doom, however the bullets move quite slow and your hitbox is the size of a couple of pixels. In all my years with the genre, I've found that bullet-hell is quite a bit harder, but dramatically more rewarding. One reason is the scoring system. Shmups are almost always played for score, and more traditional ones usually have rather braindead scoring systems (blow thing up, get points, repeat).


If I had to choose one to start with... I would pick the original Giga Wing (arcade). If you can manage to 1cc that game, AND defeat the "true" final boss (requires meeting special conditions to even fight it), you'll at least be on the road to learning to mentally process all of the chaos the genre offers. However, harder games can and absolutely will still stomp your face in. Get used to losing. Because it's going to happen over... and over... and over... and over... If you cant deal with that part, this is not the genre for you. And note that a game in this genre is not considered "beaten" until you do it without using even one continue (and many of them outright lock endgame content from you if you do continue).

I would strongly suggest experimenting and trying out all sorts of games though. Dont worry if they seem too hard (because really, the whole genre will). Just keep trying out different ones to see what you like and what you dont. If you're willing to use emulators, there's about 5 zillion of these out there, easily accessed.


Been into these for many years, myself. Hardest one I've managed to beat is Mushihime-sama, on Ultra difficulty. But even playing at that level, these always offer up a true challenge.

I sort of know what I'm getting into as far as difficulty goes. I know most of the games are punishingly difficult and I'm not expecting to get the hang of it very quickly.
I guess I'm more looking for games that are "hard but fair" without too ridiculous of a difficulty curve or too steep of a penalty for dying, like losing all your upgrades and being screwed in later levels.

To be honest, "punishingly difficult" doesnt even come close.

Everyone always uses Dark Souls as a measure of difficulty nowadays, yeah? Well, to be blunt, that game wouldnt even register on the difficulty meter when compared to this genre. Doesnt even come close. As hard as Dark Souls seems, if you simply keep digging at it, you *will* win in the end, even if your personal skill with that type of game doesnt go up. It's like the original Castlevania... the difficulty is super deceptive. It's nowhere near as hard as it looks. This is how many hard games are.

Shmups arent like that. They look like they'll pound your face in... and then they prove to be about 20x harder than they looked, and only get worse from there. That's why I always say to potential new players: You gotta be ready to lose. Lose 100 times, and then lose 100 more. You cant beat these by just grinding away at them like you can with most difficult games. Either your actual skill level rises high enough... which takes alot of time... or you will not win.

There's a comparison I'm going to make here, because I think it best illustrates what goes into this. Fighting games. In any fighting game, if you want to really, truly compete, you're expected to practice. And I mean alot. Like, hundreds of hours just to Git Gud, as they say. And you'll do that, you'll be ready to fight... and you will get stomped anyway. Back to more practicing. Then more getting stomped. The genre often has trouble drawing in new players not because the games arent fun or enjoyable, but because it's THAT FREAKING BRUTAL. And time consuming. Fighting games are a major time sink and can also be a big source of frustration and stress. I mean seriously you should see how ANGRY that community is...

Shmups (and also roguelikes) are like that (not the community part). Endless practice and lots and lots of losing, over a period of time that's muuuuuuch longer than the learning curve for most games. And an incredibly repetitive gameplay loop with a rather crazy difficulty curve.

I keep emphasizing this stuff mostly because I do really think it's important to know. The last thing you want to do is dive into this genre, buy/download these games, and then 200 hours in, realize that you really dont like it at all and are only getting frustration and stress from it. With something like this it's important to know what you're ACTUALLY getting into. I do think it's a very rewarding genre though. If it does turn out to be something you like, there's lots of good stuff to be had there.


Now as for that last thing you mentioned, with the powerups, modern shmups dont really do that. It's the much older ones that do that bit. I mean, think about it: taking powerups away from the player in an area that REQUIRES them in order to proceed is literally unfair. Heck, I can think of a couple of levels in the Gradius series where you are *guaranteed* to get blown up if you dont have enough speed upgrades. And being "unfair" like that is one of the cardinal sins of the genre for many fans these days. Not that Gradius isnt a good game mind you, but that's the sort of game you want to avoid. Those older ones that used that idea alot.

Many modern shmups technically have powerups, but they're... tangential at best. Like a piece that doesnt really need to be there. Like in Dodonpachi for instance. When you get hit, you'll drop the "powerups" you had... but they'll just bounce around the screen. When you respawn a couple of seconds later, you have plenty of invincibility time to just grab the things and get back into position. I honestly dont get why they even HAVE the damn things in that series. And other shmups just outright dont use the concept.

BEAT HAZARD on Steam? Plays a lot like Asteroids. I think it has a wide range of difficulty settings.

It's main gimmick is the graphics animation is responsive to the soundtrack and you can add songs to play with the game.

This game is newer, but with a polished arcade feel.

I'd recommend the excellent Ikaruga (2001) made by Treasure. You can pick it up on Steam for $10, which is a fair bit less than many similar games. It's very challenging, with mechanics that are simple to learn but hard to master, rewarding riskier play.

If you're looking for something more classic than that and free, you can pick up Tyrian (1995), developed by Epic. It's been ported to pretty much everything and is much easier than most other games in the genre owing to being originally developed for PC rather than arcades. The lack of influence from the arcade gives it a much different design as well, with a story campaign told through data logs, outfitting before missions, save game support and a ton of unlockable game modes. Plus it has mouse support, which IMO is way better for these sorts of games than gamepad.

Both have multiple difficulty settings that make a significant difference in difficulty, which make them ideal for beginners.

Doom

I hate to have to be contradictory here, but....

Ikaruga is.... ehhhh. To be honest it's one of the games I wouldnt recommend for new players.

Reason: Complicated controls/mechanics that are REQUIRED to get anywhere. A new player to the genre is going to have enough trouble just dodging stuff. Better to stick to something a bit simpler. Not to mention that Treasure's games arent exactly good representations of the genre as a whole. They tend to be a bit... strange. Alot of techniques learned in those dont translate whatsoever to the rest of the genre.

I've never liked them at all, to be honest. Come to think of it, I've never liked almost anything they made. Except Gunstar Heroes, for some reason.

Anyway, start with something simple where you can focus on learning to dodge things without adding unnecessary complications, and also focus on being able to deal with the inevitable visual chaos the genre is known for.


Also DONT start with mouse support. Absolutely do not. Simple reason: Damn near the entire genre doesnt support use of a mouse (and there's good reason for that). TERRIBLE for practice.

Ideally you get an arcade stick for these. I personally dont use one, but that's because my arm cant take it. If not an arcade stick, a controller does just fine, BUT, it needs a good d-pad to do that. Analog use will just get you blown up over and over. And some controllers have absolutely godawful d-pads. Notably anything Xbox. They're outright legendary for really awful dpads. As I discovered the hard way, it's possible to hit "down" on one and have it think you're hitting "up". Yeah. It's THAT bad.

PS4 (used to be PS3) is what I've always gone with. Actually fairly easy to get Sony's controllers working on a PC. Supposedly Nintendo's stuff is an option, if you can manage to get it hooked up. There are probably plenty of other controller options.... "PC gamepads"... but again, gotta be careful to get something that doesnt have a crappy, flimsy dPad.

But yeah, if you're REALLY going to get into the genre... and if you dont have screwy tendon/nerve issues like I do... an arcade stick is the way to go for best accuracy. Almost everything will support that, and the very few games that dont, can be FORCED to support it.

Getting an arcade stick or a gamepad if you don't already have one is a pretty big investment for someone dipping their toes into the water. I suggested Tyrian because it runs on just about anything that has a processor and a screen and it's free. The mouse support is also great because even though most other games of the genre don't support it, you'd be hard pressed to find someone with a PC but not a mouse or even a trackpad. Heck, you can even just use your phone and use the touchscreen, god knows tons of people find that covering half the screen with your thumbs is somehow an acceptable way to play games like this.

If a game only supports eight cardinal directions, then keyboard is fine. I have owned about twenty gamepads in my lifetime and only a couple have had decent D-Pads that would be at least on par with a good keyboard.

If you're on console, that's another matter. Sony's DPads are good, and the Xbox Elite's is the best DPad I've ever used, though it costs a lot. All the other Xbox controllers are absolute trash though, I remember trying to play Tetris and fighting games on them before and it was completely unplayable.

I'm not going to get myself an arcade stick or gamepad for just a handful of games. Too much effort and/or money. I'll just make due with my keyboard or whatever d-pad goes with the console the game is on.

The thing about shmups: They're a MASSIVE time-sink. I wasnt at all exaggerating about that. I can think of more than one game that I've probably put 500+ hours into. One notable one has been 1000+ (because that's how long it took to get ONE win). A "handful of games" tends to work a bit differently in this genre than in others, since they're designed for an absolutely stupid amount of replayability. That's the main reason I always suggest the stick, because in that case it's absolutely worth the price and effort. Anyone that does end up really getting into the genre would actually end up WASTING more time by not getting a good method of control (because not doing that will drastically slow down your progress). Though yes, a controller is just fine too, though oddly many players seem to have alot of trouble with that. I'm not quite sure why, but then I've been forced to use one the whole time.

Keyboard, now... for something easy like Tyrian it can be okay, but dont even bother with more modern games if you're going that route. Very, very few players can actually get away with that one. It effectively multiplies the amount of skill that is required to succeed. I wont go into just why, that's a bit of a long explanation. For consoles, well... it depends on which console. Oddly, the XBox 360 has the most shmups (of the modern ones). It also has a controller so unfathomably bad that a stick becomes a *requirement*. The other recent consoles either A: have very, very few of these (AAA devs dont touch the genre, after all, and indie devs have a very hard time getting games on those), or B: have some, but they're expensive imports from Japan. Older consoles now, they've got plenty. Lotsa good stuff. Though you're more likely to run into games that have the Gradius Problem with those.

I actually thought of a couple more suggestions here, for something a little less ridiculous to start with.

If you're willing to go back as far as the NES, try Life Force. It's definitely one of the easier ones I can think of despite having the Gradius Problem. The original Gradius on the other hand is brutal.

Also, the first few R-Type games. Firstly they're bloody brilliant, but also they're not AS ridiculous as the rest of the genre. Dont get me wrong, they're still very hard, but the game's unique mechanic gives you some leeway and an actual way of defending yourself.



As for the phone, you know, I've actually found ALOT of shmups on mobile (including direct ports of things like Mushihime, even... without them being altered or dumbed down) and interestingly, it's actually the single most accurate control method I've ever seen for the genre.

....When done on a tablet. I dont use a phone. Phone screen is just far too small. Indeed, you'd cover up half the bloody screen on one of those. But on my iPad? Well, there's a reason why there are so many shmups even on iOS. You dont actually have to cover any part of the gameplay since the screen is so huge. Usually your finger is way below where your ship actually is, and your motions translate to it's movements (there's no virtual dpad/stick or anything, they dont work that way). It's not a "keep your finger directly on your ship the whole time" sort of thing. Well, unless the game is made by idiots, of course.

I dont play them too much these days though. The "App-pocalypse" on iOS did way too much damage (I refuse to update and let it hit mine) and my device goes slowly more and more insane. Ah, how that platform has fallen... Bah.

Logitech are fairly inexpensive.