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You've done justice to Battle Garegga and it echoes my thoughts, though you've constructed yours so well and laid them out. However, Armed Police Batrider deserves to be mentioned alongside Garegga for similar reasons. But Battle Garegga is one of the best games I've ever played, and for me it's the best shmup ever designed, with one of the best OSTs ever conceived.

One aspect I really enjoy about Garegga and similar games to this day is the opportunity for a more tailored challenge. Rank management is the best way for scoring and survival and I like playing that way, however it's also fun to see how far I can get with maximum rank, I've already 1 credited the game on Arcade difficulty so the rank adds more room for longevity and engagement, I can always keep pushing things further and gaining new skills and strategy. I got the game for it's amazing soundtrack and detailed graphical spectacle and stayed for the deep mechanics I appreciate that you've shared your own experience with it. Raizing games are all worth checking out imo

Unlock the hidden dragon for more fun in this game

Oh, you’re one of those good RUclipsrs huh? Great video

If you haven't checked them out already, look into the other Raizing offerings from around that same time. Armed Police Batrider and Battle Bakraid are both ones I recommend. Both of them refine the ranking system to be a little less... insane. Batrider also has some really crazy stuff like extra stages depending on if you're using some of the guest fighters.

I really enjoyed your video. Armed Police Batrider is also amazing from Shinobu Yagawa / Raizing.

not really related to the video itself but i wish more arcade type games gave you a ranking based on score its something so simple that goes a long way to make sure people actually want to go for high scores

Be shure to rotate your big ass crt by 90* to enjoy arcade Mode.

The four horsemen of shmups : Battle Garegga Ketsui Dodonpachi DaiOujou Mushihimesama Futari

Tried for the first time at the arcade in Osaka recently and I had no idea there was this much depth to the game. I didn't even notice the point things were for chaining. I thought they were just random. Also didn't know about the rank system. Loved battle garegga mainly because it's just got great levels but now I hope this helps me actually 1cc the game, ty.

Just finished it for the first time (using MAME). It is my first shmup ever, took around 15 continues. Dear God, what a rush! Haven’t felt like that in years when playing a game. That freakin final boss man, just phenomenal. Previously my favorite games where old school CRPGs like Fallout 2 and Deus Ex. But this game changed something for sure. I guess i’m hooked for life now.

Regarding what you said about the game design intentionality of the rank system, there actually is a good reason for that: a lot of Garegga’s design philosophy is borrowed directly from Gun Frontier, a Taito shmup and Shinobu Yagawa’s favorite in the genre. Yagawa’s work with Raizing shares not only the complex rank systems but also the heavy emphasis on visual setpieces and detailed environments. It’s fair to assume that *both* this legitimate artistic inspiration and the desire for financial income drove the inclusion of the rank system; it’s just a great system for devs and players alike, which is why it tends to show up in a great deal of shmups even on PC. I’d also like to point out that while home console games don’t really use lives anymore, neither do shmups use them in their original form :p Modern extend systems function more like health does in something like an action roguelike or a 3d platformer- they just got to that point by removing checkpoints instead of giving the player infinite lives, and made up the difference with bombs and other survival mechanics (including continues).

Great video! Garegga is a game that I can't help but revisit. I definitely didn't clock with it at first but once I actually got to grips with it I felt like a genius.

Battle Garegga was always my favourite shmup to play through as a beginner because of the ranking system. Dying in other shmups often felt either like an unfair punishment (especially those were you just straight up lose one tier of powerups in spite of the game getting harder) or inconsequential from a beginners perspective (you lose some score, whatever). In Battle Garegga you get some breathing room through the ranking system but at the same time super exciting sections if you somehow prevail. Also knowing nothing about unlocking advanced powerups and seemingly getting awesome firepower at random made them feel really special instead of the same ol' weapon you always work towards in other shmups. I played hundreds of playthroughs of Battle Garegga without knowing nothing about the ranking system other than the game getting a little easier after a death and actually got somewhat good at it through sheer brute force because subconciously it inticed me to play more with its dynamic nature. I think this may have been the original goal of the devs instead of creating an enigma for shmup experts to dig their teeth into but of course, that's speculation. Of course playing Garegga as this more laidback, chill beginner shmup was only possible if you had the MAME rom or very, very rich parents ^^

I always click on Garegga content, but rarely do I find smth of this quality. The only issue I have w/ it is that you seem to assume I can get an extend...

this is an amazing video, I heard that gun frontier, border down, and ibara carry this rank-controlling philosophy rather well

To me, the biggest advantage of the PS4/XBOX versions, recommended at the end of the video are the pink-colored enemy bullets. The metal-colored bullets in the original arcade version are at times incredibly hard to see, making for an experience that ends up completely ruining this otherwise s-tier stg for me.

Plane go BURRRRRR

Great video, really interesting. I'd never even heard of this game

#pewpew

Great video. Just downloaded the saturn version for my Steam Deck. I always enjoyed shmups but I never paid this one much attention. Didn’t know there was such depth and uniqueness to this particular game.

Great video! Garegga is one of the best. Even if it might seem scary from what a player hears about it, it's a great option once you feel like you need something different. The quote from Yagawa sounds weird out of context, but in the full interview he express in many ways how he's proud of the game and made sure to tune it to be as good as possible.

This was a great vid. Just recently went back to play this on my Saturn... I always loved how this game makes you feel like a GENIUS when you get the items and rankings all synched up during a playthrough...

Absolutely lovely work, Luke! It is wonderful to see this video editorial after having watched you play these games and gather hardware piece by piece in The Bunker. I know how many hours went into that lone Alien Soldier clips! Haha!

got into Battle Garegga recently purely because of the soundtrack and visual aesthetic but watching this and learning about the absurd complexity in its mechanics that completely passed me by has been fun, I’ll be sure to keep a lot of this in mind whenever I play it again

Man, thanks for making this video. What a treat! One thing you didn't touch on that I think is pretty unique to Garegga is the way the options work. Having to mash a button in order to swap formations can contribute to the game's frantic nature and is just really fun. The big-brained secret option formations are also really cool.

I really enjoyed this, and I'm glad you talked about how this design came from a kind of nasty place, whilst also so eloquently elucidating why the game is still so compelling in spite of, and even because of it. I think there can often be a tendency to romanticise arcade design as "purer", which the economic realities of the time don't bear out, really, but finding beauty intertwined with that ugliness is kind of a microcosm of what it can mean to appreciate art like this a lot of the time. We're all fighting against the material circumstances we're stuck in, whether we're making art or enjoying it. "Even though the ideal is high, I never give in..." or something like that... I've been trying to get into shmups more lately with G-Darius and others and have always meant to give Garegga a shot but I feel like this has given me a really good framework of appreciation for it. Great video!

This was a beautiful exploration of shmup design, thank you! I got into Garegga recently too and really came to appreciate it. I feel like one of the things that made me engage with it was that it forced me to score for survival, all the way through. And that feeds into what you said about always having meaningful decisions to make. A classic for sure. Also, Gain ftw :)

Just finished watching this, everything you went over is how I feel about Garegga, It's still one of my favorite shmups of all time and every time I play it it's still just as fun and engaging as the first time I played it 6 years ago. You mentioned that 25 years later, people are still finding ways to push the game further; this is true! the usage of synchronizing your shot firing frame to get slightly more points on various sections of the game is becoming more widespread. As well as a few new tidbits on Stage 6 to squeeze out just eeks of points here and there. Garegga is truly a wonderous game. While ironically stage 3 is my least favorite (its a little slow and only a few things to do) Stages 5, 6 and 7 are some of the most fun I have in this genre. Truly a masterclass game. Thanks Yagawa and thank you Luke for this video

Nice vid! I will say though, using "player expression" in the context of a Gregga 1cc/scoring doesn't make a whole lot of sense IMO. You make choices in Greg, but they aren't you expressing yourself - they're simply your attempt to evaluate what the best option is given very ambiguous unclear context. Your choices get evaluated based on the game's objective performance metrics and the more you understand the game's mechanics the more solidified your routes become. Garegga is particularly good at encouraging decision making becasue of how well it obfuscates optimal strats (even if you have rank details enabled, the slow granular nature of rank makes it a lot harder to track). Presumably if you knew what the optimal choice was in any given situation & had the ability to execute it, you'd always go for it no? Player expression happens mostly when you choose which ship you play, when you decide to commit to a 1cc or a survival run, it's when you deliberately go against what's optimal, what's sensible within the logic of the game. You could say that merely having a playstyle is self expression (some of them obviously are - suboptimal/unnecessary ones for example) but at that point the meaning of "expression" gets very fuzzy since playstyles tend to be the result of players falling into more comfortable patterns unconsciously even if they don't want to. A good example here would be Radiant Silvergun which has a similar game long resource build up (which affects difficulty in a different way) but is a lot clearer in what it wants you to do - I'd be hard pressed to say that I choose the chains I choose because I'm expressing myself, it's just cause I'm not good enough to go for harder chains. Player expression as a design virtue is less of an arcade thing (they're obsessed with objective performance metrics, after all) and more of a modern lense that tries to shove square pegs into round holes. Another thing is that, while Gregga's rank being a game long resource is fairly unique, if you zoom in a little bit these dynamics are nearly universal in shmups with indepth scoring. Ketsui which you showed is a great example of that since once you get into scoring you will be figuring out how to best gain/spend your chips and figuring out enemy base values right from the get-go. Guwange is another great example, because the earlier you get to 1000 coins, the quicker you can start milking enemies/bosses for EVEN MORE coins. This is really nice design for the arcades, but it does come with its drawbacks - the more you stress the player early on, the more prone to resets the game will be. Eventually players will have a hard time even making it out of the first 2 stages and seeing the rest of the game. And ofc getting people to care about scoring is hard, but hey choosing to go for a good score is some solid player expression ;) ....Also Greg's take on rank to me highlights the problem with trying to wipe away abstract elements from games. Developers have been trying to ground the under-the-hood elements of games in in-universe objects (think score vs actual ingame coins), which makes them more accessible to players but as a result trains them to be less tolerant of abstractions. As a result completely unique experiences like Garegga become unpalatable to the modern audience. Not just because of difficulty/lack of familiarity with conventions but because of their low tolerance for abstractions. It legit massively limits what game developers can do, and in turn homogenizes games.

Great vid Luke ❤ maybe it’s time to take a break from the Saturn version and dive in to that M2 port…

you don't really need to score to get extends in most shmups as pure survival is usually enough to meet thresholds. garegga only encourages scoring cause it doesn't cap score extends unlike most other games. scoring is generally a bad idea as it makes the early game harder which will cause more resets. being in early game jail is mentally taxing and you'll also end up seeing the later stages less often which means less opportunities to practice, so by the time you do reach the late game, you won't be prepared and you'll get your ass kicked. i recommend beginners to ignore scoring and just focus on the 1cc, then they can think about if they wanna score or not speaking of new players idk if i'd show garegga to them cause it's hard lol. i'm aware the m2 port has a super easy mode but they're too easy to really teach you anything and the gap between that and arcade mode is enormous so they won't transition well, if at all. something like mushi original would be a better start i've always thought garegga was overrated, at least from a scoring perspective. the mechanics are cool and all but unfortunately it has milking which i really don't like. i like my shmups to be short and sweet, but a score run of this game takes like 50 minutes which is way too long. i really don't get how anyone can call this the greatest shmup of all time when you have to shoot boss 1 for two minutes every credit

Great video. I'd appreciate the game more if I could see the fucking bullets though.

How did I correctly say there were seven time stones in my recording at 10:07 and then falsely correct myself in an edit by saying there were only six? the clip right after literally shows seven on screen? what was my problem 😭

The 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand clip at the start infinitely unnerves me but I still respect it.

Excellent video bb

One of the few games where a critical head shot can be a negative outcome, if you wanted to stun an enemy to create more space. Now, you suddenly have to adapt while the other enemies are getting closer. This is also why I like the instant weapon swapping through the menu. You can always react to all the RNG outcomes. What a game.

Great video! If you do one for wonderful 101 and alien soldier. Im all here for it!

🎉🎉🎉

Really liked every clip you used was perfectly lined up with what you were discussing. The 3rd strike clip was just as impressive as it was hilarious. Excellent editing!

Great video! I'm curious, given how you talked about it in this video, if you have tried it - how does Resi 4 *play* when you don't interact with the merchant at all? To me, he's such a crucial part of the macro loop of the game, treasure hunting is important to the downtime, and the majority of the rewards the game gives you for successful play - both in terms of combat and exploration - that imagining him totally subtracted from the experience feels like it would result in a totally different game, and one that I don't necessarily think I like the sound of as much, purely in the abstract. How did you find it?

second

first

Super well spoken and put together video. Hope to see you upload another one!

great video!

This is very well presented! Great work!

good shit, managed to make me reconsider my feelings on a game i had largely written off

Nice video! Sonic CD has a flow that both manages to be different than other 2D Sonic games while still feeling distinctly "Sonic" and I think that's worth appreciating. You've easily earned a sub.

Props for making this exactly 15 minutes 😳

I liked the video, though I still disagree with you at the end of the day. I really think you should play Sonic 3 & Knuckles at some point. Also it probably would’ve helped to specify between the original CD release and the Christian Whitehead release since the original had serious collision detection issues that made the game really uncomfortable to play and made the process of getting the generators and Time Stones an absolute pain in the ass. Also, when Alien Soldier Review?