Keeping with the Milestone theme, I picked up these two Naomi GDRoms relatively cheaply. Not your typical style shooters, Milestone shmups favor function over form with complicated scoring mechanics and simple cell shaded artwork. Maybe its the need for variety over Cave danmaku, but I'm finding these games refreshing. The catchy techno soundtracks also help to hold my interest.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
April GETs
Posted by Arcade Fever at 9:08 PM 0 comments
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Bombjack Twin highscore
NMK really upped the speed (and thus difficulty) in Bombjack Twin, making average game play times in the single digit minutes. This game is not for casual play, unless you like being stuffed by round 3 all the time. But there is definitely a pattern that can be found, where memorizing paths, and timing when the P icon comes out (which freeze the screen), can really help to finish off stages quickly. Each round has 3 stages, and after two completed rounds a special bonus round contributes to a majority of your score. Thus my highscore table below shows some big jumps after stage 3 and 6. I believe I got an extend icon by round 4 or 5.
DJK - 766,420 7-1
Posted by Arcade Fever at 8:23 PM 0 comments
Labels: *My High Scores*, Bombjack Twin
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
March GETs
I could not pass up an opportunity to snatch up one of those new Radirgy Noa kits on YAJ.
As well as another rarely seen NMK sequel (the original put NMK on the map) Bombjack Twin!
Posted by Arcade Fever at 8:33 PM 3 comments
Labels: Bombjack Twin, Radirgy Noa
Tuesday, March 09, 2010
The TRON desk is back!
Last December, I pointed out that Japanese STG blogger Ikeda_San had this cool black Taito cocktail cabinet, that looked similar to Dillenger's desk in the movie TRON. Well now the desk is back in its full glory, and I can't wait to see it coming out this December!
Posted by Arcade Fever at 4:36 PM 0 comments
Labels: Misc
Sunday, March 07, 2010
Espgaluda II Black Label release party
This past weekend, I hosted a get-together for local SF Bay Area friends to celebrate Cave's Espgaluda II Black Label for XB360. I have to admit that one of the best things about these latest Cave ports are the Novice modes. Although these provide little challenge for 1CC, they do give an opportunity to really understand the deep scoring mechanics for what is considered one of Caves most complex games. I can attest to getting quite frustrated at this game in PCB form, and as such, have never given it a lot of attention, but am really enjoying the opportunity to learn it in a more friendly environment, which I'm sure non-shmup players would also find quite accessible. It seems that Cave really does understand the difference between their hardcore PCB fans and consumer console players.
Besides playing Cave's latest XB360 port (with its equally awesome Black Label and Arrange modes), we also played a few unreleased Cave titles, namely Muchi Muchi Pork and Pink Sweets, as well as some Type X2 games, and classic Genesis games via a jamma-converter.
Posted by Arcade Fever at 8:45 PM 1 comments
Labels: Espgaluda II, Misc
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Rapid Hero highscore
I finally spent some quality time with Rapid Hero this Saturday, racking up a decent score, with plenty of room for improvement. In this run, I died twice in a row on stage 5, and was about to restart the game, but decided to stick it out to see how far I could get with 1 ship remaining. I got a 1UP in stage 6, and finally died part way into stage 7.
Overall, I'd say Rapid Hero is pretty easy up until stage 5, making this a pure joy to pickup and play without any prior practicing. Nothing beats ripping through waves of popcorn enemy, and collecting 10000 bonus chips. Stage 5 and onward has lots of scoring potential with strategies for positioning your ship for maximum amount of enemy destruction, while weaving through slow moving bullets that get left behind. There is really only 1 boss of the game, who keeps running away at the end of each level after taking a beating, but comes back with bigger and badder armor and attachments next time.
I'm pretty confident I could 1CC this soon, but now I need to prepare for next weekend's shmupmeet!
DJK - 2,102,030 - Stage 7 [Score Update!]
Posted by Arcade Fever at 1:25 PM 0 comments
Labels: *My High Scores*, Rapid Hero
Monday, February 22, 2010
Rapid Hero
If you hadn't noticed by now, I'm a huge NMK fan, and this PCB had occupied the number 1 slot of my most wanted list for the last 3 years! What most consider the pinnacle of NMK's vertical shooters, is also the most rare, so words can't express how happy I am to now have this in my collection. ^_^
[Update 08/31/13]
Earlier this year, a Korean / International version of Rapid Hero was discovered called Arcadia. As with other Korean region games, these have notably different colored silk-screening and components (typically cheaper to save costs). System11 over at shmups forum has broken down the general difference between regions as follows:
Japanese build NMK pcb:
- Amp screwed down to the PCB
- Small filter caps near all TTL chips
- Typical paper square NMK ROM labels
- Typical paper NMK serial sticker (obviously these are often missing)
- Mostly Japanese brand TTL chips - Motorola everywhere
Korean built NMK pcb:
- Amp just floating - typical assembly method for Korean and bootleg games
- Mitsubishi ROM labels - again common in Korea
- Incorrect large filter cap sizes - back in the day cheaper brands were often larger
- Most of the small filters are missing (a cost cutting measure, extrremely common on Korean boards of all makes)
- Masses of Goldstar chips - while you do see isolated use on some Japanese boards, it's normal for Korean boards to be covered with them.
There has been at least one occurrence of a Korean built Arcadia board surfacing with Rapid Hero roms covered with Mitsubishi stickers. Its unclear if this was a rom-swap by Korean importers, or are original JP roms populated by Korean distributors. I've included some examples of recent sales, the last one being the board with RH roms.
Arcadia sold on eBay for $611 by boardfixxer (Korean importer) on Jun 03, 2013
Arcadia sold on eBay for $999 by www_worldhobbyist_com for $999 (Korean importer) on Aug 13, 2013
Aracdia with Rapid Hero roms on shmups forum sold for (unknown amt) by snkpowa on Jul 13, 2013 and then again for €460 by warlord on Aug 31, 2013
Arcadia unsold on ebay for $999 by by boardfixxer (Korean importer) on May 30, 2015
[Update 08/28/19]
So it turns out one of my friends recently bought a Rapid Hero board, which is a pretty rare find nowadays. Upon looking at the picture, it was clear the board was actually an Arcadia that had been rom swapped to Rapid Hero. All the tell tail signs were there, as described above, in fact upon closer inspection, the board he bought (in late 2019) was actually the 2nd board I have pictured above that sold on eBay Aug 13th 2013! Lets take a closer look at his board:
First off, the pea green colored silkscreened top board is a dead giveaway of an Arcadia. Then there is the floating amp, black caps, and goldstar chips. What has changed is removing of the Korean tax sticker across the mask roms, and of course newly burned roms with fake labels (which were pretty well done).
So how do we know for sure this is the same as the 2013 Arcadia on eBay? Look closely at the mask roms where the tax sticker was removed. Notice the scraps along the bottom right most mask rom. Also notice the same irregularities around the jamma edge. And finally if you look at the first SMT chip below the jamma edge, again you will see a similar scrape along the right and left on the chip.
So yes, people are trying to pass off Korean Arcadia's as Japan Rapid Hero's, and going to great lengths to do so. Now why would someone do this? I'm sure the Korean version is just as rare, and in my opinion just as valuable. But to the otaku PCB collector, they will pay much more money for an authentic Japan region board than the same game made for international distribution. This is what creates demand for these types of conversion shenanigans.
Five year bump since last update (14 years since original post)! Another Rapid Hero appears on eBay, this time by a well known China seller (who happens to also sell cave cv1K bootlegs). But this one looks to be legit. Both PCBs have the correct JPN color and components. The unlabeled program rom is not unusual, mine also came that way from a Japanese operator. Of course prices have come a long way in 10 years on eBay. The seller is w45050 and the listing price is $6000! I'll have to update this again, if it sells, but likely with offers turned on, we won't know know it actually sells for.
Posted by Arcade Fever at 4:20 PM 8 comments
Labels: Rapid Hero
Saturday, February 20, 2010
Astro Restoration
Last month I bought this fixer-upper from Kenchan on the shmups forum. I remember the same cabinet being offered on the sega-naomi forum awhile ago, due to the distict "Lyfer" graffiti scratched into the monitor. :(
And here is the finished cab.
Posted by Arcade Fever at 8:42 PM 2 comments
Labels: Misc
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Ketsui Highscore
I've never given Ketsui a lot of attention since my last high score, only playing it on random occasions. In fact I'd almost call it casual play, since I have no strategy, other than trying to get as many 5 chips as possible. I think I decided to bomb more often in this run, and it paid off, getting me almost halfway into stage 5.
DJK - 95,357,314 - Stage 5 - Tiger Schwert
I'd really like to clear this before the port comes out for xbox360...but seems unlikely without some serious time and attention.
Posted by Arcade Fever at 6:39 PM 1 comments
Labels: *My High Scores*, Ketsui
Saturday, January 09, 2010
Ketsui crashes with no battery. Solved!
After having discovered what happens to Varta batteries if left unchecked, I decided it was best to remove them from all of my PGM Cave boards (Espgaluda, DoDonPachi Dai-Ou-Jou, Ketsui). Since I always use default settings and always play with coins, I figured there was no need to buy new batteries, only to have them fail sometime in the future, so I just left them off the PCB.
[update]
So it seems option 2 above, using the red switch to reset NVRAM (and fix the demo crashing bug), didn't seem to work 100% of the time. So option 1 is really the only way to ensure your Ketsui doesn't crash without a battery: just insert a coin (or press the credit button) after booting up the PCB and all will be fine.
[/update]
Posted by Arcade Fever at 11:39 PM 5 comments
Labels: Ketsui
Saturday, December 26, 2009
A Merry Christmas!
Santa was good to me this Christmas, got some much wanted Technosoft and NMK games, and even a great puzzler for the wife!
Posted by Arcade Fever at 11:06 AM 4 comments
Labels: Misc
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
Cyvern The Dragon Weapons
Cyvern is an exceptional Kaneko game on the Super Nova motherboard system. I bought this awhile ago, and don't see it come up for sale often anymore. I started playing this today after watching NRKCFK's 27M superplay (and 41M Cyvern Plus superplay). As seen in the videos, using a 30hz rapid fire on the C button can recharge your banish shot a lot faster!
*Updated* with my newly aquired artwork, and score from STGT'10 Cyvern competition.
Posted by Arcade Fever at 7:43 PM 0 comments
Labels: *My High Scores*, Cyvern
Friday, December 18, 2009
Galmedes
[update]I had a heck of time trying to figure out why the game had no sound on my Astro City 2 or New Astro City cabs, but worked fine in the Windy or original Astro City cabs. Turns out Galmedes, being an old Taito board, requires -5V for the sound to function.[/update]
Posted by Arcade Fever at 8:32 PM 0 comments
Labels: *My High Scores*, Galmedes
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Japanese STG blogs
Posted by Arcade Fever at 7:43 AM 8 comments
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Weekend Project - XB360 to Jamma
Update: I have since made one more modification to this converter which makes it a bit safer to operaate!
Posted by Arcade Fever at 6:06 PM 13 comments
Labels: Misc