Duration: 14:30

82 views

2

After a first Normal mode clear last year, I wanted to come back to this pretty cool Shikigami no Shiro-inspired doujin shmup, and work my way up towards some of the higher difficulties.

Hard is not the hardest, as there is still Unreal and then Paranoia above. While those two difficulty levels above seem pretty damn tough, this one is relatively manageable, as only an afternoon was necessary for me to get that clear with a bit of scoring in it.

I am using Akiha once again, as I found her playstyle to be straightforward enough but still interactive and not too risky. Aside from Boss 3's later attacks, her stage selection didn't seem to be too tricky in the end. However, the Ex stage at the end is where even a good run can die, specifically because of the Shiki (ha) fight. Well...I think the guy is supposed to be named Shiki, right...I have never played the actual Tsukihime VN and don't intend to lmao.

His patterns are a mix of randomly selected attacks that can screw you over depending on the combinations that are picked, and some fixed Black Heart winder attacks. The first one isn't too bad as long as you stay below him but the random opening pattern sometimes doesn't let you do that comfortably. The second one is basically a life tax for me. I get the feeling it's possible to Hi Tension bomb through it and get behind the boss during the iframes as the attack doesn't cover the full 360° range, but I haven't pulled it off yet. In this run I didn't even have bombs to use there anyways.

And since the bombs become Hi Tension bombs when the tension gauge is red and this boss fight usually has your tension gauge at max most of the time, using defensive big bombs with long iframes can't really be done. Oops. Here I came in with 5 lives and lost 1, but I had some runs with 4 lives in and Game over against him anyways. Oof. Battle Garegga was a mistake. And speaking of Garegga mistakes, this game also seems to have non-normalized diagonals heh, so I had to adjust when dodging some of the denser patterns. To be fair Shiki 3 also has that, but it doesn't feature as much micrododging aside from the endgame.

The second part of the Ex stage is very interesting, as it's timed and the scoring goal is to speed-damage the black cube in order to refill its bar as many times as possible and cause some enemies to spawn every time. While Shiki is worth almost nothing and is mostly there to fuck you up, the second part of the stage can net you some good points. I use a Hi tension bomb right before the bar gets full as to score those enemies, which I assume and hope is lucrative. The very end with the regular bombs and stuff was a bit messy and improvised, I tried to sneak in one last cycle but it didn't really work out heh.

When it comes to scoring, there are some techniques that are reminiscent of Shiki 3 with the Hi Tension bombs, and Sisters Royale with the multiplier being doubled. I haven't pushed it to the point where I SD to regain bombs and then score with them, but given how you regain a bomb by losing/gaining a life or whenever you level up (just like in Shiki 1 basically), maybe sacrificing some lives after those juicy early boss milks is the way to go, Shiki 3-style? It all seems very interesting in any case, and the short game length makes runs pretty engaging.

Played on PC, recorded with OBS Studio
#STG #shmup