/vr/ - Retro Games

Cotton Boomerang is without question the best one.

Honestly, I looked at Rainbow Cotton's screenshots and seemed decent enough, 3dgrafics, different perspective and mechanics whatnot. Then I played and I just couldn't stand it. Actually looks pretty cheap and it plays just as cheap. I don't know how to put it better, but I think if they tried something more like Panzer dragoon or star fox 64 it would've been decent or maybe even great.

Panorama Cotton off course

>>1941156
Seconded.

>>1941156
That game was shit to play on an emulator, I don't know if it's any better on a real Genesis, but it was infuriatingly hard to see what I was flying into. Managed to beat it by the skin of my teeth.

>>1941156
I love this game. Easily the most expensive game I've ever purchased, but definitely worth it.

Still not the best rail shooter I've ever played though.

It doesn't hold a candle to Space Harrier or Sin & Punishment.

But I do appreciate any game with cute witches. Are there any other good ones?

>>1941395
>Sin and Punishment
>rail shooter
I don't even know where to begin here.

>>1941431
of course it is. Have you even played it? I've heard arguments of it being a cabal shooter, but that really only applies in a select few places. Most of the game is nonstop.

This is the only one I've ever played. It was okay.

>>1941436
Have YOU played it? Learn what a rail shooter is. The 3D Cotton games aren't ones either.

>>1941438
I've heard that definition before and it's bullshit. The game on the left is a lightgun game. The game on the right is a rail shooter. Radirgy or Astebreed are 3d shmups.

>>1941156
Painfully low framerate crap.

>>1941443
Most lightgun games do happen to be rail shooters. "Lightgun" isn't a game genre.

>Be first greentext.
>pleasedontkillmecuziputithere.gif
>Be new to 4chan
>Doesn't suck yet, wondering why so much h8
>Read shitty comments in Video Game and Anime section
>Shit. Now i'm stuck here forever

>>1941460
Can you go away?

Anyway, I love the Cotton games, but I feel there's a lot of unrealized potential. Panorama Cotton should have been on the saturn.

>>1941438
New anon here, but every description I've ever read has called Star Fox a rail shooter. The fact you can marginally move your craft left or right or up or down doesn't change the fact you're stuck following a pre-determined course, aka, following a rail.

>>1941489
And by new anon I didn't mean I'm this guy >>1941460, just I wasn't the one arguing with >>1941438 before.

>>1941489
That's not the definition of a rail and you know it. And it's not "marginal", it changes -everything- about the gameplay. You no longer need to shoot down every threat coming at you; you can simply move to avoid them. Rail shooters and 3D shmups play worlds apart.

>>1941503
Take it up with Wikipedia then

>"Rail shooters" limit the player to moving around the screen while the game follows a specific route;[14] these games often feature an "into the screen" viewpoint, with which the action is seen from behind the player character, and moves "into the screen", while the player retains control over dodging.[6][15]

>moving around
>dodging

>>1941503
I've always heard games like space harrier and star fox referred to as rail shooters.

>>1941514
Wikipedia is not a source of authority, please stop citing it.

Now, wikipedia aside, I'd like you to put aside any biases of popular opinion and consider the simple logic behind these terms. There is a set of games that play similarly--games such as House of the Dead, Rez, Pokemon Snap, etc.--and they don't all use light guns. There is another set of games that play similarly--games such as Star Fox, Panorama Cotton, Space Harrier, etc. These two sets of games play distinctly differently from one another. It is not helpful for discussion to lump them all into the same category. And it is especially unhelpful for discussion to refer to the games that -don't- involve actual on-rails gameplay as the "rail shooters". You have -more- freedom of movement in a 3D scrolling shooter like Star Fox 64 than you do a 2D one like Marchen Adventure Cotton 100%. Shouldn't Cotton 100% be referred to as a rail shooter too then?

This is one of the reasons why video games aren't respected as a media form. When people use such needlessly confusing misnomers to categorize them, it only breeds a culture of exclusiveness.

>>1941438
Game on the right is a rail shooter. You're constantly moving forward.

>>1941443
>Radirgy is a 3d shmup
And Donkey Kong Country is a 3D platformer.

>>1941549
I've poked around on google for a bit and everyone seems to count both of these>>1941438
as rail shooters.

I'd say it's more likely that arguing over minute details makes us less respected than having misnomers for genre titles.

If film buffs get into heated, thread-derailing arguments about whether "acid western" is a good name for that niche genre, you certainly don't hear about it.

>>1941616
>Wikipedia isn't a reliable source so I'll cite a more reliable one like some kids on teh intarwebz

>>1941636
There's no definitive authority that determines genre for any media, regardless of whether it's a books, movies, music, or games. But If I wanted to know what a rail shooter is, and I were a reasonably intelligent internet-age human being, I'd google it. Let me tell you what the first page of google results comes up with for rail shooter:

http://www.giantbomb.com/rail-shooter/3015-320/games/
http://www.ranker.com/list/all-rail-shooters-list/reference
http://www.mobygames.com/game-group/genre-rail-shooter
http://gaming.stackexchange.com/questions/29295/what-does-the-term-rail-shooter-mean
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANYsOnWYuCs
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/RailShooter

Everyone from TVtropes, to Youtube celebrities agrees, Starfox and its ilk are rail shooters, and House of the Dead style games are lumped into the category too. You may argue that they shouldn't be considered the same category, but too fucking bad. The ship had sailed on that one.

>>1941649
>Everyone from TVtropes, to Youtube celebrities agrees, Starfox and its ilk are rail shooters, and House of the Dead style games are lumped into the category too. You may argue that they shouldn't be considered the same category, but too fucking bad. The ship had sailed on that one.

I think you're misrepresenting some of the links you're linking to. I think there is value in distinguishing between "your input is ONLY where you are shooting" i.e., House of the Dead, and games where you are controlling both the movement and the aim, but are still "on rails" as far as the camera and the level progression.

To extend the metaphor, if a train goes on rails, a train can't move side to side to dodge projectiles, you know? The distinction is definitely understandable.

Ultimately it's a semantic thing, but it's more internally consistent than that idiot blathering about Radirgy being a 3d shooter.

>>1941656
Samefag here. To clarify on this post, I wish there was a term in common use like "rails-like" which described this category of games. There are definitely attributes of rail shooters but to call them "on rails" seems like a misnomer.

I actually enjoy conversations about the subtleties of genre conventions/classifications, but since they so often lead to unproductive/uninteresting flamewars I wonder if I should just avoid them altogether. Anyway, I love you anon!

>>1941549
Why does no one realize Wikipedia is not a source unto itself as it is a place that summarizes cited sources? I had a professor once that would instantly invalidate any source that was used on wikipedia for that same shitty logic, despite wikipedia actually quoting good sources for things. I should not be arbitrarily allowed to use certain scientific journals because some site on the internet quotes them as well.

And yes I mad.

>>1941659
Samefag again. I can also see an argument for referring to all the games as "rail shooters" and then referring to "light gun games" as a subset thereof. Hopefully we can all be convinced of one convention or the other.

>>1941682
>I had a professor once that would instantly invalidate any source that was used on wikipedia for that same shitty logic, despite wikipedia actually quoting good sources for things. I should not be arbitrarily allowed to use certain scientific journals because some site on the internet quotes them as well.
Your mistake was mentioning that you had used Wikipedia at all instead of citing the sources directly, I think. Sage for offtopic.

>>1941686
No, as in he had software that would check your source to see if it was used on wikipedia, I assume as a way to stop people from using sources from there. I cited the journal itself, and another issue of the same journal -- the first was considered invalid, the second fine. It's more that some professors just have their heads up their ass.

And sage as well for OT.

>>1941454
This.
Some "Lightgun" games don't even support any kind of gun peripheral (Pokémon Snap).

>>1941503
I'm convinced the disuse of the genre name 3D SHMUP is a conspiracy by hardcore 2D SHMUP fans (particularly the ones at system11) who insist 3D SHMUPS cannot be called SHMUPS because they want to avoid comparisons to their hallowed 2D only genre.

>>1941616
"Everyone" tends to be really confused about genre labels in videogames though. Have you ever experienced the intense amounts of miscommunication that happens regularly when talking about fighting games and beat'em ups?

The way Rail Shooter is generally used is very vague, so it would make more sense to apply Rail Shooter only to those games we typically call "Lightgun shooters". Those games in particular are absolutely with no exception on rails, giving you control over nothing but where to aim your shots.

By contrast, while the screen constantly scrolls in Starfox and Panorama Cotton, you can move anywhere on the screen, meaning you are not affixed to the rail despite automatically following it.

BACK ON TOPIC:
Panorama Cotton is really cool despite not having a smooth framerate. That's a thing I can live with if other design aspects can overshadow it, and it has this hectic level pace and variation that I like.

Otherwise not too strong a fan of Cotton 2D shooters. Don't dislike them but have never put down enough time to get far into them, the shots just feel too unsatisfying.

>>1941395
>But I do appreciate any game with cute witches. Are there any other good ones?
Magical Chase is really cool. It has super pleasant graphical effects and the star options are really fun to use.

>>1941649
If you were a reasonably intelligent internet-age human being you'd know better. Unfortunately the ship had sailed on that one.

>>1941693
Maybe one of the points of the class was to teach you how to use other research tools.

>>1941656
What was the name of that one shmup where you play as a train?

>>1941078
I used to believe this as well, until I put some serious time into Cotton 2. Boomerang is the more accessible of the 2, and fixes some admittedly annoying quirks about Cotton 2. It also feels more rushed, the level design is more sterile, and the new mechanics make it ultimately a less satisfying experience than its predecessor. Furthermore, survival is a joke in Boomerang if you know about the bullet punching. Cotton 2 is an interesting game both for scoring and on the survival front.

Not to mention Cotton 2 has the full version of Ayakashi Swamp. That alone ensures its superiority.
<iframe width="420" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/ZkVH_q51U-4" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

The first Cotton is great, as well. Even if it is a bit 'by the books' gameplay-wise, and nowhere near as fun for scoreplay as the Saturn/ST-V iterations.

>>1941061
Rainbow really isn't the black sheep that everyone makes it out to be. I can at least force myself to shoot for a 1cc of it on occasion. To contrast, I haven't even touched Cotton 100% since credit feeding it to completion ages ago.

>>1941438
if you are trying to tell me panzer dragoon isn't a rail shoot I'll twist yer bleedin neck off m8

>>1941061
Panorama Cotton is impressive but the gameplay is not that fun imo.

Cotton Boomerang is my personal favourite. Now if only it didn't fetch 300$ on ebay, maybe I could get a copy (seriously wtf? and these are the normal editions too, not the extra one with the teacup).

>>1941682
>Why does no one realize Wikipedia is not a source unto itself as it is a place that summarizes cited sources?

Because Wikipedia cites sources that copy their info off of Wikipedia, thereby allowing information creep.

>>1942195
>Furthermore, survival is a joke in Boomerang if you know about the bullet punching.

Yeah, but it is a joke that can deliver one hell of a hilarious punchline. It is so damn satisfying to fly into the face of the giant armoured demon knight level boss and simply slap its face into oblivion before it can let off a single bullet.

>>1942881
It is and it isn't. There are points where you have no control over your ship; then it is definitely a rail shooter. However any time you can maneuver yourself around it isn't.