Joined: 4/9/2004
Posts: 18
I saw some posts on Gradius 3 and R-Type, so I figured I'd mention Axelay. Some of you may not know this game, but it's in the same vein as Gradius. It's also similar to Life Force in that some of the stages are vertical and some are horizontal. You get new weapons on the completion of levels, and can pick a new weapon lineup for each level -- sometimes it's beneficial to use older weapons than the new ones you receive. In terms of time, it's fixed movement, but there are times when the game waits for you to beat certain enemies before progressing you further through the stage. The real "challenge" to this game, then, would be points and kills. The horizontal stages are just as packed as horizontal Gradius stages, and in some cases you can move up and down multiple screens (like the Moai head levels in Gradius), so there are LOTS of enemies to be killed. There are no speed upgrades, so various weapon properties would need to be utilized to effectively kill 100% of the enemies. Also, from a purely aesthetic aspect, the controls are crisp and the music is some of the best from on the SNES. A lot of the people who did this game later went on to make Radiant Silvergun and Ikaruga. Anyway, just throwing the idea out there.
Former player
Joined: 6/26/2004
Posts: 139
Location: Kuopio, Finland
Been there, done that. I used only Straight laser and Round Vulcan in some certain places and tried to kill the bosses/minibosses as fast as possible with missiles and bombs, but something is still missing.. some trick that could be used to kill them faster. I've tried all the weapons you had at that point but no-one seemed to be super-effective. The ship itself moves so slowly and the weapons are kinda weak and inaccurate to make a significantly looking aesthetic form. Well.. you could make just a perfect run outta this but I highly doubt that it looks cool enough. Straight laser is perhaps the best weapon if somebody is attempting a no-miss/somewhat pacifist (you gotta clear the way in some stages) run. Most bosses are quickly destroyed by Explosion Bombs. (or something like that) But the game itself is one of the best there is on SNES. The music is indeed magnificient (aah, love that Colony), the graphs are excellent and such. High entertainment value in the game itself.
- mazzeneko
Joined: 4/9/2004
Posts: 18
Colony is on my top 10 list of favorite songs (video game or otherwise -- and it's actually the only video game tune on there!). Weaponwise, I think all the weapons have their uses. The straight laser is pretty powerful, but I think the round vulcan provides a lot of flexability on non-boss enemies. The boss at the end of stage 2 -- I think one of the bomb weapons is useful here (when he walks towards the left side of the screen). Even the morning star may find some use taking out large numbers of small enemies (unfortunately it's not available for the opening of stage 1, but it has its uses in the lava stage). I think the weird ass lasers you get for the last mission may be optimal as well, since you can hit stuff on the opposite side of ships with them. Very unwieldy though. Overall, I think the only useless weapon would be the Needle Cracker. Anyway, about the gameplay mechanics themselves. I think there are a lot of interesting things that could be done that a normal player wouldn't do because they're too hazardous, including: Stage 1:
    Go horizontal through the floating shooting rock islands, trying to destroy them all, as well as their debris. Go very quickly between the tunnels towards the end, trying to take out extra enemies before having to commit to one tunnel.
Stage 2:
    Wait until the last moment to pass under the blocks that fall after you shoot the supports out.
Stage 3:
    Go in and out of the pipes over the city, trying to destroy all the cannons. Stay inbetween lasers when they are shot at you by both bosses.
Stage 4:
    Leave the jellyfish creatures attached to your ship (if I remember correctly, they just drag the ship down)
I'm sure there are some other ways to spice up a run like this too. I know after you beat the game, it puts it on a harder difficulty -- I don't know if you can skip to this harder difficulty automatically, but if you can, that would be really cool. The amount of bullets that come at you in the hardest difficulty surpasses anything like Gradius.
Post subject: After playing through a bit
Joined: 4/9/2004
Posts: 18
I still can't find a way to jump straight to the hardest difficulty level. Anyway, I played through the first few levels (on hard difficulty) at about 15% speed and using 0 rerecords. Here are some observations: The floating laser-shooting islands in the first stage may be better to destroy, pointwise, than trying to destroy them and the rocks that form when they break up. It almost certainly is possible to defeat the miniboss of the first stage before he disappears for the first time. It's possible to kill the second stage boss before he uses the giant laser beam for the second time, and it's probably possible to kill him as he's doing it for the first time, especially if you get in front of him when it happens. There are some enemies in the game that may be impossible to reach. However, when your ship crashes, it spews shrapnel around the area, even beyond barriers, so it may be advantageous to lose a ship. Heck, it may even be advantageous to crash your ship to kill a boss quicker. Since there's a bit of slowdown, I'm not 100% certain, but it's definitely worth looking into. The needle cracker is crap, and the round vulcan is probably the best weapon for general enemies. Fine-tuned control of the round vulcan looks REALLY impressive. Also, when I play I put the missiles and shots on the same button, but when doing a real run, it'd probably be best to not put them on the same button. There are a number of times when those secondary missiles alone would be fine (such as taking out the bombs at the end of the first stage, and destroying the wall-mounted turrets beneath the dropping ceiling of the second stage). I was creating a movie of the first couple of stages, but when I played it back I went to record it as an AVI and it erased my smv file (and yes, I picked a different file name). Anyone know what's up with that?
Former player
Joined: 6/26/2004
Posts: 139
Location: Kuopio, Finland
bumpity bump. Any progress ?
- mazzeneko
Joined: 1/9/2005
Posts: 219
Location: The Netherlands
Aaah, thank you for mentioning this game. I've just finished playing Axelay again. I played it back in the days, and enjoyed playing it and listening to the music again. Anyway, i'd be very interested in watching a run for this game, so i wish you the best of luck :)
http://www.megazpeed.com - THE site for the ultimate MegaMan Zero superplay movies.
Joined: 9/26/2009
Posts: 1
Wooo necro Anyways, Im new to the whole TAS thing. I was thinking of doing a TAS for this game, and wanted some feedback as to what people would like to see, i.e., hardest difficulty, 100% kills, least number of kills, etc... From what I read, shmups are pretty hard to get published, but I want to see if I can make it entertaining enough
Player (117)
Joined: 5/13/2009
Posts: 700
Location: suffern, ny
I played this game, its seems nearly impossible to get 100% kills. Then again I could be wrong. Its seems awfully slow though.
[19:16] <scrimpy> silly portuguese [19:16] <scrimpy> it's like spanish, only less cool