Shmupmeet 2012: Midwest is the Best

Another successful shmupmeet with the denizens of the shmups.com forum has come and went. Another big thanks to caldwert for his hospitality, snacks and massive collection of games, cabinets, pinball machines and a billion NEC XM29 Plus monitors. Played like shit in almost every game, per usual. I guess my approach of not practicing and hoping to magically get better isn't really working. Might have to change my methods up a bit, I guess. Also, it has been further embedded into my skull that I need to purchase some sort of Japanese candy cabinet as soon as possible. And buy a bunch of arcade PCBs. Imperative.

The playfield. Near impossible to get everything in the shot. Another monitor lies behind me with a U.S. TurboDuo and an NES hooked up. On the first monitor we had a PC-Engine Duo-R hooked up, as well as a model 1 Sega Genesis. Download 2, Spriggan, Gleylancer, Magical Chase, and a handful of others were played. Never had gotten around to playing Gleylancer before. Damned good stuff. On the next monitor--an NEC XM37 I believe; correct me if I'm wrong--we had a supergun hooked up to play PCBs. Replaying Gigawing on the actually CPSII board really affirmed my love for that game, further establishing my adoration for Capcom during their CPSII run. Blackheart also made a showing, which was quite unexpected, yet I sadly got a chance to play it this time. Later in our arcade marathon vigil we experienced the lack of sleep stupor that sets in after staring at monitors for 12 hours straight, resulting in a somnambulant-like outing of bizarre arcade games from the depths of caldwert's basement. Heated Barrel, a lost title from the equally enigmatic TAD corporation, stole the show and won the hearts of all. Or whatever. What was aptly described as a "horizontal Gun.Smoke" lasted what felt like a lifetime, yet was quite joyful to watch. Playfully racist (uh...), yet brightly colorful with cowboy ghosts, pot-bellied Native Americans and pink bears as enemies; complete with an impossible last boss with almost every attack completely unavoidable and full of damage. Also played was a Japanese Gauntlet clone (the name escapes me) and Psycho-Nics Oscar, a sort of inspiration for Turrican with a Gradius-like power-up system. On the far monitor we had a Japanese Xbox 360 hooked up that primarily played all the vertical Cave release: Ketsui, Mushihimesama-Futari, Mushihimesama HD, Pink Sweets, Muchi-Muchi Pork!, DFK, etc.

The wall of rape: Raiden DX and Same! Same! Same! (lit. Shark! Shark! Shark!), known as Fire Shark in the U.S.. Both games proved that I am a sick bastard and a masochist, for I kept coming back for more. Same! literally depressed me later in the night, yet I've thought about the game for the past couple of days. It's like some nasty hooker that gave me the clap that I keep going back to. Raiden DX is almost just as brutal and I still feel the pain. Damned good stuff, though.

Lil' baby Neo cab kinda made me envious and slightly inclined to exchange such a thing for my hulking brute of a wooden cabinet with dented corners, missing paint and slightly unbalanced. Shown here is the fantastic Shock Troopers, which is easily one of my favorite games on the MVS--that I still don't own for some stupid reason. Blazing Star, Sengoku 3, Aero Fighters 2, and an MVS conversion of Ironclad were a few of the games played.

Whirlwind and Rollersgames, two of the pinball machines in the back corner. Whirlwind is a pretty neat machine. I spent some time on it later in the evening and got my ass thoroughly kicked. I think I'm starting to pick up a theme here. Whirlwind was especially neat, for at certain parts of the game the fan on the top of the machine blows a bunch of pungent air into your face and makes you feel like Bill Paxton in Twister.

Earthshaker, a game that literally rumbled the floor with its earthquake theme. A pretty frantic, neat machine that I didn't have the chance to play but a time or two. It kept scaring the shit out of me when I was playing Sengoku 3 behind it.

Diner was probably the pinball machine I spent the most time on and enjoyed the most. It gave us some grief earlier on in the day but was eventually fixed. Believe it or not, but I sucked at this, too.

Shown here is friend and user drunkninja being his photogenic self, this time with the cabs running Armed Police Batrider on the left and DoDonPachi on the right. Batrider is really a game I'd like to get better at, as well as Battle Garegga, another phenomenal game by 8ing/Raizing. I figured if anything playing DoDonPachi again on an actually PCB would boost my confidence a bit after all the rapeage, as I usually can do quite well on a credit--well, relatively speaking, that is. I don't even want to talk about how bad I did. I, uh...need some practice.

There is plenty more to be said and I wish I would have taken some more pictures, but aye, it's too late for that and I've got chicken in the oven and a fat cat in front of the computer screen. Damned good time and a great group of guys. Hope to do it again soon! Maybe I can actually practice for this next one...