Good 90's vertical game help

crassmage

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I am looking at getting my Stepdad a twin eagle JAMMA cab for cheap. He really likes my games so he wanted one for himself. Anyways I would guess the twin eagle may get old after awhile and I was looking to see what other good vertical orientated games there are out there to be had for cheap that could be swapped in and out. Mainly the shoot'em up types. I know of guerilla war and ikari warriors and those would be perfect but those take the rotary type joys and I dont want to go that route. Any ideas?

Here is link of cab:
http://minneapolis.craigslist.org/dak/for/2721445575.html
 
ME TOO! I have a couple on a neo multicart, I would be looking for some cheaper boards, games like mercs or something like the 1942/strikers types may be what I am looking for. Just can't think of any for the life of me
 
I'm big on vertical shooters too. Twin Eagle is fun but yes the looping music, lack of enemy variety and same three sounds effects gets old. I love the animated waterfall scene though.

Absolute musts:
Sky Shark
Twin Cobra
19XX
Lightning Fighters

Worthwhile if cheap:
Aerofighters
Dragon Spirit (always expensive)
Dragon Saber (same)
Legendary Wings
Sky Soldiers

These are mostly personal favorites, but they also were some of the highest earners when I used to operate them. Everything listed uses two buttons and is JAMMA, so they'd drop right in, no problems. $100 for a nice working twin eagle is a good deal! Good luck.
 
Don Pachi and Guwange are my picks.

Guwange has some of the creepiest bosses I've ever seen.
Most of the 90's stuff runs great in MAME if you just want to check them out to help decide what to buy. Everything thats been named up to now, including my two choices runs perfect.
 
How old is this guy and is he a gamer? Cause I wouldn't recommend stuff like Don Pachi to a lightweight. Need to ease some people in.
 
He is in his 50s. Not a heavy gamer at all but his eyes lit up playng my neo geo and my pin. He said he has to get one for his new house, doesent care what. We will see. Thanks for bringing some up I will have to run those through mame
 
You want the Raiden Series. Many are 100 or less a board and all are pretty fun. The 194x games are good as well. 1943, 1941: Counter Attack, 1944: The Loop Master, 19XX: The War Against Destiny. Varth is good. Anything by Cave, Atlus, and Psyko assuming they are shutmups and you have plenty of money. Namco has some decent ones. Galaga '88, Fighter and Attacker, Dragon Spirit, Dragon Saber. I'm sure Konami has some decent ones that I can't think of right now.
 
Anything by Toaplan - Dogyuun, Rally Bike, Truxton 1 or 2), Outzone and Fixeight.

I highly recommend Rally Bike - its pretty cheap and is awesome fun. Has quickly become a staple at our weekly gamenights.
 
Truxton 2 is hard as nails , I wouldn't recommend it to any newb .
Viper Phase 1 ( new version preferred ) or the Raiden Fighters series look awesome and are not to extreme as is Strikers 1999 , Dogyuun is a good one also .
 
Truxton 2 is hard as nails , I wouldn't recommend it to any newb .
Viper Phase 1 ( new version preferred ) or the Raiden Fighters series look awesome and are not to extreme as is Strikers 1999 , Dogyuun is a good one also .

True enough.

I'll second Strikers 1999 - great shooter.

Need to get my hands on Viper Phase 1 (NV) one of these days...
 
Raiden first, then some Raiden, and if you can find it, another Raiden board.

After that, all 194X games. They're all good to begin with and have staying power.

Vertical shooters, hard or easy, are terrific stress relievers. You can channel a lot of negative energy and adrenaline into those (as a tech support phone/email rep, this is critical).
 
Isn't there a Ms. Pac / Galaga reunion board that's JAMMA? He'd probably really love both of those.


Psikyo. Important to get the spelling right if you're plugging it into a computer search engine. And I'll second this -- if you're just starting out in scrolling shmups, early Psikyo is where you wanna go.

Also, I love Cave, but for this I'd avoid them. Pretty much all their games are $400+ for just the board because they're hotly in demand and the games can be pretty overwhelming if you're not already pretty attuned to the genre.

Early Raiden games kinda suck. I'm sorry, they do. Raiden 1/2/DX get a free ride because of their name and nostalgia, and there are way better games that can be had for less. If you're interested in the series, start with Raiden Fighters and work your way forward.
 
Also, I love Cave, but for this I'd avoid them. Pretty much all their games are $400+ for just the board because they're hotly in demand and the games can be pretty overwhelming if you're not already pretty attuned to the genre.

Being a Cave fan sucks for the wallet, that's for damn sure. It's pretty ridiculous and in the end is totally screwing with their exposure. Ranting...anyways...

+1, again, on Cave games not being the best titles to expose novice players to. I find most non-hardcore players have 1 of 2 reactions to most bullet hell shmups: they either think it looks awesome and want to step up to the challenge...or they think it is complete bullshit, utterly ridiculous and begin backing away from the genre.

Early Raiden games kinda suck. I'm sorry, they do. Raiden 1/2/DX get a free ride because of their name and nostalgia, and there are way better games that can be had for less. If you're interested in the series, start with Raiden Fighters and work your way forward.

Not to be "that guy", but Raiden Fighters is pretty different from Raiden. I'm just mentioning this for others looking to work their way through the Raiden series with Fighters first (or visa versa) For those that don't know, Raiden Fighters is actually only attached to the Raiden series by name alone. It was originally titled Gun Dogs, but they thought it
would be better from a marketing standpoint to attach the game to the Raiden universe.

Sorry Raiden fans, but I think regular Raiden is inferior by a large margin. The Raiden Fighters series is so much more entertaining, deeper and infinitely replayable in comparison. The scoring system is awkward at first, but really cool once you get your head wrapped around it, which in turn unlocks how well thought out the enemy layout design is. The large cast of jets to choose from also makes it incredibly replayable in comparison.

Great series of shmups. As an added bonus, they released the entire series on a 20 dollar disc for the 360. A cheap alternative to paying 100+ per Seibu SP-1 cart/board.

Cool site about the series
 
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