DoDonPachi

DoDonPachi is probably CAVE's most well known and most influential game. I've always struggled to see what makes it stand out so much over other shmups, though. Sure enough, bullet hell was quite rare at the time of its release and it was without a doubt the most important game to develop this "subgenre" and present it to the mainstream in arcades, but I'm just one guy who plays these games and to me all that really matters in the end is how good I think something is and unfortunately DoDonPachi isn't that great of a game. The sequel, DOJ, did it much better, honestly.

About why I don't like the chaining very much: It seems to me to be something you spend a whole lot of time practicing, and in the end you can pretty much do it on command; failure just shouldn't occur anymore. It's kinda like learning to play a piano piece. Once it sticks, it's easy enough to pull off repeatedly. I don't like that, I want the stakes to be high when I play. Something that's nigh impossible to master. I am aware that the Pachi games have nuances with the hit counts, though, so I am aware that my view isn't entirely accurate in the long run, but I think it makes for an apt enough description of why I'm not a fan. Going back to the music analogy, practicing in order to play a piano piece ends up gratifying in the end in a visceral sense. You are not only moving your hands and fingers to play the music, but the music which is lovely to hear also enters your eardrums. It's very rewarding. By comparison, I cannot find chaining nearly as rewarding. Doing the same relatively easy chains endless amounts of times is not something I see much value in. Let's compare it to the coin/medal chaining in Gunbird 2 and Strikers 1999, where the object of what you want to accomplish is more clear and more hectic in the moment-to-moment gameplay: collect each item within a timeframe of about 1/10ths of a second, and do it over and over without ever failing this. That's how you chain in those Psikyo titles and I preferred that kind of chaining a lot more because I found it much tougher to do without fail (and well, it obviously is.)

All of that said, within the DonPachi series I think DDP did chaining the worst out of the 3 DP games I've played. DonPachi is quite slow and bad to play for survival, but the more burst-like "combo" chains in it are more impressive and seems more rewarding to pull off (haven't really tried learning any, so keyword is seems). DOJ as well, which is the game I actually learned a bunch of chains for, is a much better game than DDP and it did chaining a bit better but it's still not something I would wanna sit down and spend my big parts of my life on. Perhaps it is the Hyper management that made it more appealing to me to chain, I'm not quite sure myself, but I really do like that final stage. Anyways, this review is about DoDonPachi and yeah I don't like its chaining.

Then comes the next question. What if you don't care about chaining, and you just wanna dodge bullets and blow shit up? In that case, I also don't think DDP is anything too special nowadays. Even if you only look at CAVE's catalogue, they kept on churning out good games year after year, some of which are way more impressive if you ask me. DDP is much too slow. I do like the second loop a lot more, but the first loop is really a waste of time to play for survival, hardly anything exciting in it. I have quite a strong distaste for this slow micro dodging and all the streaming, as well the slow down in this particular title, which really gets on my nerves. It's really such a shame that so many shmups have to have loops in them because a lot of them would be better with difficulty settings, I really don't want to waste my time playing something easy just to play the same stages in a harder mode. Just give me my fucking hard mode!

The generic cock rock music gets old quickly, and the bosses have no personality, they're just big thingies that shoot some unmemorable patterns at you, for the most part. The pixel art is nicely detailed but the game lacks personality, the whole game was so busy being the new "thing" with its bullet hell and all that it totally forgot that it could also distinguish itself aesthetically, unlike some past pseudo-bullet hells like Batsugun and Battle Garegga, which look gorgeous to this day. Thankfully CAVE proved what they're capable of in this regard with games like ESPRade and Guwange.

I realize this review must be sounding awfully negative, so I'll part with some positivity instead. The game is good, it's just not one of the best shmups ever unlike what you'll hear everywhere else you look. CAVE has done much better numerous times and there are other developers arguably as capable as CAVE that were just doing different things. However, it will come down to how much you like chaining, I think. If chaining is rewarding to you, this game is going to be better than I find it to be, probably. All of the things that makes me enjoy DDP are survival oriented and exist in the 2nd loop. Hibachi is a pretty cool TLB.

It may be shorter than DonPachi, but it refined all of the problems I had with the original, while.. creating more problems. Instead of having cheap shots that fly to quickly across the screen, this iteration has slower shots moving in huge masses , and loads of flying enemies that constantly cross into your line of movement. The game completely cramps you, making that sense of judging space and dodging all that much more valuable. And when you're about to lose a ship, it's almost as if time stops for a moment as you accept the coming death of your ship. The story is still pretty much non existent. The only notable new designs were the bosses, which were all designed very well.