R8zing!

[xS]

My thoughts on Toaplan are mixed on one hand, more than half of their games do not appeal to me, while on the other hand they had a huge role in the evolution of the shooting genre. If you play games like Tiger Heli, Truxton(tatsujin), and Batsugun you can see their basic design philosophy of making games more manic over time( much like FPS evolution IMO) by making bullet patterns more complex, placing more emphasis on reflexes than memorization.

After Toaplans unfortunate death in 1994, many of their staff members went on to work for companies like Cave, Raizing,(and Takumi?) which pioneered the art of 'bullet hell shooting'.

Raizing, much like Toaplan was a mixed bag. Their best games were the best games in the genre, but they had made alot of unspectacular stuff.


Their main series was the Mahou Daisakusen series. All of them were based in swords and sorcery based worlds, which is very unique in the genre. Kingdom Granprix was the only game in the series that has seen a console release. It's a very solid game, and one of the most innovative games(racing/shmup hybrid) in the genre.






Their war based shooters( Battle Bakraid & Garrega) are their most popular games. I honestly think that Garrega is the most over rated shooter ever..... the level design fails to live up to it's potential, and bosses are boring. It's not a bad game per say, it's just not as good as it's touted to be.




Armed Police Batrider is their best game, and IMO it's the best shooter ever made. It's an amalgamation of all of their other games, and it somehow manages to play down all of their weaknesses, while maintaining all of their strong points. Anyone who is interested in arcade emulation/ PCB collection should check this game out.






They've also worked on Terra driver....which I probably will pick up very soon.




/me is not feeling very well so forgive me for my incoherrence

[Frogacuda]

Dimahoo>All other Raizing shmups.

I really don;t care for their games overall. I haven't played Kingdom Grandprix though.

[Kinopio]

I like me some Raizing. Yes, Battle Garegga is overated. Soukyugurentai is fantastic, and Great Mahou is worthy of its name. Kingdom Grandprix is cool, but has some problems.

[Despair]

Well, I like Raising. I enjoyed Kingdom Granprix and Souky alot, but Battle Garegga came up short on the expectations.

I really wish I could play Batrider and Dimahoo though.

[xS]

They've also worked on Brave Blade.

[img]http://www.vsa-ag.ch/r8zing/Brave_Blade/Brave5.jpg/img]

[Click_Stick]

Link

I'd like to check out Batrider, myself.

[Frogacuda]

Originally posted by Despair
Well, I like Raising. I enjoyed Kingdom Granprix and Souky alot, but Battle Garegga came up short on the expectations.

I really wish I could play Batrider and Dimahoo though.

No one's gonna kill you if you emulate, you know.

[kingoffighters]

I love Battle Garegga and Souky, still waiting to pickup Kingdom Grandprix someday... I like their shooters, maybe not the best in some respect but I am having fun playing them.

[NeoZeedeater]

I liked all the Raizing games I played. I played Garegga before it was hyped to hell so I didn't come away disappointed; it's definitely a quality game. Batrider is great as well. I got to play Dimahoo once in the arcades. It was only couple years ago but I have hardly any memory of it.

I would import Souky but my interest in shooters has been down considerably so it might not be worth the money for me, especially with many 32-bit shooters like R-Type Delta in my collection not getting played.

[Bonestorm]

Batrider is pretty fun, but Battle Garegga and Battle Bakraid are my favorites. I can see why people might not like Battle Garegga, but I think it's one of the best modern shooters.

I'm not crazy about their mahou daisakusen games, kingdom grandprix was a great concept but I think it failed in it's execution.

The should have a follow up to Soukyugurentai- their shooters don't always have to be in 2D.