Are there any "easier" shmups?

[marurun]

You have the magic console for beginner shmups. IMO a good beginner shmup is one that starts easy and gets hard gradually over time. If it starts hard or never gets hard or the difficulty makes an enormous jump halfway through I generally wouldn't consider it a beginner shmup. There are a couple exceptions, mind you.

For the TG-16, the best platform to start with for shmups. (H means Horizontal and V means Vertical)

Aero Blasters - H - Hard game in the later levels, especially when gravity goes away, but it's manageable on early levels and really stresses a variety of skills.

Soldier Blade - V - A great vert shooter with good music and excellent graphics. It's got a great difficulty curve though it is a little on the easy side over all. A good way to get your feet wet.

Blazing Lazers - V - Let's call this game an advanced beginner game, because around level 5 (pyramid level, it's been a while so the number might be wrong) it suddenly gets quite a bit harder. But this game has so much Compile goodness, and makes the earlier levels so manageable, that by the time you get trashed a few times on the pyramids you'll be a much better player.

I'm ill, so more titles and platforms will have to come later. Must go be sick now.

Gate of Thunder - H - You need a CD and CD add-on or an ISO and an emu to play this one, but it's worth it. Don't play it with Magic Engine, for goodness sake, the sound gets wonky. This game is tons of fun, has excellent music, has a nice gradual challenge curve, and it just all around one of the best console-exclusive shooters out there.

[AwesomeMonstar]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the raiden series. Raiden X is tons of fun and quite easy as well. I think there are PC ports to most of these games.

[ott0bot]

I really have to disagree with a lot of those suggestions, ott0. A lot of those really are harder shmups? Dodonpachi? Super R-Type? Gigawing? Definitely not beginner fare, IMO.

So you disagree with 3 of my choices. Is there any others that you think are bad choices, and why? I can see what you mean about Super R-Type or actually the whole series, the checkpoint system is way more annoying than the re-spawn on games like ThunderForce. But on each title I explained why I chose it, ans I stand by pretty much all my suggestions.

In my experience most of the games were really playable and not as frustrating as other shumps. I've played Giga Wing with a 6 year old and after 15 minutes he was blasting away. We beat the game on medium difficuly with each of us only using 3 continues. Thats a good time. I don't see anything wrong with dying a few times. These games are hard and you won't become expert right away, but by god you shouldn't just play easy as hell games or you'll never get better.

You have to ask yourself,

"Is my goal to have a good time?" or
"Is my goal to get the highest score and beat this game with one continue?"

Either way I think my advice was helpful.

I have to politely disagree with ottObot about games with unlimited continues. It is a poor way to learn a game, even as an introduction, and your shooter instincts will not get much sharper. It is flat out cheating. The games, when designed properly, are made to be finished with one credit. Yes, it makes almost every shooter incredibly difficult, but that is the way they are. It's like playing Doom or something in "god" mode. I mean, what is the bloody point?

I guess thats just been my strategy, and it's really helped me to become better at shmups. My main point is that once you know a games weapon system, level design, and how to defeat the enemies that will help you beat it. It doesn't matter how dificult the game appears to be, if you learn the game and practice you will have a high probability of getting better. And you did suggest several of the same games, so I think you know what I mean as far as these shmups being more user friendly and less frustrating. I also did try to give a variety of styles, and as you said everyone has different taste.

[ott0bot]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the raiden series. Raiden X is tons of fun and quite easy as well. I think there are PC ports to most of these games.

I like Raiden, but it's my bane. I don't know why, it just kicks my ass sometime.

There is a Turbo Grafx-16 release of the first Raiden, so he could definately try it out.

[Ramatut4001]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the raiden series. Raiden X is tons of fun and quite easy as well. I think there are PC ports to most of these games.

I like Raiden, but it's my bane. I don't know why, it just kicks my ass sometime.

There is a Turbo Grafx-16 release of the first Raiden, so he could definately try it out.

I might check that out. I was looking at the Turbo because I just got one and I know there's a lot of shmups for it but I do own just about every console mentioned in this thread (except TurboCD and Neo Geo) so I have some options.

[marurun]

Dont' get me wrong, ott0, you named some quality shmups, but I think most of them are more appropriate as intermediate shmups. After you've got the core skills you would use many of those to refine them.

So I did some more poking around in my shmup collection.

For SNES:
U.N. Squadron - H - An RPG-like shmup in which you earn cash to buy better planes and secondary weapon payloads. You can also pick which order you want to fly some missions.

Super EDF - H - Arcade port that's pretty fine. The music is kinda funky. Again, RPG-like. You level up by killing and your weapons all improve. It does get pretty hard by the end of the game but has a decent curve on it.

And I've realized I don't have any Genesis shmups that I think are good beginner shmups. There are some good ones on the Genny, but it and the SNES pale to the TG.

Oh, and another cross-platform shmup series that's good for beginners... Parodius. A horzie that kicks ass and is amusing to boot. Some levels can be torturous, but the early levels are always manageable and there are always lots of different characters to choose from. You're bound to find someone with an ability set you like.

[racketboy]

Yeah, I've played some of Sexy Parodius on the Saturn and it wasn't too intimidating.
There were some parts I had to work at, but it's wasn't bad.

[ott0bot]

Dont' get me wrong, ott0, you named some quality shmups, but I think most of them are more appropriate as intermediate shmups. After you've got the core skills you would use many of those to refine them.

So I did some more poking around in my shmup collection.

For SNES:
U.N. Squadron - H - An RPG-like shmup in which you earn cash to buy better planes and secondary weapon payloads. You can also pick which order you want to fly some missions.

I actually have that in my SNES right now. Its fun, I though it was kinda hard so I didn't suggest it. I guess it's not hard per se but has a different stye than most shmups i'm used to.

And I've realized I don't have any Genesis shmups that I think are good beginner shmups. There are some good ones on the Genny, but it and the SNES pale to the TG.

I did some searching through my collection and found a few other good genesis hori titles you might like...

Steel Empire - choose between a blimp and and old school plane. you get tons of fire power and you can easily dodge enemy bullets.Plus you have a life meter, no more one hit kills. it's also got a cool front and back shooting feature and bombs! It does get a bit tricky after stage 4 but gives you enough time to warm up.

Wings of Wor - similar to steel empire, lots of power ups/items and again a life meter. the bosses look awesome, but this game does fall victim at times to cheap enemy bullet patterns sometimes.

Oh, and another cross-platform shmup series that's good for beginners... Parodius. A horzie that kicks ass and is amusing to boot. Some levels can be torturous, but the early levels are always manageable and there are always lots of different characters to choose from. You're bound to find someone with an ability set you like

Parodius is really fun, it's pretty much exactly like Gradius except it's got crazy cutesy graphics. I think the later versions on the Saturn would be great for beginners. I thought the SFC versions were pretty hard.

But you know what a good cutsy not so difficult game would be
...Keio Flying Squadron for sega cd. The only catch is that the US version fetches around 150-200 bucks. yeouch. There is a sequel on Saturn that goes for a bit less, but it's not exactly just a shooter....it's cool though.

[marurun]

Wings of Wor is awesome, but I wouldn't recommend someone start with it unless they enjoy pulling out their hair. That game's hard.

[Ramatut4001]

Dont' get me wrong, ott0, you named some quality shmups, but I think most of them are more appropriate as intermediate shmups. After you've got the core skills you would use many of those to refine them.

So I did some more poking around in my shmup collection.

For SNES:
U.N. Squadron - H - An RPG-like shmup in which you earn cash to buy better planes and secondary weapon payloads. You can also pick which order you want to fly some missions.

I actually have that in my SNES right now. Its fun, I though it was kinda hard so I didn't suggest it. I guess it's not hard per se but has a different stye than most shmups i'm used to.

And I've realized I don't have any Genesis shmups that I think are good beginner shmups. There are some good ones on the Genny, but it and the SNES pale to the TG.

I did some searching through my collection and found a few other good genesis hori titles you might like...

Steel Empire - choose between a blimp and and old school plane. you get tons of fire power and you can easily dodge enemy bullets.Plus you have a life meter, no more one hit kills. it's also got a cool front and back shooting feature and bombs! It does get a bit tricky after stage 4 but gives you enough time to warm up.

Wings of Wor - similar to steel empire, lots of power ups/items and again a life meter. the bosses look awesome, but this game does fall victim at times to cheap enemy bullet patterns sometimes.

Oh, and another cross-platform shmup series that's good for beginners... Parodius. A horzie that kicks ass and is amusing to boot. Some levels can be torturous, but the early levels are always manageable and there are always lots of different characters to choose from. You're bound to find someone with an ability set you like

Parodius is really fun, it's pretty much exactly like Gradius except it's got crazy cutesy graphics. I think the later versions on the Saturn would be great for beginners. I thought the SFC versions were pretty hard.

But you know what a good cutsy not so difficult game would be
...Keio Flying Squadron for sega cd. The only catch is that the US version fetches around 150-200 bucks. yeouch. There is a sequel on Saturn that goes for a bit less, but it's not exactly just a shooter....it's cool though.

Life meter sounds promising!