Bosconian High Score thread

[Valkyrie-Favor]

Bosconian is a multi-directional free-roaming shooter by Namco. It came out in 1981 and it is pretty awesome. Please post your scores, which round you died on, and which version you played.

-1. ExedExes - 221,490 - [Round 12] - NM50 (GC)
-2. Despatche - 166,760 - [Round 10] - ShmupMAME v3.0b
-3. Valkyrie-Favor - [Round 10] - 144,640 - NM50 (PC)
-4.
-5.
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-10.

Bosconian is ahead of its time with voice effects, a mini map, and an awesome weapon that fires behind you and in front of you at the same time. Every fan of old-school shooters should give it a try. The arcade machine is hard to find - consider yourself lucky if there's one in your area.

• Accepted Versions:
  Arcade
  MAME
  
  Namco Museum compilations:
  PSX - (Vol. 1)
  PS2 - (50th Anniversary)
  Xbox - (50th Anniversary)
  Gamecube - (50th Anniversary)
  PSP
  Wii
  Xbox 360

I played Bosconian years ago on a Pac-Man plug-and-play system. It comes with a built-in stick but it's a pretty bad reproduction. There are no voice effects, the levels are entirely different, and it's much too easy. There's no pause button and it goes right back to the menu screen when you die, making it difficult to photograph the score.

There was also a sequel on CPC, C64, and ZX Spectrum.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

Extra lives:
-At 10,000 points
-At 50,000 points
-Every additional 50,000 points.
-Extra lives stop at 2,000,000 points.

Tips:
-You still get points of an enemy collides with mines or asteroids.
-Mine explosions persist for half a second, and they're pretty large. Don't fly into one after shooting!
-When you begin a level, try and get to the outside. You don't want to be between several bases.
-Asteroids have smaller hitboxes than mines.
-Levels wrap like in Defender or the "secret passage" in Pac-Man. Enemies will chase you down this way.
-Enemies keep coming. You could max out your score on level 1...if you wanted.


Game info:
Bosconian has a fairly complex set of rules for a shooter. The object of is to score points (of course) by destroying rocks, space mines, three types of enemy fighters, and enemy space stations. When all the stations are destroyed, you'll advance to the next level.

If you manage to beat level 255, the game rolls over to 0. The "Abnormal behavior" shouldn't prevent you from playing.

--
I-Type fighter - tries to smash into you. Turns slowly.
P-type - Tries to swing around from the side
E-type - Fired straight from a station's core. Very fast. Can't turn unless in formation.
Spy ship - If this shows up and you let it escape, the enemy will be alerted to your presence. During Red Alert, tons of enemies will chase you.

Sometimes the fighters will attack in formations of five. Destroy the purple leader and his subordinates will flee. Destroy a whole formation for big points!

The space stations consist of six orbs and a bright red core. They are destroyed when you shoot the core or when you shoot all six of the orbs. The core can shoot at you. After level 1, the core is covered with a shield that periodically opens and closes.

• Score table:
  Asteroid 10
  Cosmo Mine 20
  I-Type (Leader) 50 (100)
  P-Type (Leader) 60 (120)
  E-Type (Leader) 70 (140)
  Spy Ships 200, 400, or 800
  Enemy Base Orb 200
  Enemy Base 1500
  Complete Enemy Formation 500 (I), 1000 (P), or 1500(E)

Thanks to StrategyWiki for the images and score table.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

My Plug-n-play stick doesn't allow me to move the ship diagonally, so I'll be switching to emulation. Still managed to get a non-completely-terrible score. Somebody beat it, please!

[Gunstar Green]

Bosconian is one of my favorite golden age arcade games. There used to be one in a hamburger place when I was a kid which was fortunate because the cab is pretty uncommon. I've played it more than Galaga even.

Not sure if I'll get around to trying to beat your score any time soon but cheers for Bosconian love.

I currently have it on Gamecube and the Namco Virtual Arcade on the 360.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

My current score will probably only take ten minutes to beat. I'm gonna start playing it properly once I get MAME working...never used it before

[ExedExes]

Nice to see an old school shmup among the high score threads. I've got this on Namco50 for Gamecube. Will be playing it for sure!

NM50 also came out on the PC, and I'm sure it also has Bosconian.

I didn't see MAME listed as a valid format; otherwise I'd go to town on that with my arcade-style joystick I remember preferring MAME over NM50 when we did Dragon Spirit back in February. I'll play it on console first.

(btw, good score to start. When I played this last month, I made just over 90K.)

[ExedExes]

All right, time to get to it.

ExedExes - 155,370 - Round 9 - NM50 (GC)

This version of Bosconian has "no miss" bonuses which give you extra points if you do not die in a stage. This may be on all the NM50 ports, not sure if it is on the TV plug n play.

Formula: (Round # X 100) X (# of bases in stage)
Example: 3 bases in Round 1, 100X3=300, 4 bases in Round 2, 200X4=800

And for goodness sakes shoot the spy ships! In this playthrough I got a Condition Red in Round 4 and it took me nearly a minute to find an opening to take down the last base.

Also, mines are your friends if you use them during Formation Attacks (look above mini-map to see the formation's pattern to help you plan to get them all)

[Valkyrie-Favor]

I started playing the Namco50 version on my laptop today. It's a lot better than the Plug-n-play, even if the stick had been working. The ship and enemies both move a bit faster, but I'll get used to it quickly.

[Valkyrie-Favor]

Had to take a few days off. I was stuck at 50,000 in Namco50, unable to get into the groove with the faster pasting. I'm back up to my old score now! The full version of this game is a lot better than the TV game I grew up with, and it's a bit harder too. Very glad I decided to do this. It's like meeting the childhood friend you liked in middle school, but suddenly she's all...grown up...

I'm removing Plug 'n' Play from the accepted formats, and the early home PC versions. If anyone actually wants to play one, we can talk about it.

The Sharp X68000 version looks interesting though. I wasn't able to find much information on it, but it has nicer graphics and some amazing music.

[mjmjr25]

Added to hyperlink list, thanks for starting it...