The Hullet Bells – Part 1 (A Primer on Shmups)

As a would-be hardcore gamer, for me shoot ’em ups, or ‘shmups’, are a fascinating intersection of complexity, fun and playability.

With humble roots in Space Invaders, shmups began with a simple premise: The player controls a ship (or perhaps a flying witch or android) and must defend themselves against wave after wave of enemy attacks. Typically, the player will shoot them, although some games reward dodging over destruction.

The genre split in to two distinct schools of design: fewer, often faster bullets, and denser, slower bullet clouds. The former emphasises reaction speed, the latter memorisation. For example, R-Type and Gradius fall in to the former category, while games such as ESP Ra. De and DoDonPachi epitomise the other.

: ESP Ra. De, a bullet hell game

: R-Type III, a more traditional game focused on environment

Towards the end of either type of game, the two styles begin to converge: Bullets can only get so fast or dense before they become impossible to dodge, so elements of the other style begin to creep in.

The mechanics of these games vary. Often in simple games, the only variations will be in the graphics and bullet patterns, while the mainstays of lives, power ups and bombs are changed only in token ways. Such games are not necessarily bad! I can revel in the simplicity of a game like Strikers or Raiden, so even with limited mechanics it is possible to construct entertaining games.

That isn’t to say that there isn’t innovation happening! Far from it. The arcade roots of shmups meant that you had to stand out in a sea of other shmups. Some games introduced alternate modes of fire, giving the player a choice between whether they mow down their enemies with scattered shots or concentrated blasts. Others capitalised on the nature of the competitive high score lists omnipresent in the arcade, implementing complicated scoring systems that would require months to master, but for huge score rewards.

More recently, games like Ikaruga have aimed to maintain the old school shmup elements while placing unique and innovative mechanics on top. In Ikaruga’s case, the inclusion of the polarity switch (each polarity allowed players to absorb one of two kinds of bullet) added an entirely new dimension of gameplay, requiring not only that players dodge bullets, but also take in to consideration whether they should be absorbed or not.

: Ikargua is a challenging polarity-based shooting game

Generally speaking, once play begins the player will always be looking at the playfield, with the ship present on screen at all times. Plot is sacrificed for an uninterrupted game experience, due to the very nature of the arcade itself: players are here to play games and not take up time on the machine watching cutscenes! This was something of a missed opportunity. CAVE, the popular shmup creators, would be forced to explain the majority of the plot in a 15 second cutscene at the start of the game, with the remainder inferred from short boss dialogues and cryptic ending scenes (if any). With the advent of releasing shmups in both the arcade and then porting them to home console, games have begun to include a longer ‘story mode’ in addition to the ‘arcade mode’ they would normally experience.

This is a completely different story to the doujin and independent game scene. Doujin games are created with the intention of sold at Japanese conventions. Touhou is a popular doujin game shmup series. While the story is probably just as deep as any given fable, a huge fan community has sprung up to fill in the blanks for the world, creating a vibrant living setting with hundreds of different interpretations.

The independent game Sine Mora has a very strong plot with a moderately challenging game to go with it. Indeed, the plot is explained over the course of the game with haunting monologues between levels, and heated dialogue during the game itself. In a rare twist for the genre, control is occasionally taken from the player for plot purposes.

The world of shmups is hugely varied, despite the basic principles being the same between games. This thread that runs through them means skills learned are transferable, while the player can still experience something new and challenging. The best way to experience it is to get out there and try some of the linked games in this post! I can’t possibly describe the fun you’ll experience.

I have a deep enjoyment of these games. While I don’t have the artistic ability or level design experience, there is still one thing I can do to help this dying genre: I can write an easily extensible, open source engine for the creation of shooting games. Over the next few months, I hope to build a small demo game in this engine, graphics be damned! I will also have to write the engine, of course.

I will document this journey here, both to provide insight in to the development process and to keep myself motivated. Maybe one day you’ll even want to build a shmup yourself!