A small review for the definition of shmup for those who are not familiar with this term. Shmup, or simply shoot ’em up (not to be confused with the first-person genre i.e. Doom), is a genre where the objective is shooting down everything that is in place with enough reaction time to dodge incoming bullets or attacks. If you are still not familiar, then this article from racketboy can be a good read.
1cc, one credit clear, or simply in layman’s term, is simply beating the game within it’s factory setting, as in default settings, without continuing. This was initially the term, as a Filipino shmupper, that we didn’t get until sometime in the early 2000s or late 2010, most of us people will have to be ready to face our fears and get through our bigger challenges. This is the same case when we have to achieve certain goals like applying for a job without screwing up an interview, defending a thesis with a passing with at least major or minor revision, creating a product that will satisfy many customers with at least a market reaching more than a thousand or million, etc. But what about playing an arcade or console shmup on a single or with a friend, as in two players, with only one coin? The answer is always no. Why? This is due to the fact that the shoot ’em up genre is simply not that popular and for certain people that complain that it is very difficult or simply saying “cheating” without knowing that the player is simply doing good. Hence the part of the title of this article ‘Sense of Negativism’.
The oncoming bullets being dodged from the first boss of Raiden Fighters 2.
To start it off, there are many reasons to mention that the shmup community is very short in my country. First, there are people whining thing like ‘ang hirap naman niyan’ or ‘ang bilis naman, patay na agad.’ Well you guessed it. These are simply people who complain that shmups are really difficult. There are even some who troll people with ‘ang daya’ or ‘cheater’, or even saying ‘panget niyan’, just because they have not tried playing the game yet, be it a retro or a modern release. Of course, they are difficult but not all games somehow. Most shmup games are released in consoles, and with their emulators being released in different ports (e.g. PC has Fusion, MAME, Ootake, Nestopia, PSP has RIN, SMS+, NesterJ, etc.) And with those, you have all the time in the world to practice the genre without using continues and with the default amount of lives (as in, not changing the life and bomb stock settings) as changing it’s setting may mean consequences, such as the early Touhou Project games giving bonus score penalty for changing the life and bomb stock setting. You cannot even pause during the game, and do not even think about retrying in the middle of the run, so practice, practice, practice! (Op-op-oops! don’t even think about it! Example is Blue Wish Resurrection, which disallows pausing as it disables saving replays.) Practicing it, and finally mastering it and completing it within one coin or credit, takes substantial hours, days or weeks. While games like the Star Soldier series or Zanac/Aleste series and some shmups on this level takes around a few hours, days or weeks to finish, the bullet hell genre (e.g. Dodonpachi, Raiden Fighters, Touhou, etc.) may take around several weeks or months to do so.
Player (me), as a Slave, dodging and grazing the stage 5 boss’ attacks on Raiden Fighters 2.
These people have devoted their time onto 1cc-ing every single shmup, and it now includes me. And someday, I may even reach about a hundred. Remember, puso lang mga kapatid! Shmups within one credit require patience and concentration, WITHOUT interruption, because they are an achievement that one gamer and/or shmupper is destined for!
Recommended reads:
One credit completion by SHMUPtheory
‘Why are shmups so unpopular?’ by Continue?
The Weiss Schwarz PH banner at ACGT Con PH. (Anime Card Game Tournament Convention Philippines 2014)
Me (tinotormed) with the admins of Anime Corner Group Pilipinas, and with the chair himself, Marlo.
tinotormed 