sawyer

this game hasn't aged well at all. try playing it on MAME and see if you don't get bored by the fourth stage.

nevertheless, i'm still getting it. :)

get the arcade perfect HD remakes of R-Type 1 & 2 (R-Type Dimensions) on XBLA intead. you can switch back to the original graphics if you want.

@Ample Salty i bought it full price. if you like strider, it's great. yes, it gets monotonous when you play one player, but it has 4 player local co-op that really spices it up.

i even liked it one player, though it won't blow you away.

you can always try the demo. :)

im probably the only one bummed we aren't getting this version in the states. would glady play $100 for that booklet/box.

i know i could import, but the book would be in japanese as would the games. guess i'll take my cheapo american puke box and deal with it.

praise to atlus/xseed for putting out japanese games with the original box art.

the reason there is no MGS1 or SH1 is because they are PS1 games. these are not remakes, they are just the PS2 versions upscaled in HD.

if you've ever used a PSX emulator on your computer and upped the resolution, the game actually looks worse. the PSX relied on it's ultra-low resolution as kind of a blurring effect to mask jaggies and low poly-counts. when you see the games in high-res it really doesn't improve them. they would have to do full on remakes for those titles.

way bummed about this. deathsmiles has a lot of storyline for a standard shmup. i have the japanese version already and would have loved to see what was going on in the cutscenes/endings.

will still pick it up to support cave bringing it over though. :\

@The Only Girl actually the game they are referring to is "pipe dream". bioshock lifted it for their "hacking" concept.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pipe_Mania

kids these days. ;P

i met billy here. it was great.

@smoothy gamers don't buy new IPs because the vast majority in today's era don't know they exist.

they don't read joystiq. they don't read magazines. they don't know about new games and they don't care.

they see commercials for the new call of duty (or hear about it from their other semi-casual gaming friends) and they go pre-order it. when they go to gamestop, the employee tells them about the new guitar hero coming out, so then they know what to buy next.

i've never actually worked at gamestop, but my friends who have say that 95% of their customers fall into two categories: moms and madden fans. neither of them know or care about anything but the biggest AAA titles, and probably never will.

back in the 90s, people would rent games quite a lot. rental stores would stock most everything as the amount of games coming out a week was MUCH lower than today. you'd always have a wide selection. well i HAVE worked at blockbuster and i can tell you that if a game isn't a AA or AAA title we wouldn't carry it. it 's pretty shoddy, as i've found some of my favorite games (toe jam and earl, strider, burning force) from randomly renting them as a kid. now it's the new madden/halo or nothing.

@smoothy i agree with you, but there is a reason behind it: rising development costs.

many developers have gone on record saying if you take your chances on a new idea and it bombs it can nearly bankrupt a company, because the cost of making a game now is much more than it used to be (i blame FF7 for starting the trend).

nintendo churns out sequel after sequel because they sell like crazy, while original wii titles like zak and wiki went nowhere.

in the end, it's all about what makes the most money. it's a business after all. that's why you see new call of dutys, guitar heros, etc. every single year. tell your friends to stop buying them, and maybe they'll take a chance on some new IPs. ;)