Maybe I'm wrong here, but I always thought bullet hell was just a sub-genre of shmup. Specifically, it refers to the shmups that have tons of bullets on-screen. Wikipedia seems to agree with this.
You and Wikipedia are right, I guess, at least in principle.. Without traditional Shmups, there wouldn't be any bullet hell shooters. However, talking strictly from my own personal biases, the actual gameplay is so vastly different. When I play a bullet hell, all I see is bullets. I hardly glance at backgrounds, enemy formations or anything but the bullets, and it gets terrible repetitive for me, otherwise I don't survive. Add to that strange multiplier and gracing rules that gets more and more bizarre to the point where it almost require a manual to figure out and it becomes so different than a traditional western Shmup. Take for instance Raptor: Call of the Shadows or Tyrian, which have constant upgrades for my ship, evolving enemies, ground and air weapons, different environments , boss battles etc. and the experience and gameplay is is like night and day. Granted, bullet hell shooters also often have boss battles, some only have boss battles, I guess because they contain more bullets? I don't have anything against bullet hell shooters, I just haven't been able to find any joy in them personally, even after buying and trying most of cave shooters on my iPad. Maybe it's because I'm a child of the eighties, and I spent way too much of my allowance on any shmup I could find in the arcades in my childhood... For me at least, it's two different genres of games, where one is an evolution from the other.
So you don't like the subgenre, that doesn't make it a different genre. It's also not as simple as bullet hell vs traditional western shooter. Many great traditional style shooters were/are eastern in origin. Bullet hell is just a more recent evolution of trends that had been going on in pre-bh shmups (complex scoring systems, increasing numbers of bullets/lasers (lots of bullets does not define bh, there are manic shooters with crazy bullets that are not bh which is better identified by the types of bullet patterns/curtains, bullet speed, hitbox size, etc.), these things are not an invention of bh, just the extreme of trends that created a subgenre). I like comedies, I don't like romantic comedies, but it's still a subgenre
Hi Bytebrain, great to hear We actually just released Battle Squadron ONE for Android devices this week and it is just like on iOS with all the fun and blasting. http://cope-com.com/2012/04/09/worlds-best-retro-shooter-out-now-for-android/
I'll concede to your points. However, whenever people is asking the question on the forum "best iOS shmup", at some point, someone is asking for a separation of the recommendations into Bullet Hell and traditional Shmup to find what they're looking for in a crowded genre on iOS. However you choose to slize it it, the actual gameplay between the two is incredible different.
Anyone got any suggestions of games like Raptor: Call of the Shadows (so not bullet hell) with retina graphics for iPhone 4 or non-retina iPad 2? Most of the ones I've found are just ports of old PC games so look all blurry on iPhone. I've got Space Invaders.
I would recommend Tyrian. It's a huge game with gorgeous graphics and lots and lots of ship and weapon upgrades. Also it's full of humour and also contains some fun mini games. It is a pc port, however, it's not blurry at all. An absolutely excellent port, and much better a port than Raptor, which doesn't fit well on touch screen, because they've kept every menu and button from the pc, so it's very hard to play on its, IMO. There is a lite version, so I would recommend trying it on for size. It's universal, but I've only played it on my iPad 2, so I don't know how good it is on iPhone, but I doubt it's retina.
well... there's just a couple I don't think were listed... a couple for decent reason... I guess... they aren't really shmups, but do fit in the same genre... if that makes sense. But since Gods Of Nibiru, Space Tripper, Velocispider and a couple other non-shmup shmups were listed... I figured these could be listed as well. There are a couple actual shmups here as well... like G-Shooter, Invasion Earth... Enborn-X BlastZone2 Hypership Out of Control G-Shooter Space Junk Invasion Earth 1953 Parallax Assault Squadron SpaceBoss Tumiki Fighters I'm sure there's more... but that's just what's coming to my mind not listed so far...
Hybris ONE is progressing at a fine pace and is now playable on iOS. Very soon we may start a beta-testing round for a few selected players. As soon as I know some more I will ofcourse post it here
This had a ton of potential. It got one update which dramatically improved some of its issues, but then when the second update was supposed to be going through, it disappeared from the AppStore. I keep hoping it will show up again (and without the very un-iOS menu interface, etc.), but it's been a couple months now, and the developer's forum, which I just checked for any updates, is just filled with spam. I am also looking forward to this. Please keep us updated
THIS is what I loved about Tyrian the best. Ship/tech upgrades... Is there a modern iOS equivalent yet? I've tried a few clones and been sorely dissappointed.
Gods of Nibiru has LOADS of upgrades... =o/ Isotope also has a fairly large upgrade/equip system... Both are two of my favorite iOS shmups, and will NEVER leave my devices. =oP
Isn't Isotope a dual stick shooter like Inferno and not a shmup right? But I agree with you that it is a great game. Going to check out gods of nibiru on youtube. I liked your recommendation to buy Space Tripper. I like that game alot. Thanks
yeah... it is a DSS... sorry about that... But Nibiru is a shmup. =oP It doesn't have relative touch controls though... but the joystick works GREAT... even though that's the main reason it didn't sell well. =o/ But it's got quite a few upgrades, and is definitely one of my favorites.
Shmup is a broad category and technically DSS's fit into it, as do many other types of games that aren't listed here. This thread is mostly a discussion of forced scrolling (horizontal or vertical or a combination of the two) shooters. To really try to define the best shmups on iOS would be kind of crazy given the large number of games of different varieties that fall under that genre.
You know what would be nice? A list of iPad compatible Shmups. I love these games, but after checking every gam in this thread, found about 4 (besides cave) that are iPad compatible. I'm not fussed if it's retina or not, just something I don't have to upscale.
I think another important distinction to make besides bullet hell vs. traditional are shooters made specifically for iOS and ports. My favorite iOS shooter is Phoenix HD by a LONG shot, and it just keep improving. And SuperCrossfire is definitely a shooter and another of the best available.
Again limiting to forced scrolling shmups, some good ones for iPad are: 5 Cave games (3 Bug Princesses, and 2 HD games) Phoenix HD Dariusburst SP Shogun Space Invaders Infinity Gene Starfire HD Neoteria Icarus X Radiant HD Battle Squadron One Tyrian Toon Shooters rRootage Online HD Hypership Out of Control Ultrablast A Space Shooter for Free HD