Silpheed series

[Sketcz-1000]

This probably isn't going to receive a front page update for a couple of weeks, but have a read and let us know if it needs any changes. When designing it I played around with the idea of including as many magazine scans as possible, for historical context. With the SCD release I think this is especially interesting, since all of them compare it to Starfox, and there were some pretty disparate views.

www.hardcoregaming101.net/silpheed/silpheed1.htm


I suppose the other thing to say is, if we missed a magazine scan you feel is especially important, in this article or others, feel free to link us to it and we can consider adding it with future updates.

Also, people say Silpheed (SCD) copied Star Fox? I say Star Fox copied Silpheed (PC)!

[Gilder]

Wow. I never cared much for the series, as I have only played the Sega CD version before, but I didn't realize all of the different games for this series (or that the Sega CD version wasn't even the first game in the series!). This is really well done and I really like all of the scans of various video game mags, as they add more depth to the article and a viewpoint of what was being said about the game when they were first released.

Quick note on the Sega CD page, it says, "Even more interesting is that EDGE magazine gave it 7/10 in their launch issue, the same as some awful CDi adventure game..." Inca is actually covered on the site if it needs to be linked:

www.hardcoregaming101.net/inca/inca.htm

[Lord Dalek]

Oh man, I remember playing the original Silpheed on somebody's computer. Sucked at it so badly, even though its really not that hard.

[starscream]

Here's a couple of things to possibly alter regarding the first Silpheed.

Platform listing should say TRS-80 CoCo 1/2/3, or just leave the numbers out, the difference between a CoCo 1 and 2 is marginal and I don't know if there's even a game that only runs on either of them.

Since the unreleased Atari and Amiga versions are mentioned, include the Macintosh.

FM7 references should probably be changed to FM77AV. The difference is at least as big if not bigger than between the CoCo 1/2 and 3. + it may also explain the emulation confusion.
Regarding the FM7 port, you'll need the XM7 emulator, but the older V3.0L30 release from 2001. For some unknown reason, the newer V1.2L4.0 release from 2010 onwards won't load it.
You certainly don't need to use an ancient 2001 version - I'm using a 3.4 partially translated version posted a few years back ago at Tokugawa for example.
But from looking around, it seems that XM7 is divided into different development lines, and the 1.1/1.2 ones don't feature FM77 AV support.

Likewise you don't need to necessarly use XGS for Apple GS emulation, there is also KEGS and variants + MESS (on Windows - it also probably runs on the X-Box port of KEGS).

[nickz]

This is a very impressive article. I didn't know Silpheed was even still going, much less that there were installments on the PS2, 360, and Android.

I played Silpheed on the PC88 a while back. It's pretty cool that a game could have that kind of polygonal art style with such limitations. There are some games on the PC98 by Doujin group ABA that take some obvious inspiration from Silpheed and it's pretty cool to see it's influence in some unexpected places like that.

[Gendo Ikari]

Very thorough article. I already knew the DOS version of the game (which I'll have to dig up through my abandonware disks, never tried it with Dosbox so I didn't know it had excellent music) although the Sega CD episode/version was the first I heard of in the mid-1990s. I knew of the most recent entries only as passing mentions and Project Sylpheed is an even greater disappointment for how its section is structured: it starts by underlining its positive sides, like the impressive scale of the space battles, and then proceeds to show how it all falls apart.

I knew Silpheed originated on Japanese computers but I'd never thought the very first version of the original dated as back as 1986, which makes it even more technically impressive in perspective.

As for the emulation tips, why DosBox is not mentioned? It's not hard to configure - surely not harder than the FM7 version with which you got the to the point of putting detailed instructions... That version of the original seems the "definitive" one btw, with those renewed cutscenes.

I haven't noticed typos but integrating starscream's emulation tips would be good. Also, in the feature about Japanese computers, several games already covered on the site are linked when mentioned in the PC-8801 paragraph, so a link to the Silpheed article should be added there.

[BulletMagnet]

When discussing The Lost Planet's proximity scoring system there probably ought to be at least some mention of UPL's Omega Fighter, which is not only one of the earliest (if not the first) shmup to utilize such a system back in 1989, but a closer equivalent to TLP's setup than Psyvariar or Shikigami no Shiro.

[ReyVGM]

I read several comparisons with Star Fox but I think the game you should be looking at is at X for the Gameboy. That's the game Star Fox really came from and X is the game that probably copied from Silpheed (yes it has a polygonal disembodied head too).

[Sketcz-1000]

Well, I mention DOS configurations, which implies DOSbox. I don't know anyone who still has a DOS compatible computer. But I gloss over DOSbox because 1) the PC-88 version is considerably easier to emulate, despite having inferior music, 2) most people know DOSbox, whereas FM7 emulation most people probably haven't tried.

Thanks for the suggestions though, will make all the additions in a moment.


I have never heard of Omega Fighter before. Considering the historical precedent it sets, we should have an article on it somewhere!

Aug 25, 2012 20:53:02 GMT -5 ReyVGM said:

I read several comparisons with Star Fox but I think the game you should be looking at is at X for the Gameboy. That's the game Star Fox really came from and X is the game that probably copied from Silpheed (yes it has a polygonal disembodied head too).

Do you mean this head:
www.mobygames.com/game/gameboy/x/screenshots/gameShotId,533085/

I knew about X, it was developed by Argonaut, the guys who went on to make Star Fox. But it didn't click in my mind when writing. Good call!

Aug 25, 2012 14:16:03 GMT -5 Gendo Ikari said:

Project Sylpheed is an even greater disappointment for how its section is structured: it starts by underlining its positive sides, like the impressive scale of the space battles, and then proceeds to show how it all falls apart.

In fairness, once you have Thrush Missiles, it is a fun game. I just have a personal hatred for the Dead Rising style of game design (which is reminiscent of roguelikes). Though it seems to be worse here, in that Dead Rising started you at the beginning, albeit stronger, whereas Sylpheed just coasts you through. Hilariously, Dave Halverson's review in Play makes a big song and dance of how the game is only 2-3 hours long. Yeah, if you skip every bloody mission!


Also, I just want to re-iterate, how fucking disturbing I find the story of Sylpheed. It quite blatantly sets out to say that planetary genocide is perfectly OK as long as you're the nation in power at that moment, and it's morally right to kill those seeking emancipation.

Not one single reviewer touched upon this - several commented on the anime aesthetics of the character design, the supposed fan-service, or how it's like some kind of space opera, but not one of them pointed out the fact that throughout the game you are playing as the bad guys. And not even cool bad guys, like the Star Wars Empire, but rather sugar coated bad guys.

[Gendo Ikari]

Well, that may be an element of originality if you think about it Although it becomes disturbing when you wonder what really were the intentions of the developers and if they thought of the implications.

Regarding the first game under Dosbox, I'm now trying it with several configuratons (of itself, not Dosbox's) and, is it normal that its sound effects are generated only through the PC Speaker? Configuring the Creative Game Blaster doesn't work (either it requires special setting or it's unemulated), while other settings produce music of varying qualities: Yamaha and Roland cards are the best choices in the game's config. Still, I'd like to find out if the effects are beeper-only or not. It's a detail it may be worth pointing out because they stick out a bit (less in emulation, since now they are generated from the same source, but I can imagine on original hardware).
EDIT: ok, from a quick check on some youtube videos (I can't see much due to my limited connection), the effects are indeed PC speaker. Also, several videos point out the type of music card (authentic or emulated) used when recording.

[roushimsx]

I've always been really curious about Project Sylpheed. It looked really neat, but I've heard it wasn't very good without anyone really being able to articulate why. Thanks for laying out how fundamentally broken it is. Damn shame.

[PooshhMao]

What always intrigued me was how they achieved those graphics on the Mega-CD.
I'm reasonably sure those are not real-time generated polygons, are they? At least not the cut scenes and backgrounds. But it looks too clean for straight up streamed video, since there's no artifacts or compression visible. At least, none that I can recall.

EDIT: should've read the article first. So yeah, just as I'd expected, it used streaming video of pre-rendered polygons for the backgrounds. Blends well with the real-time polygons on top. Nice achievement.

[ivicviperi]

I've got Project Sylpheed since yesterday and I'm kinda shocked seeing how much bashing this game got, even from this website. I have nothing to say about the controls, they are perfect to me, yes the time limit (WHY IS THERE A TIME LIMIT ? AM I RUNNING OUT OF GAS ?! ) and occasional slow downs are annoying and not being able to know the optionnal missions before hand is frustrating (even though some are self-explanatory, for example in level 05, Sarah from Bird Squadron gets attacked, and Raymond asked if she needed some back-up, guess what you can do ?), but I really don't see any other downsides to this game, yet. The tutorial is MANDATORY however. I got stucked at level 02 one time, ignoring the Advanced Level Tutorial, then after mastering it, I realized how much EASIER the game had gotten.

I'm at level 06 and I'm playing on Normal difficulty, it's tough, but not unbeatable, and I'm using normal equipment, not the one from the DLCs. Still on a first playthrough too. Maybe they've made the game more balanced in PAL territories, maaaaaybe.

I'm a huge StarFox fan, and this is my first Silpheed game (got the one for the Japanese Mega-CD as well, with its original jewel-case, but I can't get it to work on my PC with an emulator and I don't have a Mega-CD anyway), but comparing this to StarFox Command, which is the closest in this series to what Project Sylpheed is, I prefer Project Sylpheed, it's probably stupid to compare a DS title to a 360 title, but SF Command just gets boring over time and way too fast considering there are like 9 different endings.

[dire51]

Do mp3s exist of the radio chatter from the Sega CD version? Some of them have some amusing profanity which cracked my friends and I up way back when, and I'd love to hear them again.

[ivicviperi]

"THEY GOT THE CARRIER !!!"


I do have the Original and Enhanced Soundtrack (CD Quality), but I didn't see anything about this.

Also, I'd really like to make my Mega-CD copy to work on Kega Fusion, but I can't even get past the "Sega" Logo, even though I can play the tracks. ForceAspi doesn't seem to work on my computer as well. So... shit.