Touhou: Dance of the Inverted Heart OST

Touhou: Dance of the Inverted Heart OST - Sky Dance

kobito 2021-06-20 | Here's the track I made for Megapig9001's entry for Touhou Pride Jam 3!
Check the game out here: megapig9001.itch.io/touhou-dance-of-the-inverted-heart

Original song: The Cliff Hidden in Deep Green by ZUN, arranged by uhhhh me lol
Artwork by DJThunderHeart

Genetos - Creator 1cc (52,636,465)

kobito 2023-08-20 | Turn on subtitles for commentary!

Genetos is a freeware shmup made by Tatsuya Koyama and released in 2009.

The game is themed after evolution, so each stage represents a different era of shmups. You progress by collecting the green items dropped by enemies to fill the item gauge at the bottom - the boss appears once it hits 800, and filling it up completely will evolve your ship, powering it up and adding new mechanics to the game.

Creator is the hardest mode in the game, though it's still not too difficult as the game is really generous with extra lives. This is a scorerun, so a lot of those extra resources are used for scoring purposes - please read the commentary because I don't want to write a huge wall on it here lol. I couldn't find any higher scores online so I guess this is WR, but please let me know if that's not the case!

Get the game here, it's quite fun!
tatsuya-koyama.com/works/games/genetos

Timestamps:
Opening - 0:00
Stage 1 - 0:17
Boss 1 - 0:36
Stage 2 - 1:28
Boss 2 - 1:58
Stage 3 - 2:50
Boss 3 - 4:02
Stage 4 - 7:10
Boss 4 - 9:18
Stage 5-1 - 11:20
Stage 5-2 - 14:46
Final Boss - 19:09

Mushihimesama (Steam) - Arrange 1cc

kobito 2022-06-28 | Just a simple 1cc because I'm too dumb for this game's scoring. Had 2 lives left at the end so I'm satisfied with the run.
The stage 3 hidden extend was ??? but the TLB went surprisingly well.
Also forgot to enable voices while recording, oops lmao

Timestamps:
Start - 0:00
Stage 1 - 0:10
Boss 1 - 1:46
Stage 2 - 2:20
Boss 2 - 4:52
Stage 3 - 5:42
what - 8:56
Boss 3 - 9:18
Stage 4 - 10:17
Boss 4 - 13:55
Stage 5 - 14:53
Boss 5 - 19:00
TLB - 20:31
Ending - 23:52

SILICON SCRAMBLE - 556,728,400

kobito 2022-06-20 | Super fun caravan shmup by rollingcrow and team!
Scoring consists of building up an x64 multiplier by shooting stuff, then self-destructing (bombing) to enter Fever mode, which activates the multiplier and causes valuable gold pickups to start appearing.
Speedkilling is also a big factor, as enemy waves show up immediately after the last one is destroyed.
You ideally want to carry an x64 through the entire stage and into the boss by killing stuff and continuously self-destructing, which completely refills the timer.
Extra lives are gained by collecting chips from destroyed ground objects. You want to have at least 3 lives for the boss to finish it at x64, which isn't too bad as long as you play aggressively to space out your bombs and don't get hit.
Download the game here: crows-nest.itch.io/silicon-scramble

Raging Blasters (Demo) - Caravan Mode 2,73 Million

kobito 2022-02-21 | ...

Praecantor Lila ~ Bell Spell - Demo Original 1,221,143,750

kobito 2022-01-22 | [Turn on captions for commentary!]

Really cool upcoming bullet hell shmup with some influence from Touhou, but also faster, more arcadey pacing. I won't go into the mechanics here too much beyond the commentary since there's a pretty comprehensive tutorial in-game and you really should play this anyway.

(Full disclosure: I was a former playtester before Personal Stuff™ got in the way but this game genuinely kicks ass and you should play it okay thanks ily)

Timestamps:
Stage 1 - 0:00
Boss 1 - 0:47
Stage 2 - 4:01
Boss 2 - 6:34
Stage 3 - 9:17
Boss 3 - 11:34

Get the demo here! taizen-chisou.itch.io/praecantor-lila-bell-spell-demo-version
Steam page: store.steampowered.com/app/1820700/Praecantor_Lila__Bell_Spell

[WR(?)] Graze Counter - Expert Pacifist 1cc (1,008,107,370, Type-4)

kobito 2021-02-21 | Graze Counter is a pretty fun shmup by Bikkuri Software released back in 2017.
I'm pretty sure this run is a world record but I can't say for 100% sure, although I haven't been able to find any higher scores online lol.

In this game, you can charge up a powerful bullet-cancelling laser by grazing bullets. The gauge needs to be filled up to at least 50% before you can use it, but if you fill it up all the way you'll also be invincible while it lasts.
Grazing works somewhat differently from stuff like Touhou in this game. You can graze bullets continuously (once per frame, in fact!), and the number of bullets you're grazing at the same time doesn't actually matter.

Cancelling bullets and hitting enemies with the Graze Counter beam gives you stars, which would normally fill up the Break gauge (which is basically a hyper), but the ship I'm using doesn't have Break mode.
Instead, the Break button is used for a melee attack. There's no limit to using it and it shreds through bosses. This ship also has a very short-ranged main shot, but that's not available in Pacifist mode.

Besides choosing what ship to use, you can also choose one of 3 passive skills to use. I'm using the auto-shield here which is easily the best as it gives you a regenerating shield that only takes about 15 seconds to reactivate.

Certain enemies will drop a power-up ring. The 3 pickups are:
-Boost: Instantly maxes out the multiplier.
-Shield: Self-explanatory lol.
-Gauge: Instantly fills the Graze Counter gauge (and the Break gauge for ships that have it).
These may remind you of the powerups in Cho Ren Sha 68k but unlike that game, you can't get all 3 by going in the center of the ring (this has been added to the upcoming GM Edition though!)

Expert is the hardest base difficulty in the game and Pacifist disables your main shot, but makes the Graze Counter gauge fill at x2.5 speed, which is actually really useful, especially since Type-4's main shot is garbage lol. (Pacifist doesn't affect the melee attack in any way.)

This game has a rank system. You can see the current rank in the top left, and it increases by 1 every ten seconds. Picking up a power-up will also increase it by 3. Rank only affects bullet speed and maxes out at 100 (x1.3 speed). Normally it would also make the Graze Counter gauge fill faster, but that doesn't apply to Pacifist.

The main scoring mechanic is the multiplier in the top left. It increases by grazing bullets and starts to drop if you don't graze for a while, but since every stage has an item carrier at the start, as long as you always pick Boost you mainly just need to worry about maintaining it by grazing and not dying (which resets it to x1).
This multiplier applies to enemy kills and is where most of your score will come from if you can keep it at x1000.

Yellow stars give 250 points each. Normally you'd also be able to get red stars in Break mode for 500 points each, but the ships that don't have Break mode get an additional x1.5 multiplier for enemy kills which is much more valuable.

There's also a time bonus for killing bosses which is 500 points per frame (or 30,000 per second), but half the bosses spawn smaller enemies which are worth way more than the time bonus if you milk them for as long as possible.

One thing to note about the clear bonuses is that they stack between stages, so the clear bonus in stage 1 basically has a x5 multiplier, the clear bonus in stage 2 is x4 and so on.

Get the game here: store.steampowered.com/app/629440/Graze_Counter

Timestamps:
0:00 - Intro
0:50 - Stage 1
2:32 - Boss 1
5:51 - Stage 2
7:50 - Boss 2
8:26 - Stage 3
10:20 - Boss 3
10:59 - Stage 4
12:58 - Boss 4
16:21 - Final Stage
19:33 - Final Boss
22:40 - TLB
23:49 - Ending/Credits

Tou no Kuni no Shuukaku Sai - 2P Normal 1cc (Meiling)

kobito 2021-01-16 | (Note: this is a re-recorded version of a run I uploaded earlier with a decent framerate this time.)

This run was done for Touhou Replay Showcase's January theme (Multiplayer Touhou) with Rezardi! I did movement/focus while he managed color switching and bombs/hypers. (technically i did shooting too but we were just gonna hold that down anyway lol)

In this game, you have a shield that can be switched between blue and red. If it touches a bullet of the same color you absorb it and fill your hyper meter.
Most bullets are red/blue but there are a few other colors which cannot be absorbed at all.
Of course, since movement and color changing was done by different people, this was, uh, interesting to pull off haha.

Collecting items and cancelling/absorbing bullets charges the hyper meter. Once it's at 70% or above, you can press the bomb key to activate a hyper.
If the meter is full, you'll also avoid a death and automatically hyper if you get hit, but the hyper will be shorter.

Activating a hyper cancels bullets around you, increases your level and gives you a score bonus. While it's active, you'll also have a larger shield, a smaller hitbox and more shot power.
If you get hit during a hyper, you'll use an autobomb or if you don't have any bombs, the hyper ends instantly but you won't die either way.
You can also keep filling the hyper gauge while you already have one active. This won't extend your current hyper but you can chain hypers this way if you fill it up to 70% again, especially since the gauge fills faster if you have an active hyper.

Your level is the large number on the hyper gauge and it's basically your power, your main shot gets upgraded at certain levels.

Bosses will occasionally fire star-shaped bullets during spellcards. If you absorb one of these during a hyper, you'll deal damage to the boss and start a star chain.
To keep the chain going you need to keep the bar at the bottom of the screen from emptying by absorbing bullets.
These stars start out very weak but the higher your chain, the more damage they do (and they can get *very* powerful). Your hyper also won't end as long as you have an active chain.
You won't see this mechanic being used much during this run though since again, this was a 2-player run.
The final practically requires you to chain though which is why it takes so long here.

Scoring mostly revolves around hypering as much as possible and capturing spellcards, but one weird thing about the scoring is that you get a *massive* bonus if you're forced out of a hyper (this happens when a dialog scene starts, the stage result screen appears or the stage ends). You can also graze bullets for 1,000 points each but your graze radius is very small.

There are also multiple "tiers" of spellcard captures. I assume the higher tiers give more score, but some of them also give you extra levels:
Timeout - Self-explanatory, although you still get some score from this. Counts as a failed capture.
Break Through - Clear the spell without meeting any of the other conditions. This also counts as a failed capture, but again, you still get some score.
Complete Victory - Clear the spell without misses or bombs. Even if you don't die, you won't get this if you took a hit. Hypers are allowed, though.
Seal - Clear the spell without misses or bombs and while dealing enough damage with stars. The manual says you need to take down at least 50% of the boss's HP with stars but I'm fairly certain it's lower than that. Increases your level by 1.
Complete Sealing - Clear the spell without misses, bombs or shooting. You need to deal all your damage by star chaining, although I'm pretty sure there's a short grace period for the no-shoot requirement. Increases your level by 3.
(For obvious reasons, you won't be seeing these last two very much lol)

Note that this video was edited to flow better since you can only replay one stage at a time, idk if this matters at all but I wanted to make it clear anyway. The replays also don't include clear bonuses so you might see the score jump up between stages.

Very fun game, you can get it here:
dlsite.com/home/work/=/product_id/RJ155138.html

Timestamps:
Stage 1: 0:00
Boss 1: 3:25
Stage 2: 5:05
Boss 2: 8:05
Stage 3: 10:45
Boss 3: 14:47
Final Stage: 17:01
Final Boss: 20:43

Omega Blast - 1,019,050 (Normal)

kobito 2020-11-25 | Omega Blast is a really fun free homebrew caravan shooter made by Nendo (aka Rael) for the 30th anniversary of the Mega Drive. In true caravan fashion, you have 2 minutes to score as high as you can.

The most important parts of scoring are taking out the hidden blocks and S blocks, as well as speedkilling the boss.

S blocks always appear in groups and award 64k if you destroy all of them quickly enough, while hidden blocks are invisible and need to be revealed by shooting them. These start out at 2k but double each time, up to 64k if you destroy all six.

Certain blocks will also reveal orange score items when destroyed, these give you 8k points and also grant you invincibility for a short while. I'm not sure how long it lasts exactly but it seems to last about as long as the "8000" popup stays on screen.

You get an extra 10k for every remaining second when you kill the boss, so you really want to kill it as fast as possible.
The trick is to pointblank the boss by staying inside its shield. You also do way more damage by mashing the regular shot button (A) while holding down autofire (C).

There's also some optimization you can do by destroying as much stuff as you can during the stage.
It's worth noting that enemies appear faster as you shoot them down, so you can get a couple extra points that way too.

I threw in an input display on the right because...I dunno, I felt like it, so please enjoy my crappy pixel art.

Apologies for the low quality, apparently my PC doesn't appreciate me recording emulators at a decent resolution, haha.

Get the game here:
nendo16.jimdofree.com/omega-blast

This was played for Shmup Junkie's Omega Blast caravan event, check his channel out here:
youtube.com/c/ShmupJunkie

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Ending/Staff Roll Theme

kobito 2017-07-13 | Download the OST: mega.nz/#!89BjnCTb!HaH6cTjr9OANQ8zdo944lfJXVkmVVi9e0t5oEVABUfY

Sorry if there's any problems with the audio, my PC is pretty trash but I tried to edit out any clipping and stuttering.

If you find any issues, please let me know!

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Extra Session Theme - Heian Alien (ミエナイカラコソ)

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Tenshis Theme - Catastrophe in Bhava-Agra ~ Wonderful Heaven

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Prismriver Sisters Theme - Phantom Ensemble

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Utsuhos Theme - Solar Sect of Mystic Wisdom ~ Nuclear Fusion

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Session 3 Theme - Lets Live in a Lovely Cemetery

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Session 2 Theme - The Capital City of Clouds in the Sky

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Marisas Theme - Love-Coloured Master Spark

kobito 2017-07-13 | Download the OST: mega.nz/#!89BjnCTb!HaH6cTjr9OANQ8zdo944lfJXVkmVVi9e0t5oEVABUfY

I apologize for the fade at the end, but the music just cuts out abruptly in the game, so I tried to make it sound a little nicer.

Also, sorry if there's any problems with the audio, my PC is pretty trash but I tried to edit out any clipping and stuttering.

If you find any issues, please let me know!

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Session 1 Theme - Extend Ash ~ Hourai Victim

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Selection Screen Theme

IKUSAAAAAAAN! OST - Title Screen Theme - Crimson in the Black Sea ~ Legendary Fish