Slap Fight MD (スラップファイト) is a 1993 shoot-'em-up game developed by Toaplan and MNM Software for the Sega Mega Drive and published by Tengen exclusively in Japan and South Korea. Two games are available: a port of Toaplan's 1986 arcade shoot-'em-up Slap Fight with the choice to use either remastered music or the original sound, and a separate game called Slap Fight MD, that has the same gameplay mechanics but new art, levels, weapons, and music (composed by Yuzo Koshiro). The option to switch between Slap Fight and Slap Fight MD is in the Options menu under "Game Mode," with Normal enabling Slap Fight and Special enabling Slap Fight MD.
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I dabbled in the original Slap Fight for a couple runs, but that's better left explored in a proper AC review (though I hear this port is pretty good!). What I was really interested in was the MD arrange mode, made my MNM software years after the original game's release; a play on the latter's mechanics with all new stage design, Yuzo Koshiro music, and multiple, significant weapon balances.
The key concept is that you attach "wings" to your ship, making it wider and thus easier to hit, but also much more powerful. Each wing beyond the first acts as an autobomb if it gets hit, and then you can manually detonate the last one to shrink down to a pea-sized ship and attempt to survive long enough to build back up again. Really fun design!
It's especially hilarious and charming that a lot of the bullet patterns (though not all) are actually designed to work with a ship that is roughly a third-of-the-screen wide. I was shocked at the dodges I was able to pull off looking like a goddamn arkanoid paddle -- though the real move is to get the shield power up and THEN add your wings, allowing you to take three hits with them before resorting to the bomb.
My problems with the game are that: 1) in contrast to its music, its stages and enemy designs are not particularly inspired, and 2) the weapon balance is out of whack. On normal difficulty, the homing missle at full power and shield brings the first 3/4 of the game absolutely to its knees--you can just sit in the middle and watch everything die. Conversely, I've found no particular use for the bomb weapon, and although the laser is nice for bosses, it sucks so badly for killing small enemies that I preferred to never touch it.
Of course, all of this could change at the game's higher difficulties and in subsequent loops. I really enjoyed getting a normal 1st loop clear, and suspect I'll eventually be back for more.
The key concept is that you attach "wings" to your ship, making it wider and thus easier to hit, but also much more powerful. Each wing beyond the first acts as an autobomb if it gets hit, and then you can manually detonate the last one to shrink down to a pea-sized ship and attempt to survive long enough to build back up again. Really fun design!
It's especially hilarious and charming that a lot of the bullet patterns (though not all) are actually designed to work with a ship that is roughly a third-of-the-screen wide. I was shocked at the dodges I was able to pull off looking like a goddamn arkanoid paddle -- though the real move is to get the shield power up and THEN add your wings, allowing you to take three hits with them before resorting to the bomb.
My problems with the game are that: 1) in contrast to its music, its stages and enemy designs are not particularly inspired, and 2) the weapon balance is out of whack. On normal difficulty, the homing missle at full power and shield brings the first 3/4 of the game absolutely to its knees--you can just sit in the middle and watch everything die. Conversely, I've found no particular use for the bomb weapon, and although the laser is nice for bosses, it sucks so badly for killing small enemies that I preferred to never touch it.
Of course, all of this could change at the game's higher difficulties and in subsequent loops. I really enjoyed getting a normal 1st loop clear, and suspect I'll eventually be back for more.
A vertical shooter where you start as a very slow and weak ship but as you collect frequently appearing star powerups from destroyed enemies a bar on the side of the screen cycles through upgrades that you can spend your current star level on, which places you back on the start of the bar. The first upgrade is speed which you can take multiple times to become very fast, you can upgrade your main straightforward shot or change it to a penetrating laser, barrage of homing missiles, or a AoE bomb that shoots a short distance in front of your ship. Other upgrades add rapidly firing shots to the sides of your ship (that can potentially kill the final boss before it even gets to attack if you position yourself right with homing missiles), two tiers of wing upgrades that attach to your ship and make you a much larger target but improve your weapons and only cause you to lose the wings when they are hit, and the final upgrade on the tree is a powerful shield that can take multiple hits before depleting. I found the extremely easy way to play the game was to almost max speed, get the homing weapon, then get the shield and wings, finishing maxing speed, and then just try to keep the upgrade bar so it always stays on shield so as soon as it depletes you can just get it again.
It's a somewhat interesting title in how the upgrades change the size of your ship but most of the weapons are fairly dull, homing shots make it often play itself, it's short and easy, the enemies have dull designs, there are very few bosses, and what you will mostly end up avoiding is the additional stars that move you off the shield powerup.
The Genesis version is a port of the 86' arcade game that both faithfully recreated the original and added a new MD mode with slight graphic improvements, improvements to bosses, new backgrounds (mostly focusing more on being in space), a better soundtrack made just for the mode, and a new feature where you can detonate the addons to your ship as a bomb. The new mode makes good changes but for the most part it is still a short and easy shooter that doesn't do enough to make it visually or mechanically interesting.
Screenshots: https://twitter.com/Legolas_Katarn/status/1597375138152214530
It's a somewhat interesting title in how the upgrades change the size of your ship but most of the weapons are fairly dull, homing shots make it often play itself, it's short and easy, the enemies have dull designs, there are very few bosses, and what you will mostly end up avoiding is the additional stars that move you off the shield powerup.
The Genesis version is a port of the 86' arcade game that both faithfully recreated the original and added a new MD mode with slight graphic improvements, improvements to bosses, new backgrounds (mostly focusing more on being in space), a better soundtrack made just for the mode, and a new feature where you can detonate the addons to your ship as a bomb. The new mode makes good changes but for the most part it is still a short and easy shooter that doesn't do enough to make it visually or mechanically interesting.
Screenshots: https://twitter.com/Legolas_Katarn/status/1597375138152214530
Wow this game is terrible. Some of the most dull environments and enemy designs I've ever seen. Enemy types include: circle, a slightly different circle, a square, and a square within a circle (I wish I was making this up). Projectile types include: generic tiny orb (which are very small and hard to see). Upgrades and weapons are really terribly balanced. Speed is way too fast beyond a single upgrade, the firepower upgrade massively increases hitbox, making it not worth it, and only 1-2 weapons are actually decent (which you can't upgrade, only swap). Oh, and it also somehow has slowdown despite being one of the most basic and ugly games on the system.
So basically you just go through these excruciatingly slow and boring stages, basically never using upgrades beyond the first minute, occasionally maybe for a shield refresh if you get hit because you fell asleep while playing. That's if the shield actually works, half the time you just instantly die even with a shield. I don't understand what people see in this game at all.
So basically you just go through these excruciatingly slow and boring stages, basically never using upgrades beyond the first minute, occasionally maybe for a shield refresh if you get hit because you fell asleep while playing. That's if the shield actually works, half the time you just instantly die even with a shield. I don't understand what people see in this game at all.
Pretty cool. Feels like Truxton and Gradius mashed together, to a solid end result. It's incredibly short though, looping after only ~15 minutes, which was when I was really starting to get into it. A bit of a shame.
In a recent video, Tatsuya Uemura, one of the lead developers and composers at Toaplan in the 80s and early 90s, details his top 5 games the studio developed. The video's quite nice, as Uemura reflects on the games he's most proud of and likes. And whilst it's far from comprehensive and heavily personal, there is one deeper cut that stands out. At number 3, he has Slap fight.
Who the fuck talks about Slap Fight? Whilst Toaplan have gained a bit of notoriety in the scene as of late due to ports and re-issues, Slap Fight is not one of them. It's not even a game Uemura worked on, so why did he list it so high in his personal list?
Well, i gave it a go, and I can kind of see it. Slap Fight AC is pretty good. Not great, and far from Toaplan's best in my book, but for a game going on 37 years old, it holds up well. It's essentially Tiger Heli's gameplay system - consisting almost entirely of ground enemies that fire slow-ish bullets at the same time at a large player hitbox, but massively more engaging, mostly due to a power up system very similar to that of Gradius. These power ups are great, with the main gimmick being that a wing power up, which increases power at the cost of making your hitbox dramatically wider. Its good shit, eventually leading to you weaving through enormous waves of fire at high speed with your massive hitbox. It's less route heavy that tiger heli and just a lot more dynamic and well thought out.
Despite a surprisingly deep power up system, it's still extremely primative, coming very early in an era where Shmups as a genre were modernising rapidly. Even compared to games developed by Toaplan released nary two years later, It feels old. I can get why Uemura likes it, but it's just a little too unrefined and antiquated for me. But that's not where the story ends.
Bizzarely, Slap Fight got a Mega Drive port in 1993, a point at which it could arguably be deemed almost retro seeing the vast changes the genre went through in the intervening years. Many newer, better toaplan titles had allready gotten MD ports long before this came out - so again, what gives?
Well what gives is that it's clear MNM had plans. Slap Fight MD is not just the arcade game (which, for what it's worth, is recreated near perfectly), but also a brand new version of Slap Fight. Consisting of new mechanics, completely different stage design, massively improved boss fights, and a brand new, great soundtrack composed by Yuzo Koshiro.
The main thing here is the new bomb mechanic, where the hitbox-expanding wings of the base game can now be sacrificed for use as the typical STG bullet clearing bomb. It's a mechanic that works so extremely well it feels like it should have been there the whole time, and adds a lot to the experience.
Special mode in general just feels like a refined, semi-modernised version of Slap Fight that plays better, sounds better, has great level flow and just really works. It's a dad shmup without the jank, the technical issues, and with refinement.
The only real letdown with MD is that, much like AC, it's incredibly short and quite easy, and that's going to really hurt it as a long term play prospect. But sometimes, you just want to play a dad shmup. And no dad shmup quite holds up like this.
Who the fuck talks about Slap Fight? Whilst Toaplan have gained a bit of notoriety in the scene as of late due to ports and re-issues, Slap Fight is not one of them. It's not even a game Uemura worked on, so why did he list it so high in his personal list?
Well, i gave it a go, and I can kind of see it. Slap Fight AC is pretty good. Not great, and far from Toaplan's best in my book, but for a game going on 37 years old, it holds up well. It's essentially Tiger Heli's gameplay system - consisting almost entirely of ground enemies that fire slow-ish bullets at the same time at a large player hitbox, but massively more engaging, mostly due to a power up system very similar to that of Gradius. These power ups are great, with the main gimmick being that a wing power up, which increases power at the cost of making your hitbox dramatically wider. Its good shit, eventually leading to you weaving through enormous waves of fire at high speed with your massive hitbox. It's less route heavy that tiger heli and just a lot more dynamic and well thought out.
Despite a surprisingly deep power up system, it's still extremely primative, coming very early in an era where Shmups as a genre were modernising rapidly. Even compared to games developed by Toaplan released nary two years later, It feels old. I can get why Uemura likes it, but it's just a little too unrefined and antiquated for me. But that's not where the story ends.
Bizzarely, Slap Fight got a Mega Drive port in 1993, a point at which it could arguably be deemed almost retro seeing the vast changes the genre went through in the intervening years. Many newer, better toaplan titles had allready gotten MD ports long before this came out - so again, what gives?
Well what gives is that it's clear MNM had plans. Slap Fight MD is not just the arcade game (which, for what it's worth, is recreated near perfectly), but also a brand new version of Slap Fight. Consisting of new mechanics, completely different stage design, massively improved boss fights, and a brand new, great soundtrack composed by Yuzo Koshiro.
The main thing here is the new bomb mechanic, where the hitbox-expanding wings of the base game can now be sacrificed for use as the typical STG bullet clearing bomb. It's a mechanic that works so extremely well it feels like it should have been there the whole time, and adds a lot to the experience.
Special mode in general just feels like a refined, semi-modernised version of Slap Fight that plays better, sounds better, has great level flow and just really works. It's a dad shmup without the jank, the technical issues, and with refinement.
The only real letdown with MD is that, much like AC, it's incredibly short and quite easy, and that's going to really hurt it as a long term play prospect. But sometimes, you just want to play a dad shmup. And no dad shmup quite holds up like this.
The Arrange mode helps turn an otherwise middling Toaplan shmup into an excellent bite-sized trip. A single stage that runs for about 15 minutes with good replayability and an engaging difficulty curve.
The bombing mechanics are really cool too. Adding wings to your ship upgrades its weapons, but increases your hitbox. The wings also act as your bombs, so if you want, you can bomb them away to nuke the screen, give yourself time to fly around and grab stars, and reduce the size of your hitbox for more challenging sections. An extremely novel design choice that keeps the game fresh even after several runs.
Main draw against the game is that the alternate weapons all kinda suck and I only ever used the Shot and Homing Missiles. Also the section leading up to the final boss is infuriating.
The bombing mechanics are really cool too. Adding wings to your ship upgrades its weapons, but increases your hitbox. The wings also act as your bombs, so if you want, you can bomb them away to nuke the screen, give yourself time to fly around and grab stars, and reduce the size of your hitbox for more challenging sections. An extremely novel design choice that keeps the game fresh even after several runs.
Main draw against the game is that the alternate weapons all kinda suck and I only ever used the Shot and Homing Missiles. Also the section leading up to the final boss is infuriating.