Grasshopper Manufacture and Digital Reality’s side-scrolling shoot ’em up Sine Mora is back, though it never left. The 2012 game has been expanded and fancied up for the new generation of consoles with new modes and local cooperative play, and those have come our way too. Sine Mo
Grasshopper Manufacture and Digital Reality’s side-scrolling shoot ’em up Sine Mora is back, though it never left. The 2012 game has been expanded and fancied up for the new generation of consoles with new modes and local cooperative play, and those have come our way too. Sine Mora EX [official site] is out now, and is free to folks who own the original. Yup, this is the Grasshopper best known for brash games like Killer7, No More Heroes, and Lollipop Chainsaw, but no one shouts “Fuck you!” when killing enemies or suplexes anyone. Sine Mora is mostly a nice shmup with big bosses. (more…)
Dear THQ Nordic fans, Sine Mora EX, the extended version of the critically acclaimed original Sine Mora, is out now on Steam. To give a big "Thank you" to all of our great fans out there, all Steam owners of the old version will get this new version automatically added to their S
Dear THQ Nordic fans,
Sine Mora EX, the extended version of the critically acclaimed original Sine Mora, is out now on Steam. To give a big "Thank you" to all of our great fans out there, all Steam owners of the old version will get this new version automatically added to their Steam library!
Dear THQ Nordic fans, Sine Mora EX, the extended version of the critically acclaimed original Sine Mora, is out now on Steam. To give a big "Thank you" to all of our great fans out there, all Steam owners of the old version will get this new version automatically added to their S
Dear THQ Nordic fans,
Sine Mora EX, the extended version of the critically acclaimed original Sine Mora, is out now on Steam. To give a big "Thank you" to all of our great fans out there, all Steam owners of the old version will get this new version automatically added to their Steam library!
Shoot-'em-up Sine Mora has been remastered for PC, and for the current generation of consoles, with a gaggle of new modes, a more common aspect ratio, and 4K support. That's the pretty shmup featuring anthropomorphic animals piloting bullet-spewing ships, created by Digital Reali
Shoot-'em-up Sine Mora has been remastered for PC, and for the current generation of consoles, with a gaggle of new modes, a more common aspect ratio, and 4K support. That's the pretty shmup featuring anthropomorphic animals piloting bullet-spewing ships, created by Digital Reality and (Killer is Dead developer) Grasshopper Manufacture.
You can find Sine Mora EX on Steam here, where the page proudly boasts of the update's additional features. Here they are, if you're curious:
16:9 Aspect ratio (instead of 16:10 which is still an option)
Full English Voice Overs (Original Hungarian ones are still available as an option)
Local co-op for up to 2 players in Story mode
3 New versus modes: Race, Tanks, Dodgeball
New challenge levels
Improved Rendering
Native 4k at 60 FPS
Sine Mora EX will release on August 8, and did you know that its soundtrack is provided by Silent Hill composer Akira Yamaoka? The only trailer I can find is of the Switch version, but I don't imagine the PC game will be wildly different:
By the late ‘90s, with Street Fighter 2’s impact on arcades receding in the West, the beautiful rows of wooden cabinets and the glow of their CRTs suffered a commercial deforestation. With their dwindling ranks went the heyday for genres built around a quick play and immediate gr
By the late ‘90s, with Street Fighter 2’s impact on arcades receding in the West, the beautiful rows of wooden cabinets and the glow of their CRTs suffered a commercial deforestation. With their dwindling ranks went the heyday for genres built around a quick play and immediate gratification. Genres like the shoot-em-up, which predates all the rest with links back to 1962’s pioneering Spacewar!
In its prime, the shoot-em-up genre swelled with a distinctly Japanese form of game design, screens covered by hellish bullet patterns and anime girls—plus notable domestic off-shoots. Post-arcade, the shoot-em-up, the shooter, the shmup, or the STG (pick your acronym preference) receded into an enthusiast bubble, hidden from view after first and third-person action games captured the designation of 'shooter.'
In those dark years, shmup enthusiasts either contended with pricey, obscure late releases on the Dreamcast and Neo Geo, or by sheer will, discovered alternate venues, corners of the internet where potential classics like the enemy pile-on Cho Ren Sha resided prior to common digital distribution and Steam.
"I found an online resource of Japanese people, just basement devs, who would be posting shmups and posting updates every day online. Some of them were crap. Some of them were unbelievably cool," remembered Don Thacker, founder of Imagos Softworks, developers of the Kickstarted genre cross-over Starr Mazer.
Discovery comes easy when wandering a hall of video games, each churning attract screens. Without arcades, those random hubs found by curious Google hunters such as Thacker were it for the shmup’s exposure, outside of certain studios aiming at the die-hard audience. The genre, and with it the shmup’s myriad of sci-fi, fantasy, and military fetishism, fell into disrepair. The mainstream gaming public chewed on ever increasing polygon counts; the dedicated shmup fan sifted through what amounted to back alley digital dumpsters seeking anything of merit still made with scrappy 2D sprites, subwoofer crushing explosions, and mountainous end level bosses.
Then, a visible indie game movement, and more so, Steam. Consider the timing as the calendar turned to the 2010s: Kids who mastered joystick controls in front of CRTs burning phosphors, expertly navigating games at the height of shmup popularity—from Namco’s ageless Galaga to Capcom’s beautifully exaggerated, WWII "inspired" 194X series—plug into their nostalgia as developers. Thus a flurry of Steam activity, sizable enough to wear down even the hardened genre devotees, but also a sign of regeneration and visibility.
Now developers like Mommy’s Best Games, developer of the neon obsessed heavy metal shmup Shoot 1UP, can find a home for their uniquely textured throwbacks.
"Steam has been great to release Shoot 1UP to, as it was very successful on Xbox 360 and now we can reach even more people. I love consoles but not everyone has one. With PCs, nearly every gamer has a machine that can run our 1990s style shooters," said Nathan Fouts of Mommy’s Best Games.
It’s a gold rush on Steam compared to the genre’s low point. The service afforded a substantial kick to the shmup, which at the turn of the decade saw a fleet of indies in such numbers, Don Thacker amusingly stated that for developers, "Steam is bullet hell."
The slow resurgence
Throughout the early 2000s, a few notable studios entered the space, some earning wide acclaim, including Treasure’s polarity swapping Ikaruga (no article on shmups is free from Ikaruga’s notable grasp). Aside from Treasure, popular Japanese developer Psikyo (notable for their raucous Strikers 1945 and the perky, daydream-like Gunbird) died off by 2003, vacating the space. Enter Japanese developer Cave.
Founded in 1994 but finding their footing as Psikyo neared shutdown, Cave’s numerous early entries include tongue twisting titles DoDonPachi, Espagaluda, and Guwange, the latter boasting a genre-exotic medieval Japan setting. Further efforts in the later 2000s brought on bullets in droves from Mushihimesama, Espagaluda II, and Deathsmiles, the latter fitted with anime witches and anime fantasy and anime tropes to saturated extremes. Each of Cave’s entries fell into a contemporary sub-genre affectionately coined 'bullet hell,' partly unsurprising since the studio’s formation is owed to former employees of the bankrupt Toaplan, arguably where the designation came from following Toaplan’s sci-fi dazzler Batsugun.
Bullet hell came to define the zest of a shmup, balancing an elegant ballet of colored weaponry and a playable protagonist with a single weak point, mere pixels (or even pixel) wide. They’re peak shmup, where pressure-driven, graceful movement meets a handsome (and ceaseless) display of enemy attack patterns. Steam is full of these gripping yet punishing games, including a back library of Cave’s work.
"There's a strong support for Cave and the bullet hell genre itself… The shooting game developers catered more to a dwindling audience who were demanding harder and harder games," noted James Wragg, Director of Publishing at Degica, responsible for bringing some of those Cave classics to Steam.
"Steam fills that gap and enables companies. They don't need to go through a publisher like us. They can publish independently," began Wragg. "It basically allows them to publish without all of the red tape of the platforms like PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo. In theory, it opens it up to a much wider audience because Steam's got such a huge user base."
"It's very encouraging to see a lot of indie circles start to release stuff on Steam. Back in my day, you wouldn't see that. But now you're seeing stuff like Crimzon Clover [and] Mecha Ritz [Steel Rondo]," said Danny 'danbo' Baxter of Stellar Circle, developer of 2016’s Blue Revolver, a suitably low-fi gem owing much to Cave’s turn-of-the-century design philosophy.
Influenced
Nostalgic influence feeds the listings on Steam, cultivating a collection of shmups which hit every classification in a varied genre—vertical, horizontal, traditional, even twin stick (although the hardcore community may find the inclusion dubious). Shmups even interject themselves elsewhere.
"If you click the bullet hell tab on Steam, you'll see a lot of games that bear no resemblance to something that I've been playing. Undertale had bullet patterns, Neir Automata is going to have them," said danbo a few weeks before Nier's release.
The rush of games—and those borrowing elements—has caused a touch of in-fighting between those passionate for the striking difficulty of bullet hell and those seeking something more passive. Like Degica’s Dariusburst, the continuation of a decades old franchise set in deep space as players set ablaze robotic, oceanic inspired creatures. In a genre of familiar routines, Darius is (and forgive the pun) in a sea of its own.
"There's a certain generation where their first encounter with shooting games was bullet hell. For them, bullet hell equals shooting games. We came across this when we released Dariusburst. Some of the reviews from users saying there's not enough bullets on screen, but it's like comparing Virtua Fighter to Street Fighter," said Wragg, noting the wide separation in shmup styles.
Steaming
Paging the community on hangout Shmupsforum, users expressed dismay surrounding imperfect ports, brought up fandom punching bag Sine Mora for a laugh, and tossed positive sentiments at the modern accessibility of the genre. "The recent deluge of shmups on Steam has been a great thing… The genre is finding a wider audience and there have been some great indie efforts. Shmups are alive and kicking and I hope it continues forever," noted one user.
"At the same time, especially in recent years, it also allows for a boatload of shovelware to gum up the works," countered one forum regular.
As with Steam in general, the visibility problem grows with each new game added to the service. "I think Steam is brilliant at making things accessible. I also think Steam added more games last year than Steam had previous," stated Thacker. "If you look at our little pie slice on Steam and you fill it 80% with Cave games, I think it's going to be hard for us to have the discussion about a genre a lot of indies are trying to put back together."
Wragg, however, welcomed the influx. "I'm happy to see competition in the market because competition is good for everybody. It makes people push harder and I'd rather see the shooting genre go somewhere other than just bullet hell and have somebody come up with crazy mechanics that push things in other directions. The only way that can happen is through new people with new ideas coming in."
I'd rather see the shooting genre go somewhere other than just bullet hell and have somebody come up with crazy mechanics that push things in other directions.
James Wragg
Bullet hell continues to dominate on Steam. Of the 15 pages of games listing themselves under shoot-em-up, nearly half pin themselves to bullet hell. "There's definitely a lot of games you could play, but I'm not sure how many of those are really geared to getting people into games like bullet hell," said danbo.
"For the beginner coming in, it is a very difficult place to start. But Steam again on that front allows people to, without much of a financial investment, pick up couple of shooting games in the sale or a couple of really well priced indies," said Wragg.
Games like Thacker’s gorgeous Starr Mazer, mixing horizontal shooting and point-and-click gameplay, come pre-designed for entry level play. "I've had 45, 50 year old guys come up and they'll be like, 'Oh, it's Galaga.' It's super not, but I understand that's all you can link it to so let's use that as a stepping stone."
Those looking to jump in on Steam might be turned away by Cave’s kinetic, even exuberant style, but can find solace elsewhere. "[Jamestown is] pretty simple to pick up. You can sit around with two, three, four players locally, enjoy it with your friends and the mechanics work very well for multiple players," said Wragg. He’s right: Jamestown’s friendly H.G. Wells-meets-American-Western aesthetic marries to a charming entry level pixel adventure without being first baptized by Cave.
If nothing else, the genre remains alive, and in good hands. The indie surge brought on by Steam, for its inevitable faults in saturation, allows developers to find a home. “If you haven't gone to the shmup section on Steam, check out some indies. You're missing a lot," began Thacker. "Also if you grew up in the ‘80s and ‘90s and you liked shmups, they're there. They exist. It didn't go away with arcades. They survived."
Today's Deal: Save 66% on Sine Mora ! Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or Facebook for instant notifications wherever you are!
Today's Deal: Save 66% on Sine Mora!
Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or Facebook for instant notifications wherever you are!
When the splendid time-bending shoot ‘em up Sine Mora arrived on PC after a long delay in the land of porting, I lamented the fact that the trial version wasn’t available alongside the full release. As an XBLA game, the game already had a demo so it seemed odd that it had been lo
When the splendid time-bending shoot ‘em up Sine Mora arrived on PC after a long delay in the land of porting, I lamented the fact that the trial version wasn’t available alongside the full release. As an XBLA game, the game already had a demo so it seemed odd that it had been lost during transition. Fortunately, it wasn’t lost entirely and did in fact drift onto Steam a couple of days ago. My memory of the demo on 360 involves a tediously drawn-out story sequence before the dodging and destruction commences, but there’s enough to form an idea as to whether this is a suitable flavour of bullet hell. It’s not quite as difficult as the horror I’ve hidden below.
We did acknowledge the port of side-scrolling time-bending shooter Sine Mora a couple of weeks ago, but now that the game is out , perhaps you’d like to see a PC launch trailer? I played the game on the 360th Box and even though my bullet-dodging skills are more like those of a l
We did acknowledge the port of side-scrolling time-bending shooter Sine Mora a couple of weeks ago, but now that the game is out, perhaps you’d like to see a PC launch trailer? I played the game on the 360th Box and even though my bullet-dodging skills are more like those of a lobby security goon than a KeaNeo, I actually managed to complete it. Although there are moments when the screen seems to fill with pulsing death-orbs, the pace isn’t frantic even when survival becomes delicately poised. It’s a beautiful game with superb boss fights and a daft story, which can take up too much time between sections even if it is endearingly silly. Here’s the trailer.
Sine Mora is Now Available on Steam! Sine Mora is a horizontal shoot'em up that provides a unique take on challenge, where time is the ultimate factor. Mixing classic shooter sensibilities with contemporary presentation, Sine Mora is a gorgeous shoot'em up that offers a Story Mod
Sine Mora is Now Available on Steam!
Sine Mora is a horizontal shoot'em up that provides a unique take on challenge, where time is the ultimate factor. Mixing classic shooter sensibilities with contemporary presentation, Sine Mora is a gorgeous shoot'em up that offers a Story Mode that weaves an over-the-top tale and an Arcade Mode that provides deep, satisfying gameplay to challenge fans of the genre. With many ways to manipulate time, Sine Mora features over 50 weapon combinations to complete each beautiful stage that form fits to the player's skills with scaling difficulty. Soundtrack composed by Akira Yamaoka and featuring boss designs by Mahiro Maeda.
