I reached the stage 4 boss (train stage) a few times in RF1, so that’s progress.  Still scoring under 10M, but it hardly matters what I’m scoring until I can approach the clear.  Boss seems easy, but I haven’t practiced his attacks yet, so I had no idea what was coming.

As for getting past stage 3 in the first place: cowardice ho!  I timed out the boss.  His hard patterns only come out when he’s taken a bunch of damage, so the girltactics mean easy dodging.  They also mean an embarassing replay, but that’s just pride fucking with ya.