(disclaimer: I do play Team Fortress 2, just once in a red moon, aka whenever I go to LAN parties.)

I decided to take a break from Thunder Force IV to work on Thunder/Stay Ni–I mean, Thunder Force III, so I can stop sucking at it more than I should.

Taking some advice from a fellow shmupper, I decided on Haides as my starting stage, so as to quickly fully power up (assuming I don’t make any of the many wonderful stupid mistakes I usually make in a TF3 run, especially on Haides and Gorgon). It took me many runs to teach myself “don’t go into the fork where the first Lancer/Laser is, that’s guaranteed death due to the way one of those rock stick things rotate.” From the waterfall area onwards, the stage is a piece of cake, as well as the boss (assuming I haven’t lost my Craw or my Saber/Sever); with both, the boss’s missiles are nothing, but with either missing, I can very easily get hit by a stray missile.

Moving onto Ellis/Eris, this is the easiest of the initial stages, if you ask me. The diagonal-scrolling section poses very few abrupt hazards, and the scrolling-up section is almost nothing. The boss is another story, however; in the 15-20 seconds it takes for the thing to turn red and asplode, I tend to not properly dodge the lasers coming out of its center, or the arms it shoots out once its ship launchers are gone.

Most casual TF3 players have Hydra as their first stage; for me, it’s my third. I play Gradius for this stage and switch to Fire(y) to keep the ground and ceiling targets out. There are a few sudden hazards here, like the enemies that appear from behind (though it’s nothing Lancer can’t handle), a “>” formation that suddenly emerges from the top and bottom, and rows of rockets on the ceiling and floor that I find easier to simply BS through than try to destroy. I tend to die or lose shield at the boss because dammit Saber why can’t you fire right in front of my ship and not just higher and lower than it at least this shit isn’t invisible

Gorgon tends to make me use gory language for a bit. Firstly, there’s those laser-firing machines that I need to teach myself not to move vertically in front of. There’s also the pillars of lava that make it harder for me to avoid the rocks that bust to paeces–it doesn’t help that some of them will hit the floor or ceiling and burst without me doing anything. There’s a lava pillar that doesn’t stop to watch out for (hint: bouncing fireballs on the left side of a lava pool). The boss requires some tricky maneuvers to avoid slamming into it and its eight-way bullets, but otherwise does nothing out of the blue.

My last stop on my tour of whatever planetary system this is is Seiren/Siren, because it just wouldn’t be a post-T(hun)F(o)2 TF game without a stage that goes underwater. Somewhat reminiscent of Super Mario Bros‘s underwater stages (with the water currents, only they go up), my first worry is those stupid mines that, on exploding gray, can kill me. At one point, there is a narrow passage with difficult-to-hit mines, and although there is a 1-up here, it won’t make up if I lose Saber (which I’m already rarely using out of fear of losing it). The midboss and the boss are both pains in the ass; the former only opens up its weak spot when it’s doing its wave attack, and the latter is this game’s equivalent of Gradius Gaiden‘s Heaven’s Gate.

After all this, it’s time to chase after the Cerberus. Using a [DATA EXPUNGED], the (awesome) music for this stage sounds kinda off, as opposed to playing it in cartridge form (which I’d love to have one day). With Saber on hand, I can make away with the rear jets, but without her I’m kinda fucked because Twin Shot can only put so much “Practical” in Boring But Practical. Other than that, Cerberus is pathetically easy. Maybe I should snap up Thunder Force VI so I can fight Cerberus and not CerberASS.

After my ship somehow escapes the exploding Cerbuttrus without a scratch, it’s time to take on the Orn Base. Hazards include the claw-like things that act as walls that are indestructible unless they have a root that can be destroyed and the orbs that fire 8-way lasers (which, when part of the wall midbosses, are a total pushover). Said walls may cause me to lose a life or two (out of the 6-10 lives I have at this point), but the real danger here is the boss. YAY MOVING BOXES. YAY BOX PATTERNS THAT MY BRAIN CAN’T PROCESS.

Once/If I manage to BS this boss, it’s time for the final act of this game: Orn Core. At this point I’m most likely at 0 or 1 spares to go. The midboss vaguely reminds me of Gradius III/IV/V‘s Big Core mkIII, only getting between its helixing lasers is not only optional, but disaster waiting to happen. Okay, stupidass midboss down. Hey Orn Core, what’s up? Yeah, your first form is so easy it’s not even funny. Yeah, I expected you to have a second form. Oh crap, a whole screenful of wave lasers and those bullets that move in circling clusters of four! Oh hey, the wave lasers can be destroyed, I’m not as in trouble as I thought I was! Nope, too late, couldn’t process that thought fast enough to avoid these shots.

EXCELLENT PROGRESS
but…
let’s BS the Orn Base boss less next time