MMMC - Gun.Smoke

[scooterb23]

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v643/scooterb23/mameclub.jpg

Hey howdy! This week we go on a rootin'-tootin' shootin' rampage in the Ol' West with Gun.Smoke. Why there's a period between the Gun and Smoke, I'll never know.

I used to play the heck out of this game at the local bowling alley in between Saturday morning leagues. I used to be pretty darn good at it. Getting to at least the third boss. We'll see how those skills have deteriorated this week.

http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=8042

http://www.arcade-museum.com/images/11/1181242121252.png

Have fun with this one, I hope to see more activity...as things have been quiet the past couple weeks. Perhaps I'll give the choice of game next week to someone that posts something great. Whether it be an awesome tip, a great story, or a sky high score (screenshots would be great), give us something good, and you may get to pick next week's game.

If you need the ROM, head over to drop.io/dpmameclub and grab it there!

[Ed Oscuro]

I want to like this game, but every time I play it, I run into the same problems:

- Twitchy enemies that like to drop shots in your face combined with fast player speed = easy to charge blindly into a bullet

- Powerups that don't seem to do shit

- And lots of barrels that hold them and distract you

- That need to be shot so often it literally hurts my fingers

The hit detection isn't so smooth either. It's not that it's badly done, it's that the damn enemies seem to need to be shot exactly right usually - good examples are the window gunners in the first stage and especially the jumping guys with knives - in a few plays today I only managed to kill one ONCE, you have to hit them at the exact right moment twice.

Pain in the butt game that likes to induce carpal tunnel syndrome...not for me.

Very nearly broke the default highscore (i.e. got maybe midway into the third stage), maybe I'm not on top of my game today as well. But I always have trouble with this game, and never really feel it's really my doing.

[stargate]

I think I played this one a couple of times back in the day. Nice blast from the past.

I actually like the gameplay. The 3 fire buttons is a bit unusual, but seems to work well. I guess my main complaint is that the game is friggin hard. I can't get past the first level. It actually starts out pretty intense and the fact that you get killed from one bullet seems a bit rough.

[Ed Oscuro]

It's possible to get some extra hits (if you find the horse), but keeping them is tough.

I thought there was some bullet upgrade...maybe the shot items scattered around add a bit extra toughness, and by the second stage I'm able to find an icon that looks like two bullets. No idea what it does. I certainly could use a bit of spread shot.

A trick I forgot to mention earlier: Jabbing the fire-forward and one of the side buttons at the same time often seems to fire one shot forward and another slightly to the side. It's often useful. Doesn't seem to work every time though.

[Ze_ro]

I've always found this game very frustrating. The enemies are surprisingly good at dodging your shots, so you need quite a few powerups before you can really do a whole lot. Also, why do the powerup barrels take so many hits when one shot kills most enemies? The weird control scheme is also kind of hard to work with. Maybe it's just me, but I often fall into a bad habit of choosing a direction, and using that primarily for a section before switching to another... doesn't work well, but when I fiddle around trying to get a different angle, it generally results in me walking into a bullet.

It took about 5 games before I was able to get to the first boss. I'd hate to be paying a quarter a pop to learn this game.

Fairly unique style to the game though. Also, you can shoot left and right by using both side buttons at the same time. If you have all the artwork for MAME, it actually shows this stuff on the bezel. The bezel also explains the powerups: Boots = Move Faster, Gun = Shoot Farther, Bullets = Shoot Faster. The effects seem to be cumulative at least, but it's a very slow buildup.

--Zero

[Ed Oscuro]

Gun = Shoot Farther, Bullets = Shoot Faster.
Great game design right there, when you're already kneading your hand into dough with the buttons.

Anyway, I guess it's for the better that I learned what those two powerups did.

As Ze_ro says, not a bad game, but frustrating.

[jb143]

Feels a bit to much like Back to the Future than Gun Smoke for it to be very enjoyable to me(The NES game, not the 3'rd movie). The 3 direction shooting was pretty cool, but it was frustrating that you can't shoot behind you yet they can shoot at your back.

[TheDomesticInstitution]

When I first saw that this game was a MMMC choice, I was happy because it's one of the games on my Super Pac Multi. But I remembered it was one of the 2 games on the multi board that use 3 buttons. My problem was that I only had 2 buttons. I was also waiting on my custom CPO from thisoldgame.com, and I needed to completely disassemble and get my control panel ready. I figured since I was taking it apart that it would be a perfect time to add that extra button. I ordered buttons off eBay, which I got in yesterday and last night I added the extra buttons that I had to drill holes for last week. So anyway, it was a long process and it set me back a few hours but now I'm able to play it on my multicab instead of my MAME computer.

Anyway... about the game. I just got done playing a 8 or so game stint and was able to rack up the following score.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2685/4425851174_6e17e06ea5.jpg

The horse power up is a great addition and got me through a few rough patches. I was able to get to the 2nd boss, who proceeded to lay me the fuck out. I was about to beat him before he commenced with a spray of bullets while I was already dodging the many enemies moving around on the screen.

I've found that it's best to try and kill all enemies on the screen, because inadvertently one will wind up behind you making him pretty hard to kill. Anyway TL;DR so sorry. I just wanted to let everyone know the process I had to do through before playing this game.

Although it seems like there's some hate for this game- I actually enjoyed it.