Byousatsu
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| Byousatsu |
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| System(s): Sega Titan Video |
| Publisher: Sega |
| Developer: Sega AM1 |
| Development timeframe: 1995-1996 |
| Genre: 3D Vertical Shooter |
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Byousatsu (秒殺) is the placeholder title of a 3D vertical shooter developed by Sega AM1 for the Sega Titan Video arcade system. It was planned to be showcased at AOU Show 1996, but was not ready at the time, and the game was cancelled before it made it to location testing.
History
Historically, vertical shooters has been an underrepresented genre in Sega's catalogue. However, it is considered an essential genre for arcades, if only for variety. As they usually do not generate a lot of income, many, including Byousatsu, are cheaply made so that they can turn a profit.
Problems arose because the game was planned too far ahead (predating the launch of the Sega Titan Video board which it runs on) and a lot of issues with it being a 3D game weren't accounted for, like how it would be more difficult to attack both aerial and grounded enemies with the same bullets.
The game was initially coded by the main programmer of Tesou Uranai Chotto Misete, who took inspiration from Cave shooters like DoDonPachi. However, the game designer was a fan of Psikyo, so wanted the game to be more like Gunbird, so the other 2 programmers (one of whom, A.Hanado, had been the game designer for Tesou Uranai Chotto Misete, and the other of whom had previously programmed Waku Waku Tama & Friends) to copy and modify the code to suit this vision and created various bugs in the process. Akiyoshi Shinpo, who had also worked as a programmer on Tesou Uranai Chotto Misete, was brought in to help organize and clean up these disjointed routines without disrupting their workflow. An example of this was a routine which made enemy aircrafts aim directly a the player and fire their bullet in a straight line. However, the game's design also specified that some enemies would shoot in pre-determined patterns and not target the player, which the aforementioned routine overruled before it was fixed by Shinpo.
It took Shinpo a month just to understand the code before he could even begin bug fixing, which also meant the game was a month behind schedule and could not be showcased at AOU Show 1996, since they believed the game lacked variety by then. With their exhibition cancelled, the team began to focus on the aspects of the game left untouched up to this point. One aspect Shinpo has recalled being tasked with is placing grounded enemies which could have complex movement patterns. However, this wouldn't work with how the ground had been created up to this point, because it was a flat texture for an aerial object, which was simply being rotated in 3D to create the illusion of scrolling, so there was no way to easily move objects across it. Shinpo began writing a program which could calculate the correct positions and create the illusion of accurate ground movement, but the project was cancelled shortly thereafter.
At AOU Show 1996, Taito debuted RayStorm, a sequel to their vertical shooter RayForce that incorporated 3D, much like Byousatsu had intended.
Production credits
- Main Programmer: A
- Programmer: A.Hanado, Akiyoshi Shinpo