Gamers and game creators sort - or at least try to sort - games into genres, typically based on particular common threads in their mechanics. More and more, we see games transcending simple labeling, as mechanics previously unique to one genre are borrowed and inserted in another, but in some cases we see games emerge that are further refinements of their particular type. Surprisingly, examining the refinements can reveal very different values from the original genre, despite the similarities.
Danmaku games, more commonly called "bullet hell" games, are one such genre refinement. Their parent genre is one of the foremost embodiments of "twitch" gameplay - something appears, you shoot it if you can, dodge it if you can't, and you do it right damn now. Danmaku games use a similar operational premise - things show up and shoot at the player, and the player needs to survive - but what it changes is the volume of fire (the exact translation of 'danmaku' is "bullet curtain", like what you might get out of an artillery barrage). Enemies will fire ten or fifteen bullets instead of one or two; minibosses might shoot volleys of fifty; a boss might all but cover the screen with shots. To compensate, the hitbox of the character - where they must take a shot to die - is greatly reduced, frequently to nine or fewer pixels. Frequently, these games place greater emphasis on the boss fights than they do traversing stages and fighting standard enemies.
Examining one such boss fight - specifically, the true final boss of one of the best-known danmaku games, Mushihime-sama - one can very easily see how the games earned the apellation "bullet hell." More importantly, one can also begin to see the different values embedded in the mechanics of danmaku games and its parent genre. A boss in a standard top-down shooter might fire a laser, or a spread of bullets; the player must react to this and get out of the way, and then react to the next attack selected from its set of available options, and so forth. The danmaku player must similarly react to the attack of the boss, but notably, there is very little variation in the boss' attacks in any given part of the fight with that boss. One must comprehend their attack pattern and understand how to endure it; the reaction component, while still important, is de-emphasized. Standard top-down shooters reward flexibility, the ability to deal with things as they come; danmaku games, while still giving flexibility a nod, seem to hold comprehension, the understanding of what is going on, more. Moreover, as evidenced by the exacting moves required to survive some attacks, these games also value perfection, almost to the degree of enforcing it for the player to survive the more brutal attack patterns in the game (1:44).
One can also see that danmaku games change the way the player must interact with the game space. Top-down shooters generally require the player to pay attention to their ship and the boss (which will allow them to see where the boss' attacks will be directed) during a fight. Danmaku games require that as well as reading the bullet patterns themselves; their motion over time may change in unexpected ways, as evidenced by some of the arcs of fire in the early parts of the video, and the player must watch them (or have memorized them) so that they can react appropriately. This change - the additional variable to keep track of - forces the player to modify their perception of the game, especially if they are more familiar with the more breakneck, less exacting normal shooter. Oftentimes, the only way to successfully do this is to try - and fail - repeatedly; the system of the game can only really be understood by interacting with it.
Given the shift in values embraced by the mechanics, it seems odd that danmaku games would be a refinement, a "taken to the nth degree" for the top-down shooter genre. The emphasis of precision and understanding over pure reflexes suggests a more cerebral direction - not exactly what one would consider the root of the ur-shooter. Perhaps this suggests that genre and value have little actual relation.
--Evan
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