GENETOS - A Shmup for All Generations

Report written by:
Lévai József
Planet Genetos Search Project (PGSP)
fighter pilot

Pro-Log
"Tatsuya Koyama... you made my day."

I doubt there would be any more appropriate words than this for my intro to my mission report to the Project for one of the most original and peak-of-life shmup mission assignments I ever undertook: GENETOS. My first impressions on my first contact with this game can be best summed up as "a free, interactive shoot 'em up history lesson" - so I took that chance to leave a BIG mark on history (pun intended) and signed up to the Planet Genetos Search Project... as fighter pilot of course.

As you may have heard, the experimental GENETOS GenerationShift System outfitting my Planet Genetos Search Unit craft can be activated once enough DNA cells from downed enemies was collected...  that meant evolving from one generation to the next - and that translates to more advanced graphics and firepower and weapons to waste the bad guys with. Hey, it's an EVOLUTIONARY shooter simulation - you expect something else? Oh, and the heads of the PGS Project gave me my priority objective: blaze my path throughout the history of shmups from start to finish in the search for a new world, namely planet Genetos, wreakin' havoc to any bad guy and "mutant" in my way. Sounds like giving the fans their daily mayhem, huh?

If you think this mission's gonna be a piece a' cake... you got another thing comin' your way, FAST: I'm not the only one with the fancy ability to evolve into new times, so if I get overconfident, future generations will be wondering what the hootin' heck IS a fossilized advanced space fighter wreck DOING here in 1978.

A nasty job, some say insane and impossible... but someone's gotta take risks.

And I'm gonna make doggone sure that someone's ME.

That was my cue to climb into my GSS craft, start up all systems and initiate launch sequence into time itself... starting from the beginning of shump history as we all know it.

- Operating System: Running.
- Weapons: Online.
- Sensors: Online.
- Engines: Online.
- Generation Shift System: Online.
- All systems nominal.
- Genetos Search Unit ready to launch in: 3...
2...
1...

And THAT'S when I lit the candle. Shoot 'em up video game history...

HERE
I
COME!!!


1ST GENERATION - Invasion from Space
Ship: Space Invaders cannon. Movement restricted to bottom and can only shoot one bullet at a time.

First stop: 1978 AD Japan, the time of Taito's Space Invaders... no doubt the first ever shmup in recorded video game history and my favorite classic game, made by Tomoro Nishikado all by himself. This may sound insane to some, but at the time, creating a game solo was perfectly normal... well, as normal as the rest of the funny farm can be.

You can tell that this is the first ever generation of shmups: limited graphics, music, movement, sound effects... thanks to then-primitive technology. But hey - Space Invaders is as simple and innovative as simplicity and minimalism allows. Even the goal's a piece of cake: shoot down those lil' invaders from space before they hit the ground, but watch out for enemy return fire. Too bad in GENETOS, there are no shield bunkers to cover your hide... oh well, at least you can begin harvesting green DNA debris here, too.

Uh oh. Incoming Mutant. And that can only be translated into one thing: we got a BOSS incoming! (Must be that kill-and-collect binge I got myself into...)
Mutant: Alien Mothership (Boss)

This big momma of a alien mothership is easy, contrary to popular opinion. Just keep zappin' it and its invader escort until it goes boom. But easy with the triple bursts it spits out, and with that ship of yours, taking the mutant down will take longer, if not forever. Which leads to only one optimal conclusion: gather the remaining DNA and...

GENERATION SHIFT: 2ND GENERATION
Ship: Galaga-like space fighter. Movement restricted to bottom half and can shoot twin shots. 
Main weapons system can be changed here.


That's right, folks: a Generation Shift means you have evolved from one generation to the next thanks to those DNA you collected. And guess what you get:

A spiffy new space fighter straight from the late 80s' arcade shmup game classics, such as Galaga and Star Soldier. With your twin burst LASERs and expanded movement, that obsolete alien mothership stands ZERO chance now. Die, alien scum! DIE! HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!! (Sorry... got a little bit sucked into the anti-evil alien invader business.)

Well... that's it for Space Invaders and the 1st Generation as a whole. Next stop: the 80s.

To the Next Generation...

2ND GENERATION - 80s Space Mayhem

Welcome to the time of the arcade smash hits that's the 1980s, pilots, pitted against the likes of Galaxian, Galaga, Phoenix, Xevious, Gradius, R-Type, Star Soldier and Recca. The bad guys of this generation are expectin' ya - coming in with guns hot. And good thing so are you.

From attack fighters to combat drones (who can fire back harder) and smiling blocks that won't leave you smile upon making contact, plus with a rockin' 80s style music to go with, you'll be having your hands full kickin' butt and takin' DNA. Of course, when you've reduced most of the alien fleet to space debris, you're gonna have to answer to their boss...
Mutant: Giant Spinner 

Figures the Boss has evolved as well, which is now a mothership looking like a razor flower - and looks ain't the only thing evolved, but also firepower. Take out its primary shield for a DNA boost for the next generation...

GENERATION SHIFT: 3RD GENERATION
 Ship: Advanced space fighter. Ship has a wider frontal shot and can use bombs.
Movement is no longer restricted. New weapon: bomb.
This is the first ship to allow stat changes for Yellow.

A next-generation starfighter with a new weapon, the good ol' BOMB... NOW we're cookin' with gas.

3RD GENERATION - Galactic Soldier

4TH GENERATION - Bullet Curtains for You

FINAL GENERATION - Planet Genetos or 
Darwinian Doom


PHASE 1: Birth
PHASE 2: Variation
PHASE 3: Selection
PHASE 4: Prosperity
PHASE 5: EXTINCTION

ŰRHÓDÍTÓ - Video Game history exhibit in the Traffic Museum

If you can see this, femmes 'n mech, boils 'n gargoyles, it means I and Dad took a drive and then a walk into the "Űrhódító" video game history exhibition at the Traffic Museum, home to many ages of transportation from steam engines to early modern cars. And you know what? It ROCKED hard. Too bad it's gonna go bye bye in 21st November, so we hadta take the shot. Guess what it had - PONG, Space Invaders, early arcade and console and PC game classics from the '70s and '80s to kick-butt classics of the '90s arcades and PCs and consoles... including iD's DooM and Terminator 2: Judgement Day arcade game, and last, but not least, modern examples, such as the PS2. And that's not all, folks. Űrhódító also exhibited two types of PC virch: early primitive experiment and modern Leonar3Do. Hey, with Leo3Do, who knows, maybe I can forge any of my original Transformers, including one Lunazuki, to life in 3DVR glory. (heheheheh)

With no further ado, the recon files:

Virch PC platforms: before and after Leo3Do.

Left: can't one think anything more ridiculous than this early virch PC? Right: Leo3Do live.

Leonar3Do. Imagine what killin' machines I can draw up with this baby over here... and what damage I can cause when used as a VR game system post-Virtuality...

Playing Space Invaders on an ol' computer and big-butt TV. Had some out-of-practice experiences, though.

The joyball. A trackball used as a controller? Now I've seen it all.

One of the primitive lightguns before the Zapper and its Wii version.

The controllers ma 'n pa played their games when they were kids.

The Computer makes Checkmate. From Farkas' clever chessmachine to the modern chess computer. "You = Cheater!" said the chess computer to the basic one.

The Arcade. Space Invaders, Pac Man and T2 included.

Cartridges from the good ol' days to later '90s blocksmashers... hungarian titles included.

DooM. Demons, demons everywhere, and only a handful o' UAC marines to stop 'em ice-cold.

Me, rippin' SkyNET a new one in the T2 Arcade game, akimbo style. "Hasta la vista, baby" - as the Terminator said it best.

Final pay for "Gabriel" (Terminator 1) and "Lucifer" (Terminator 2) from all the property damage inflicted on SkyNET. Dad liked my pro two-in-one-man-army approach in this one.

Messier 7 Racefiles: Raptured

The Raptured

I. Salvation thru the Saviors

For time immemorial, since the dawn of Man, have the Saviors, a benevolent Race from out of nowhere, possessing Overtech used to "Save" certain Races facing annihilation, existed. We know not where they come from, save their mission to rescue alien Races at the edge of extinction.
To those grateful Races who were Saved did the Saviors only share their Overtech secrets, and all faithless Races that dare defy the Saviors and their rescue operations are brought to divine justice - "Punished".

But the very first Saved Race, of course, was the Terrans from Earth. Us. A paradox of a Race. Savage, yet sophisticated. Emotional, yet compassionate. Unstable, yet empathic.

A Race, after all, that does work hard on everything it undertakes. Given the chance, Terrans have what it takes to overcome or eliminate their foes. It happened before in the dawn of man. And it is happening again, happening to be the apocalyptic World War III when they arrived.

To the doomed human race, our race, during the End Times on Earth, in the Age of the End, did the Saviors show themselves in their magnificently advanced, cross-shaped starships, "Crosships". In the eyes of the Terrans, these Overtech aliens were here to Save us - and indeed were they Saved, being "raptured" from their dying homeworld of Earth into their fleets, believing to be angels sent from the Lord.

Little did we knew that the surviving Terrans on Earth would later evolve into what we will know as the "United Sol Federation", or USF for short.

And so did the Saviors depart from Sol, headed towards the unknown Messier 7 cluster.

In exchange for being Saved, the Saviors gave this Terran offshoot Race, our race, a new Eden-like world to call home in a new star system, advanced starship, medical, weapons, subsystem and propulsion technologies, Dark Energy, the secrets of the Wormhole and best of all, eternal paradise with the Saviors, as long as we remember their Saviors and the day we were Saved. To do otherwise would mean stagnation, corruption and eventual extinction. An act that would lead us to be called by the other Races ridiculous terms such as "high-tech zealots", "technorapture loonies" and "alien-lover fanatics" - but we beg to disagree.

So we accepted the Gift from the Saviors.

We, who will be the Raptured, knew not when will our long journey into the new system, far, far away in Messier 7, ends... until the Promised Land, at last, was in visual range, inside the safety of a vast nebula. The sight was beyond beautiful in the eyes of our race, indeed - our new homeworld in the deep-blue nebula, both christened "Empyrrean" for the heavenly sight, is indeed what exactly Eden looked like prior the Original Sin, with added winter wonderlands and cherry blossom trees and exotic lifeforms. Truly, this is where we now call "home" since then.

And so did Empyrrean II, Eden-Winterland second planet in the Empyrrean Nebula system, became the homeworld of the humans rescued by the Saviors, which became united under one name, one faith, one empire and one destiny: formally, "United Empyrrean". To reflect this fateful historic day, we, as a Race and empire, christened ourselves a name - a name after a term of salvation through grace as written in the Book of Revelation in the Conclave Bible of old, an event referred to as the "Blessed Hope" A name that described who we truthfully are.

"Raptured".

II. - Free at Last

When the Saviors departed after the Raptured first set foot on Empyrrean II, while most of us are Spacers, those who see space as their only true home, establish a magnificent starbase, the "Sanctuary", our empire flourished and evolved, many generations living and dying knowing peace, and peace only. But we have learned that even pacifist empires have standing armies - and R&D of new starship and military technologies were underway, creating our space military, the "Empyrrean Sentinel Forces", Raptured pilots, captains and soldiers dedicated to fight for the Saviors and United Empyrrean, to fight for what they hold dear, no matter what world they came from, and to fight against who would take such cherished treasures away - our lives more likely, namely the soulless "Synthyen" death machines.

But for now, manufacturing is hard at work on colony ships to expand our Empire, which yielded the first colony ship to ever set for the stars: the UECS Ark, as customary to our ships having Biblical names, named after the Ark of Noah who carried those animals and his family to safety during the Great Flood. Its destination: the nearest inhabitable planet in the Empyrrean system.

III. First Contact - Dominae

IV. First Contact - Synthyen

V. First Contact - Arachnid

VI. The Synthyen Crusade

WinHistory.DE - Windows OS Historical Chronicle

Of course every lifeform has a "turning point" in their history that alters the course of their life for either better or worse. When I, for one, was little, I had to rely on DOS and Norton Commander - functional, but not enough sauce, when I first got my hands on a PC... that is, 'till Windows 95 came along, with its system-native games, advanced features and complete independence from DOS - and that pretty much was my turning point, going through trials and tribulations until, as 19 years old, I reached the status I run a spankin' new computer runnin' today's Windows 7. Oh yes, the good ol' days...

Makes sense that Dirk Makowski of Winhistory.DE serves as a Windows OS historian, keepin' track of all the MS-DOS, Windows, OS/2 1.x released so far and, yes, even that disaster MS-BOB, stemmming from all the OS' he has in storage, past to present. Any Windows nostalgic and retro-nut should feel free to visit Dirk's Digital Windows Museum at www.winhistory.de.

Oh yes - and Dirk also has the latest 'n greatest in Windows OS', namely Vista and 7.