Dodonpachi Dai-Ou-Jou, Ketsui, and the allure of theimperfect
Ben Watson
Ketsui: Kizuna Jikgoku Tachi (2003, CAVE/AMI), is the best game ever made. It’s a game which is such an exceptional example of it’s field – brilliant system design, music, pacing, strong tone, and some of the best levels in any shmup. I love it so much, and so unconditionally, that i have found it a huge pain to actually write about it, mostly because writing about liking things is hard, but also because a spiel about how all it’s systems are so intrcate and coalesce so well turns into a katamari topic which quickly takes over a piece. Long and short of it though – it’s a game that achieves absolutely everything it seeks out to do and the apotheosis of Tsuneki Ikeda’s (lead programmer on the majority of CAVE’s games through to 2010-ish) take on the Shooting game.
And yet, in the STG spheres I find myself entangled in, especially amongst Japanese players, it is Dodonpachi Dai-Ou-Jou (2002, CAVE/AMI, aka DOJ) Ketsui’s sister title, released less than a year prior on the same hardware and sharing an awful lot of code, that stands as the jewel of the crown of the Danmaku sphere. The game with a bigger community, more competition, stronger reputation – the game that get features in Daigo’s Kenmonomichi events. It’s basically the STG equivelent to Super Turbo, as James Chen puts it.
This is despite it being clearly the worse game.
I’m not saying this to be salty about it – Ketsui gets it’s due in the scene and if anything, players need more encouraging to look beyond Cave’s output – but in that it’s just kind of fascinating. A first playthrough of DOJ, especially coming off Ketsui first like I did, will seem really kind of off. The games are so fundementally similar that the differences between them are really stark, and land in favor of Ketsui for the most part.
Perhaps the most defining difference is the level design, which is good in both but is just utterly outstanding in Ketsui. Ketsui’s levels are lightning fast paced, and there is always, always something to be doing, and the levels themselves shift frequently, including changing scrolling direction, sometimes 3 times in a 2 minute level. Meanwhile, especially for the first play and where it’s chaining system isn’t being pushed, DOJ will feel almost empty, especially in stages 1 and 2, and it’s a straight shot from start to finish.
Ketsui’s system mechanics are also outstanding. Playing Ketsui, it doesnt take long for you to work out what the game wants you to do, which is basically clear the stage with shorter chains by using the different shot types in different contexts, building up and losing a score multiplier over each stage. DOJ’s system is much simpler in many ways, being an evolution of Dodonpachi’s chaining which is a fair bit more lenient at parts, but the addition of a hyper which increases chain values – but it is full to the brim with mildly unintuitive factors, for instance;
- Hidden bee items on each stage that charge hyper meter up to 30% depending on your current chain.
- Enemies can maintain your combo even whilst in an invincible state, including whilst scrolling on and off the screen, this is crucial for some bits.
- Boss hits just work entirely differently and charge up hyper differently compared to stages.
- Using a hyper will reset the combo timer if it’s not completely unfilled.
- Gaining a hyper stock clears the screen of bullets. This is extremely important in high level play.
- And more!
But the big problem is that the game design itself kinda doesn’t run you into engaging and understanding with this. All versions of DOJ have their extend scores set low to the point you don’t really need to, and it’s kinda hard to see where the guiding hand is pushing you for a good number of playthroughs. Ketsui is just way better at driving you into understanding the system mechanics, with amazing audiovisual feedback to doing “the right thing”, less punishment for trying and failing to engage with it (Dropping a single chain in DOJ can legitimately cost you almost all of a stage’s score), and making it more obviously important for survival with harsher extend rules and the clarity of “use the laser on chunky enemies, rapid fire on the small fry”.
If it sounds like im going in too deep on this, it’s probably worth noting that even when i’m going in on it’s sloppy system mechanics – this is a whole exercise in splitting hairs. The differences in these two game’s only really stand out so much to me because they are two of the best games of all time. From the moment you set off in DOJ, you are dumped immedietly into such a thick, bleak atmosphere, as the woman-turned-war machine that enhances your shot or laser says something unintelligeable to you, into an oppressive, grimy battlefield on the lunar surface. Manabu Namiki’s legendary stage 1 track kicks in with haunting synthesised choir, and then you face down the best stage 1 boss from a genre filled with amazing ones. It’s oppressive, somber tone is unlike anything else in the genre, it’s a thrilling stage, and the quality never drops far below it.
I do have to specially mention the bosses, because the bosses are where DOJ really eats Ketsui’s lunch. They’re the best full set of any STG frankly, with not a single dud, and with the game system mechanics rewarding hyper stocks and huge point bonuses for beating them in less conventional ways, have a whole bunch of techniques associated with their fights which is honestly more remiscent of Battle Garegga’s ilk than the standard CAVE faire.
This leads us, of course, into the game’s real icon – Hibachi, its true final boss. It is a bullshit fight. Truly unfair, a boss with patterns that are essentially undodgeable, a truckload of health, and a bomb shield to ensure that even though the fight is a resource dump even at the best of times, a full stock of 5 extra possible lives going into it isn’t nearly enough for the layman.
It’s way too much. Ketsui’s equivelent, EVACANEER DOOM, is one of the best bosses ever, full of super challenging but clearly beatable patterns, why isn’t Hibachi?
And then, some day, you’ll catch a clear of DOJ and see how the masters of the game take it on – micromanaging their hyper bar throughout the whole of the second loop to have the bullets cancel at the right time, inkling every last frame of damage from bomb invincibility, dodging as much of the washing machine as they can and pushing every last advantage they can wring out of the game.
And that, for me, is the true magic of DOJ, just as much as it’s soundtrack and bosses. It’s system mechanics being sloppier than Ketsui is not “good”, but coming to terms with all it’s tricks and hooks makes it a wonderful game to develop skill on. Getting a good full chain on a stage will be built up through experimenting, understanding, planning and a high level of execution, being able to respond to the randomness and variance that comes with cave’s style. Every little step that takes your chain a little further, manipulates the right thing, feels like truly overcoming a barrier, and is a wonderful feeling no other game can really offer. When the extend jingle plays as you get over 10 million points in stage 1, it feels way like going beyond what the game was really even intended to allow. It is something the fine polish of Ketsui and the rest of the Ikeda-lead cave games just can’t offer, and the sort of thing that really drives one to improve and explore a game. Even if it comes with a good bit of jank.
It should also not go unstated, a lot of the appeal of DOJ is that it is insanely hard. It’s original version, retroactively known as “White Label” is probably the hardest STG ever made, with the 2-ALL being cruel to the point of dropping you down to zero lives at the start of loop 2 for basically no reason. Ketsui’s Ura loop is similarly hard, but the level of cruelty, and amount of sections you’ll need to have some odd plan for, is on another level. You can straight up game over within 10 seconds of loop 2 if you dont know exactly what you’re doing.
There is also, of course, Black Label – a revised version of the game released late in 2002 because Tsuneki Ikeda was still tinkering. And this is the thing that really highlights the brilliance in the wonkiness of DOJ, as it changes, on hearing what it does, ultimately little, but the entire character of large sections of the entire game is changed dramatically by making chaining a tiny bit easier, increasing hyper gain a bit, adjusting enemy timings here and there, as well as the smaller player hitbox encouraging a bit more aggression, as well as reducing the overall difficult by a decent chunk. It also marginally amends the laughably pathetic performance of the doll Shotia, which is good, though the game remains lopsided in ship choice towards Exy. These differences, stuff that would barely qualify as a major update in many a game and includes no new content at all, is enough to there being players for ONLY each version exclusively sometimes. And both versions are sick, I honestly can’t decide which I think is better, which is a wonderful argument to be able to have.
There’s even the barely known, Taiwanese locaton test only Dodonpachi III which is basically an inbetween version of the two, which is also neat as hell, and confirms IGS’ Dodonpachi II is canon, which is pretty funny.
Like all the best shmups, DOJ is a 22 minute game I could spend days talking about. Hell, im half tempted to just write another article about the strength in it’s aesthetic and music, from the awesome mechanical design to it’s Iconic arcade flyer which is both one of my favourite pieces of video game artwork, but also establishes expectations and the tone of the game so brilliantly.
I hope I’ve been able to get across what ticks about the game, and what I think is one of the core reasons it persists as the more popular in this extreme niche. Coming to love this game more than I thought I really did through getting to know it properly was one of the best things i’ve done in gaming for a long while, even if pinning down exactly why is a bit awkward.
I still prefer Ketsui, it’s better paced, it’s homoerotic, its stages are a bit better.
But I will gladly love them both.
