#dezaemon 3d

If I had to make a poll surveying for the best shoot 'em up game for the N64 it would probably have only one or two games: Star Soldier: Vanishing Earth and, if you remember it, the Space Invaders '99 3D version. So to keep things more interesting I decided to extend the semantic scope of this genre in order to include also other titles with similar shooting mechanics. I will name them "near enough shoot' em ups". It will include titles as on-rail shooters like Star Fox 64 and Sin and Punishment as well as the Japanese exclusive shmup editor app Dezaemon 3D. The concept of "near enough shoot 'em up" also needs to be big enough to include 3D exploration action games with shooting mechanics like the two Star Wars series titles: Rogue Squadron and Episode I: Battle for Naboo. Aero Fighters Assault, I kwow it is a bad game, but I decided to put it here because many folks may have some nostalgia for it. I will not consider bad games like Knife's Edge and Asteroids Hyper 64 here because they'd better fit in a poll about the crapiest game on the system. Cult classic Bangai-O of course marks its presence here despite being a 2D multi directional shooter game. So what did you think of the expanded meaning concept for shoot 'em up? Did I get too far? And by the way what's the best N64 near enough shoot 'em up game?

Mech assault from Solid Gear, one of the pre-made shooting games in Dezaemon 3D by Athena.

Blasting the belligerent bunny boss of Dezaemon 3D, by Athena.

Launching into battle from Solid Gear, one of the pre-made shooting games in Dezaemon 3D by Athena.

Larruping logrolling lagomorphs in Dezaemon 3D, by Athena.

Well, it's that time again: I spent money on something on the internet, it came in today's mail, and now I'm compelled to take pictures of it. This time: Dezaemon 3D. Not to be confused with Doraemon, as I did when I was under the terribly mistaken impression that this game was likely just a platformer about his evil twin or something. As you can see on the box, it's actually a SHOOTING GAME EDITOR. As in, a game that lets you design your own 2D core-blasting spaceship game. It's actually part of a series of such titles, and the first that lets you place background objects and the like in a 3D space. What sold me on purchasing something that's obviously going to be far too kanji-dense for me to ever fully appreciate is that it also contains three entire premade games. Considering that the western N64 library only had Star Soldier: Vanishing Earth (which I admittedly wasn't terribly fond of) to scratch one's itch for traditional shmup action, I really had no choice but to find an affordable copy immediately. Possibly the most exciting thing about this game is that it contains two music editors: an "easy" one that appears to be a beefier version of Mario Paint's icon-based system, and an "advanced" one that appears to be a lot like a simple tracker. If I try and demonstrate this myself, I probably couldn't put together anything much beyond a threadbare cover of Undone - The Sweater Song, so I'll try to see what I can dig up for you all. It sure seems neat, though.