tss practice guide

This game has a very steep learning curve. The intent of this guide is to help new players understand what they need to work on to improve. Before doing anything else, you should read Mike Uyama's guide on gamefaqs. This will teach you the mechanics of the game. All of it is important so please read the whole thing. I recommend playing on an emulator so that you can make savestates. If you don't already have an emulator then just get Fightcade and use that, since eventually you're going to want it to play against other people anyway.

Start by playing character mode. The first thing you need to do is memorize the zako formations and learn how to make perfects. This might seem a little daunting but you'll pick them up easily enough just by playing. Make sure to do runs as both player 1 and player 2 so you get comfortable playing on both sides. Once you start making it to stages 6 and 7, put savestates in front of them so you can play those stages repeatedly. You can also raise the difficulty setting to 8 to make the game harder.

An extra note about formations. When I say memorize them, I don't just mean perfects. You should know how they "work". Many formations aim themselves at you in some way, change behavior upon reaching your vertical or horizontal position, are made up of distinct groups that move independently, and so on. You should try to know the rules for as many of them as you can, especially the ones that easily trap you if you do something wrong, like for instance the ones that move down until they reach your vertical level.

Once you have a good enough grasp of the game to 1cc, the best way to practice is to play against Mevious and Memory with savestates. Here are some challenges you can do for practice.

- Try to make perfects on all formations. Do this to learn any formations you still don't know. Also bear in mind that they move much faster in story mode than in actual pvp games, so if there are some that just seem too fast to be realistic don't worry about it. There are also a few that are extremely hard to perfect regardless of circumstance, so you don't need to worry about those either.

- Avoid sending reversals. This is critical when playing against real people. The AI does not properly punish you for sending reversals, but for the sake of practice you should try not to do it. Try to misdirect enemy normals to different parts of the screen so they don't get in your way. You can also practice timing your combos such that your normals get reversed by the AI, and making boss attacks from the resulting reversals.

- Don't use bombs. Try to dodge everything, no matter how impossible it seems. Bad dodging relies on reaction. Good dodging relies on prediction. The rule of thumb in shmups is to watch the origin point of the bullets to see how you should dodge them. In this game that means watching your opponent's screen and the top area of the middle wall.

- Reverse time attack. This is one of the very best things you can do for practice against the AI. Try to keep it alive for as long as possible. This will teach you two important skills - letting formations leave the screen without shooting them, and dealing with the grim reaper. It also helps your general survival instincts and bomb management. Remember that the ability to selectively "go pacifist" is extremely important in this game. This is a critical practice that everyone should try.

There are some things the AI cannot teach you. For starters, against the AI formations move very quickly, but conversely extra attacks and fireballs are very slow. The AI also can only play well as Mevious and Memory. There is simply no way to practice against the early game characters since they lose too easily. This means you're probably unfamiliar with most characters' extra attacks and totally clueless about their bosses.

So you need to play against other people. The best way to do this is Fightcade. Try to find players who are better than you and challenge them.

General Fightcade info:
- You can use "test game" to make sure your roms work and adjust settings (input maps, graphics, etc). The overlay in the top left that shows the players' names is designed for fighting games, but in TSS it blocks player one's view of the top area. You can turn it of if you want in Video > Fightcade > Display overlay.

- You can use @name to ping people in the lobbies.

- You can press "t" to type a message in-game.

Some of the biggest mistakes I see begginers making are:

- Lack of awareness of incoming attacks. When your opponent is not in fever, and they send a volley of only 4 or 5 fireballs, you should almost never be hit by it regardless of how fast it is. This is by far the biggest problem in almost all new players' gameplay.

- Not destroying things that get in your way. You don't need to make combos with all formations. If a particularly inconvenient one appears, just clear it away quickly and painlessly. You can also punch through walls of fireballs. Charge attacks are great for both of these things. I often see people lose to players who are ostensibly worse than them just because the "worse" player more readily resorts to blasting things they don't know how to deal with. Seriously, I see this a lot!