Mahou Daisakusen

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Mahou Daisakusen

Title screen

Developer:	Raizing
Official site:	8ing Museum
Planning:	Kazuyuki Nakashima
Music:	Atsuhiro Motoyama
Program:	Yasunari Watanabe Yuuichi Toyama
Art:	Kenichi Yokoo Kazuyuki Nakashima
Release date:	1993
Next game:	Shippu Mahou Daisakusen

Mahou Daisakusen (JP:魔法大作戦) is the first game developed by Raizing in the year 1993. It is the start of the Mahou Daisakusen series. The game features a fantasy steampunk setting with four playable characters, each with their own motivations and individual endings. It was released in the same year in the west with the title Sorcer Striker.

Mahou Daisakusen had somewhat obscure ports for the X68000 and FM Towns PCs shortly after the Arcade version came out, before being released for PlayStation 4 as part of the M2 ShotTriggers lineup.

Story

No one knows when it began. The mobilization of the Goblins gradually expanded, until they at last succeeded in establishing a single Empire of their own.

All this weighed heavy on the brow of King Codwenna. He gathered all the loyal knights at hand and launched an attack on the Goblin Empire, but it was a total disaster. All he managed to learn was that the Goblins were ruled by a single charismatic leader—a human no less—and that the development and mass production of magical weapons was well underway.

The King was shocked. Magical weapons, which used mana to operate, were known to exist. But no one had ever succeeded in reproducing them, and their full operation was limited and not well understood. What could the Goblins be plotting…?

The King foresaw the approaching doom of his kingdom. But the Order of Knights themselves had failed! After much internal debate, the King decided to place a tremendous bounty on the Gobligan King’s head.

Now he could only wait for a hero to arrive and save them all…

Gameplay Overview

Mahou Daisakusen is a 2 buttons game. The game has 6 stages and a final stage that is simply a boss fight (referred to as "stage 6.5" by some sources) before moving on to the second loop.

Controls

• A button: Fires standard shots from the ship at a semi-automatic rate.
• B button: Activates a bomb. Bombs are the same between characters. The bomb will take a few frames to detonate if it does not touch a enemy, solid object or the top of the screen. If any of the listed are touched by a bomb, it will go off immediately. I-frames from the bomb are only active for as long as the bomb explosion is on screen.

Characters / Ships

	Gain the Warrior	Chitta the Witch	Miyamoto the Samurai Dragon	Bornnam the Necromancer
Portrait
Speed	Medium-Fast	Medium-Slow	Fast	Slow

Weapons/Magic Books

Each magic book corresponds to its own secondary shot type that varies between characters. You must collect 3 of the same book type to max out its fire power.

• H-Book: Homing Shot Type
• F-Book: Forward Shot Type
• W-Book: Wide Shot Type

Book	Gain	Chitta	Miyamoto	Bornnam
H	Description/Image	Description/Image	Description/Image	Description/Image
F	Description/Image	Description/Image	Description/Image	Description/Image
W	Description/Image	Description/Image	Description/Image	Description/Image

Items

• Coin Bag/Coins: Coin bags will contain 4 coins each valued at 100 points, bags will release coins in a random direction when shot. Your shot level is determined by number of coins collected starting at shot level 1. Each level up requires its own set amount of coins after gaining the next level. Level 2: 1 coin, Level 3: 2 coins, Level 4: 3 coins, Level 5: 4 coins, Level 6: 12 coins. A total of 22 coins are needed to reach max shot power for your characters main shot.
• Bomb Icon: Bomb icons are dropped by predetermined enemies or scenery in each stage. You can carry as many bombs as you can get a hold of but the bomb counter will only display 9 in stock.

Extra Lives

Extends are awarded every 300,000 points in the first loop only.

There are no 1up items or other ways to gain extra lives.

Rank

Rank in Mahou Daisakusen is a composite of several contributing elements. It affects enemy HP, the number of bullets fired by enemy attacks and the timing and frequency of enemy attacks.

Region	Difficulty
	Easy	Medium	Hard	Harder
Japan	+0	+8	+16	+24
World	+0	+4	+8	+16
Korea	+0	+8	+16	+24

Region	Loop
	1	2
Japan	+0	+24
World	+0	+16
Korea	+0	+32

Region	Stage
	1	2	3	4	5	6
Japan	+0	+2	+4	+8	+16	+24
World	+0	+1	+2	+3	+4	+6
Korea	+0	+2	+4	+10	+18	+28

Shot Power	0	1	2	3	4	5
+	0	1	2	3	4	8

Character	Sub-weapon	Level
		1	2	3
Gain	F	+4	+5	+7
	W	+2	+4	+6
	H	+2	+3	+5
Chitta	F	+5	+6	+8
	W	+3	+5	+6
	H	+2	+3	+4
Miyamoto	F	+1	+2	+4
	W	+1	+3	+5
	H	+3	+4	+6
Bornnam	F	+2	+3	+5
	W	+2	+3	+4
	H	+3	+4	+6

There is also a survival element that increments every 4096 frames. This resets to 0 upon death and at the beginning of each stage. The maximum rank value is 63.

Stages

There are six stages and a finale. A typical completion of all stages in the first loop might take approximately 29 minutes.

Loops

This game has 2 loops with the second being much harder due to the increase in rank. The second loop no longer rewards score extends and upon death the player character does not release any subweapon items to be recovered. Due to the increased rank, enemies have much more HP and are more aggressive.

Scoring

Summary

Scoring is very simple and consists mainly of destroying enemies, any destructible projectiles and collecting excess items.

The most significant scoring point is destroying the destructible projectiles shot by the stage 4 boss. These provide 5800 points each but are only shot by the boss at random times. Each attack the boss can choose between a time-consuming laser attack, and firing the projectiles with an equal probability of each. This means the number of projectiles that can be destroyed before the time limit and the boss escapes depends heavily on luck.

Points

Action	Points
Very small enemies (such as the goblin foot soldiers that run along the ground) and destructible projectiles destroyed	Multiples of 10 points
Popcorn and other small enemies destroyed	Multiples of 100 points
Large enemies destroyed	Multiples of 1,000 points
Boss or parts of a boss (including the inactive boss ships at the end of stage 5) destroyed	Multiples of 10,000 points (up to 120,000 for final boss)
Collecting coins when shot is at full power	100 points per coin

There are no points awarded for the completion of a stage or completion of a loop.

Example Scores

A typical score at the end of a first loop where a large portion of enemies and all bosses are destroyed might be 1,500,000. Record scores at the end of the first loop exceed 1,900,000. See the STG Hall of Records for more scores.

Strategy

• Video Index

Development History

This is the first game developed by Raizing.

Version Differences

Sorcer Striker

Title screen

Release date:	1993

Western release, Sorcer Striker, is a much easier game in both loops due to reduced rank. However, the Korean version of Sorcer Striker has even higher rank than the Japanese version and so is the most difficult version.

Gallery

• 

  Japanese poster