Battle Garegga/Stages
A significant part of scoring in Battle Garegga is knowing the many secrets and tricks throughout the stages and how to maximize their point yield. This page is intended to provide an overview of the seven stages in Battle Garegga and the many obstacles and secrets that a player will encounter while playing the game. It is segmented according to points of interest within the stages and includes some general advice on the scoring opportunities available.
With that said, there are a couple of things this page is not. This is not a walkthrough, and will not be providing specific routes for survival or scoring runs. For survival or character-specific scoring routes, see the Battle Garegga/Strategy page. It is also not a boss guide, since the bosses have lots of intricacies and character-specific considerations (See Battle Garegga/Bosses).
Despite all these restrictions, we hope this guide is still useful and provides a glimpse into what is possible in the game. Many of the things documented here can be safely ignored when playing for survival or a first clear. However, we still feel it is important for players of all skill levels to be aware of the many little optimizations that can be made since rank encourages even beginners to make at least a modest attempt to score in order to mitigate the game’s difficulty.
Stage 1 is a low-scoring stage. It is generally not very dangerous and serves mostly as an opportunity to power up and gather resources for key tricks in stage 2. However, fully optimizing stage 1 to maximize the resources gained is actually quite difficult, although rarely necessary.
Opening bomb fragments
The first encounter in the game are three sets of idle tanks, a set of 12 on the right followed by a set of 10 on the left and a set of 8 on the right (30 total). Each tank drops a small weapon fragment when destroyed. Harvesting all 20 fragments requires efficient movement and an autofire rate of at least 10 Hz. If this is too hard, it is easiest to focus on the set of 12 tanks and 8 tanks on the right, ignoring as many left hand columns as necessary in order to ensure you have enough time to harvest fragments from the right hand tanks.
Minecarts
The minecarts encountered in the stage will stop moving if the cart in front of them is destroyed. Moving minecarts are guaranteed to drop small weapon fragments while stopped minecarts are guaranteed to drop option power ups.
- In addition, the minecart rails can be destroyed with a special weapon and will drop medals when destroyed.
Biplane
The biplane encountered after the first minecarts will contribute the normal item drop order if defeated normally. However, if instead you keep it alive and destroy it as it flees the top of the screen (about when the second crane turret is encountered) then the biplane is guaranteed to drop a secret large shot power up.Stage 2 introduces the first major scoring tricks of the game. In addition, there are many minor yet tricky sections throughout the stage. Keeping a live medal chain throughout the stage can be a decent challenge, but is very lucrative for later sections of the game.
Gunblimp
The gunblimp enemy consists of a main body and two side blimps. Each side has four destructible turrets that are guaranteed to drop medals (8 total). A strategy for harvesting medals from the gunblimp is to commit suicide and point-blank the turrets on one side of the blimp while invincible after respawning. If done correctly, each medal will be instantly collected and thus one value higher than the previous medal. Fast characters such as Miyamoto can repeat this for the other side of the gunblimp and collect all eight medals. If attempting this, the following should be taken into account:
- Where and when you suicide is important. A consistent method is to suicide on the first spread wave from the gunblimp once it reaches the bottom of the screen (or slightly to the right of center).
- The popcorn enemies surrounding the gunblimp are liable to drop a medal when killed by the death shrapnel. This is a very common place for dropping a medal chain.
- Do not attempt this trick if you are on your last life, as this will lead to a game over.
Flamingos
Immediately after the gunblimp is a castle keep nestled in a forest on the left side of the screen. When hit by a special weapon, the keep will release a flock of pink flamingos that fly out in a cone above the keep. The flamingos award points on every frame they take damage, but the exact number that spawn and their flight paths are random. Damaging the flamingos can be very lucrative when done optimally. In general each ship wants to use all of their available special weapons on them, but the exact method differs per ship. However, all ships want to quickly destroy any turrets that spawn so they don’t interfere.
- Silver Sword wants to destroy the castle keep from close proximity when it is midscreen or slightly below, aiming the napalm up to overlap with the cone the birds fly in. Subsequent weapons should be deployed from slightly above where the road leaves the forest to maximize overlap between the napalm and the birds’ cone.
- Grasshopper wants to destroys the castle keep from below once it passes midscreen, then move up so spent shell casings still hit the keep while aiming to hit clusters of birds with the main gatling fire. Subsequent weapons can be deployed from above the keep, but the exact position should be adjusted to aim for the most birds.
- Flying Baron wants to destroy the castle keep from close proximity above and to the left when it is midscreen so that bombs from both sides home in on the birds released. Subsequent bombs should ideally be released ahead of groups of birds.
- Wild Snail wants to destroy the castle keep immediately as it comes on screen from point blank range and try to manipulate the flamethrowers so that they are hitting groups of birds from point blank range. Due to the randomness of the birds and the flamethrowers, there is huge variance in the amount of score gained.
- Gain wants to destroy the castle keep when it is midscreen, aiming his weapon such that the center of the magic circle is between the upper right corner of the keep and the upper right corner of the forest. Subsequent weapons should be deployed so that the center of the magic circle is roughly above the road exiting the forest. Note that Gain can rapidly deploy weapons.
- Chitta wants to destroy the castle keep as it reaches midscreen, aiming for the keep itself, and then immediately bomb the birds as fast as possible aiming for the point where the road leaves the forest. Note that Chitta can rapidly deploy weapons.
- Miyamoto wants to destroy the castle keep immediately as it comes on screen and point-blank as many birds as possible with four options in the forward formation (this works better at higher autofire rates). Once the keep is midscreen, additional special weapon stocks can be used from above and slightly to the left of the keep (about where the road leaves the forest) for ~200k each.
- Bornnam wants to destroy the castle keep as it reaches midscreen, aiming such that the lower left corner of the weapon hits the keep. Subsequent weapons should be deployed above the forest to maximise the overlap between the weapon’s area of effect and the cone the birds fly in.
House-crushing tanks
Immediately following the section with the birds are a series of tanks that will travel across the screen. Each tank will run into and crush a house in the background scenery. If the tanks are destroyed while crushing a house, they will drop a medal. Otherwise, they will drop a small weapon fragment.
- If a house is destroyed by the player’s special weapon before a tank reaches it, it will uncover an option power-up.
Red Popcorn
The red popcorn enemies that fly towards the player ship in the section immediately following the houses and tanks are worth 200 points when destroyed normally, but 2,000 points when destroyed by a special weapon.
Large tank
The large tank that ambushes the player is most easily dealt with by point-blanking from on top of its sprite. Both of its treads can be destroyed for extra points. The large tank drops four small weapon fragments when destroyed.
- An easy set-up for acquiring homing options exists here; simply collect two of the weapon fragments from the large tank, leaving behind the other two as well as the three dropped by the last three small tanks afterwards.
- Be wary of the popcorn enemies on both sides; this is another common place to drop a medal chain.
Black popcorn
The black popcorn here will travel down the screen in a straight line and fly away after dropping a bomb when the player crosses their line of sight. The bomb explodes into a circular spread of bullets when shot. The popcorn itself is worth 200 points while the bomb is worth 2,000 points.
- A pacifist strategy exists here; simply hug one edge of the screen and these popcorn will harmlessly fly by.
Chaingun planes
The planes with the chaingun turrets have five destructible parts each, the center body, both wings, and both chainguns. If a wing is destroyed after its gun it will drop a medal, and if the main body is destroyed after both wings it will also drop a medal. Note the main body will self-destruct a short amount of time after one of the wings is destroyed. There are six medals total between the two planes. Be careful not to get walled off by a bullet stream when harvesting medals. This is another common medal chain drop.Stage 3 is less chaotic and lower scoring than stage 2. It’s defining features are the introduction of highly lucrative destructible scenery and the secret extend obtained from the midboss, the only extra extend in the game not obtained from scoring.
Medal track
Water tanks
Midboss
Docked “Slayer” planes
Idle Planes
Trapdoor turrets
Stage 4 is all about destructible scenery and harvesting the weapon ammunition to destroy it.
Opening scenery
First orange tank
First large tank
More destructible scenery
Three orange tanks
Stealth bombers
Four large tanks
The medal rails
Stage 5 is long and is primarily composed of waves of flying platform enemies. The stage starts slowly and has a lot of repetition, but accelerates as it progresses, ending with a boss rush.
Flying platforms
Slayer
Mini Black Hearts
Stage 6 is the wall, both figuratively and literally. It is a huge difficulty spike compared to the earlier stages. The first half of the stage is a retread of the various large plane enemies from previous stages, while the second half is a chaotic frenzy through myriad small tanks and popcorn enemies. Especially the second half of the stage requires knowledge of enemy spawn points and where dangerous threats are at any given point to reasonably navigate.
Chaingun planes
Gunblimps
The Wall
Post-wall
Tank hatches
Laser turret
4th Laser turret
Pre-boss tanks
Stage 7 is the final stretch. It is shorter than the previous stages and consists of a series of sections where the screen will stop scrolling until specific enemies are eliminated or timed out. It ends with a pair of suitably ridiculous final bosses.
Rear thrusters
Large Turrets
Carrier Deck
Carrier Nose
Mini Black Hearts
References & Contributors
- Icarus, ST: Battle Garegga, https://shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=351
- Icarus, Eaglet, and Plasmo, Battle Garegga Q&A, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pz1kXyXOz_4
