Die Hard Trilogy (DH2: Die Harder) - Sinden Lightgun full playthrough
Channel: Widge
Date: 2023-12-08

Die Hard Trilogy is a set of three games inspired by the first three Die Hard movies. Each game based on a different episode in the series and featuring completely different gameplay styles from each other. As the films, and also the games, are set at Christmas, it makes them ideal to for some festive fun.

Die Hard 2: Die Harder, is an on-rails lightgun shooter made for use with the Konami HyperBlaster/Justifier on the  PlayStation, or the Sega Stunner/Virtua Gun on the Saturn.  I'm playing the PlayStation version today, but in an emulator using the Sinden Lightgun.

The game features 8 stages and a full playthrough lasts about 40 minutes if you don't skip the points calculations between stages.  The style borrows quite heavily from Virtua Cop by using the familiar rings that identify enemy targets and sudden jerky camera movements. Where it differs however is the treatment of collateral damage.  In most lightgun shooters, if you accidentally shoot an innocent bystander you lose a unit of health, but in DHT-DH2:DH, instead you lose nothing, they are just collateral damage. Well, not exactly. At the end of each stage you get a points bonus for the number of innocents that survived your rescue and you lose points with every accidental death. The point is though, that you refreshingly don't lose health because you shot someone else!

The controls are pretty straightforward.  The Konami Gun had only a Trigger, a "Special" Button and a "Start" button.  The Start button pauses the game and the Special button lobs a grenade. But you can also fire rockets if you press the Special Button while pulling the trigger. Reloading is achieved by shooting offscreen. You also had the option of using buttons on standard controller in Port 2 to handle the grenades, rockets and reloading.
As I'm emulating the game I have the option of mapping my controls exactly how I'd like, so I mapped the dedicated reload, grenade and rocket buttons from the controller onto buttons on the Sinden gun.  This has a couple of advantages: I don't need to do a trigger+button combo to launch a rocket as a single button does it, if I want to lob a grenade while I'm shooting I can do that without unintentionally firing a rocket instead, and I can reload without pointing my gun away from the target.

The ability to customise button mappings was just one of the reasons why I chose to emulate this game instead of playing on my actual PS1 or Saturn.  Neither version of the game has a lightgun calibration option, so shots will always be off-target. An emulator will allow you to overcome this obstacle.

I Also, wanted to showcase the fact that lr-pcsx-rearmed now supports emulation of the Konami HyperBlaster. Until recently, the only way to play the PS1 version of this game in pcsxr was by patching the game to Guncon mode, but now that's no longer necessary. A clean unaltered rip of my retail disc is enough. That upgrade comes courtesy of my good friend @LutherGond, who implemented the  integration of the device type into the emulator with the help of Notaz.

I hope you enjoy this seasonal gameplay video.

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0:00 - Intro
4:06 - Level 1 : Dulles Airport
9:41 - Level 2 : New Wing
15:05 - Level 3 : Tunnel
19:22 - Level 4 : Runway
25:05 - Level 5 : Plane Interior
29:04 - Level 6 : Church
26:10 - Level 7 : Snowmobile Chase
40:55 - Level 8 : Plane Intercept