I saw a chost going around asking about "good beginner modes" the other day, and I am thinking about it again after playing some more Blue Revolver tonight. As a somewhat-mild shmup player, BR is very friggin hard, but the "Normal" mode for novices adds an autoshield which triggers a bomb whenever you get hit. This helps set the expectation for the game's "usual" Hyper mode: if you do not bomb, you will die.
At first I found Blue Revolver very inaccessible, especially after coming off of a few hours of Mecha Ritz: Steel Rondo1. Mecha Ritz has a much more forgiving difficulty system, with collectable shields providing the most direct benefit and allowing you to soak your way through the game's dense backend. This allows for some player laziness, but Mecha Ritz also has scoring systems relating to long-term and reflex survival, awarding more points for long unbroken shields or "nice bombs" that negate a killing bullet at the last moment. So in that way, I think Mecha Ritz allows for a lower skill floor, but also a much higher ceiling if you can maintain a lot of score bonuses and work on your reflex bombing.
I jumped into Blue Revolver's "Hyper" mode expecting a similar padding of difficulty, but I crashed and burned pretty consistently in the start of the third stage. I didn't entirely understand why until I played the Normal mode, and saw the autoshields triggering on bullet hits, and then I started to understand the aggression with which I need to use my resources to win against the game. Jumping back into Hyper difficulty with a mind to push forward with a bomb instead of letting it go to waste felt great. It's a nice way to train that skill, I think. 
Blue Revolver's still kicking my ass but between the level select and challenge missions, it's actually feeling very available in giving the tools I need to learn specific segments or fights. Doing some of that study work got me past the third stage in a Normal 1CC tonight, so I'm feeling pretty high on shmups right now. Still probably a bit of a ways off from a full Normal 1CC but I'm also still experimenting with weapon selections and having fun with it so, what's the rush?
- i need to spill this out somewhere: thank you cohost for having great STG recommendations. shmups are so good.
