The genre that I mostly like spend time playing it on the 16-bit platform like on the SNES, Genesis/MD, and of course TG16/PCE (I own PCE CG Mini) that shares many great libraries of shooters which is we all know it as the term called Shoot-em-ups (A.K.A Shumps).
The shoot-em-ups came with the 2 different categories of 2D sub-genres like the side-scrolling horizontal shooter and top-down perspective vertical shooter which is commonly being well known back in the late 80's and early 90's for its unique power-ups that allow players to shoot multiples of firing weapons, dodging many of enemy's projectiles been scattered around the screen making it very difficult to evade stuff, and battling with the bosses which requires the strategic ways of defeating them such as finding their weak spot and memorising their attacking patterns is what made the genre so amazing back then.
Today I decided to pick my 5 favourite titles that I mostly enjoyed playing it on the 16-bit platforms to give it reason why I liked the game that are so ground-breaking for the 16-bit perspectives.
So without go further do, here is my top 5 16-bit Shoot-em-ups games.
5 - Blazing Lazers (TG16/PCE)
Blazing Lazers is a vertical scrolling shooter game was released in 1989 for TG16/PCE which was developed by Compile, a same team behind Puyo Puyo, M.U.S.H.A, Aleste, and Devil's Crush.
It is also known as Gunhed in Japanese release which is based on the Japanese film of the same name in 1989.
You're taking control of the Gunhed Advanced Star Fighter must battle against the enemy space armada called Dark Squadron and its Super Weapons to save the galaxy.
What made the Blazing Lazers so great on the PC Engine/TG16 is the fast vertical scrolling gameplay and a wide array of weapons for the player to use that really adds the intensity of game itself.
It features 9 vertically areas to playthrough contains one or more bosses to defeat, and it has numerous types of weapons can either be upgraded or changed by collecting various numbered power-ups and purple orbs starting from rapid-fire main cannon to long-range plasma lazers. You can collect optional power-ups to help fight through the game such as multibodies, homing missiles, shields, and enhanced firing capabilities, so these are the weapons are fast and responsive works effectively against the large enemy's ship that took time to defeat which requires a much stronger weapon adds up a difficulty pretty nicely.
The level design is crispy and detailed in each areas from space station to alien's organs, desert planet to big floating bubbles which I am very impressed with the use of scrolling effects, colors details, and background visuals really fits the graphical capabilities of hardware itself showing much appreciate to its quality, and it has the incredible use of sound design with no sign of scratchy noises and it definitely has the best soundtrack of all PC Engine/TG16 library with outstanding percussion and melody throughout the game's Shoot-em-ups action.
Blazing Lazers is regarded as one of the better Shoot 'em up video games for PC Engine/TG16 system is the must play for the fans of the genres.
Despite the closure of Wii's Virtual Console service since this version got re-released in 2007, I was hoping this game should deserve another re-release for Switch (via eShop) in future or if any of you preferred to play it on actual hardware instead then be warned the actual copy of the game cost around between £170 and £200 making it harder to find it online or alternately you can also get it on built-in miniature system such as PC Engine CoreGrafx Mini for more than £100 which included this game as part of 57 pre-installed titles, so I just got lucky for owning the miniature system that I had one for two years ago just for worth £70.
4 - Gradius III (SNES)
Gradius III is a side-scrolling horizontal shooter was originally released for arcade in 1989, and was came later for SNES in 1990/91 which was both developed and published by Konami.
You're the pilot starfighter controlling the fighting ship called Vic Viper to battle against the evil alien empire to save the entire galaxy.
What made the game so great on the SNES is the gameplay mechanics system where your ship started out quite slow and weak at the beginning of the first stage, so you will definitely needed to upgrade your ship by collecting and using these single power-ups items which let's you choose any of these 6 power-ups when the desired power-up is highlighted on the bottom screen.
Stuff like you can increase the speed of the ship makes the movement bit faster, it drops missile on the ground areas, it fires long-range laser dealing heavy damage, it has ripple that deals with wave-sized projectiles, the shields that protects you from taking damage from enemy's projectiles, and of course the best of all is the 5 option projectiles which allowing you to fire additional range of vulcans or lasers.
The game was notoriously being the tough ones thanks to narrowly layered level design for some areas and multiples of enemies makes really insane amount of projectiles are the reason why it's made it quite tougher to beat which requires many learning curves and strategy in order to successfully beating the entire game which is why it made the game quite good to play.
The boss battles are insanely epic that made Gradius III worth to play, so stuff like you have long-sharp armed Goliath, big blobbed Bubble Eye, metallic ship Big Core MKIII, long-firey Vulture Dragon, large-piranha Choking Weed, blue-glossy Crystal Core, and many more total non-stop bosses that gives you a great ass-kicking all the way.
Gradius III is a solid Shoot-em-ups title that never officially got released at PAL region, so thankfully I've bought the copy as an Super Famicom releases which I also had a SNES converter adapter that allowing me to bypass the Japanese imports games on my PAL SNES system due to system's region-locked restriction.
You can get the SNES copy of either the NTSC US or JP version just for less than £30 online or you can also get it on PS2 titled as Gradius III and IV for £40 or less, and PSP titled as Gradius Collection for £50.
Oh it is also available on PS4 and Switch as arcade archives for between £5.79 and £6.29 could be a better and affordable option for newcomer too.
3 - U.N Squadron (SNES)
U.N Squadron (A.K.A Area 88 in JP release) is a side-scrolling horizontal shooter was released in 1989 for Arcade, and was later released in 1991/92 for SNES which was developed and published by Capcom, and it is also based on the manga series of the same name titled as Area 88.
You take control of 3 of the pilot fighters went on the mission is to stop a terrorist group known as Project 4.
As I previously enjoyed the arcade version quite a long time ago, I decided to give a SNES version a go to see if the game does anything do better in terms of additional features and gameplay wise, the answer is it's a damn fine SNES shoot-em-ups game that does the job right.
What made the SNES version so interesting is that it featured additional mission select which allows you to choose any of the level such as the main and bonus missions.
What made the game quite unique to play is that each of the 3 fighter pilots has different style of play such as Shin Kazama has mid-range vulcan cannon which is perfect for well-balanced players, Mickey Simon has strong valcan cannon but has weak air-to-ground options, and Greg Gates has Gatling gun that has a second gun that shoots downward angle but has stronger ground options.
After beating each stages will earn you with currencies which you can spend these to the weapon shop that gives you ability to use a variety of explosion bombs and various of planes with different capabilities such as the firing range and damage which really adds up the gameplay experience.
The graphics and presentation in this game are surprisingly look amazing for the SNES shooter with detailed landscape, nice foreground layouts, and great use of colours just feels like a true 16-bit title had to offer, and of course it provides the best soundtrack in any of Capcom's Shoot-em-ups that makes you keep playing the game for the action.
U.N Squadron is a fantastic Shoot-em-ups game that I highly recommended to all SNES owners who grew up playing this particular genre. The SNES copy are not particularly that expensive which goes from £20 to £35 more which is worth owning the title for the retro collectors.
2 - M.U.S.H.A (Genesis/MD)
M.U.S.H.A (A.K.A Aleste in JP release) is a vertical scrolling shooter was released in 1990 for Genesis/MD which was developed by Compile, a same team behind behind then again such as Puyo Puyo, Blazing Lazers, Aleste, and Devil's Crush.
You take control of flying mecha pilot who has the mission to destroy a large super intelligent computer that threatens the human life and planet Earth.
This game plays on vertical perspective view and the player starts off with the main weapon that can be increasingly upgraded by collecting power chip, so there's are three different types of special weapons can be picked up such as piercing lasers, fire-based explosives and rotating shields. It also has useful drones which can be set to one of the six attack modes, such as aiming forward, behind, or rotating around the player.
What made the game incredibly impressive is that the gameplay as a whole has tons of action-packed levels starting from floating temples to industrial facility then solid-rocked layed area to dark-thunderous skies which has the best overall design for its stage presentation, and you can't go wrong with the mecha bosses like golden templed freak fires with 5 waves of firey projectiles, big metallic headed barfing out bunch of scraps out of his mouth, big fat dude with two kabuki heads floating around the multi-spiked ball and firing 4 silvered orbs, a large ship with creepy-looking facemask with 2 floating fists throwing punches at you, the badass mecha guy shoots you with 4 blue projectiles and uses long-range blue whip as melee weapon, and many more to fight against is what made the game quite epic for its atmosphere.
The graphics as a 16-bit standards are looking spectacular which really shows the power of the SEGA's 16-bit machine for its technical stand point.
The use of background layered parallax scrolling, the foreground special effects, the crispy and sharp looking animation, and detailed environments are such an incredible to look at for its design perspective making it a most technically impressive title of 16-bit libraries, and of course you had to give the game a remarkable credit for its blazing and wicked heavy metal soundtrack which makes it being the best part of the Shoot-em-ups games like this really fits the personality level of SEGA's 16-bit machine.
M.U.S.H.A is one of the game that shamefully never got the release at PAL region (not until it got re-released on Switch (via N.S.O Subscription E.P in 2021), but still it is also an outstanding Shoot-em-ups game that you really need to play this on Genesis/MD. This game is stupidly expensive for game collectors out-there because it's goes up for more than £300, so I got lucky that I've bought this game as a reproduction copy of the game from Ebay for £7.00 a very long time ago.
You can also play it on the Switch under the Nintendo Switch Online subscription (Expansion Pack) which are also an welcome options for newcomer who are interested in playing the 16-bit Shoot-em-ups libraries.
1 - Thunder Force IV (Genesis/MD)
Thunder Force IV (A.K.A Lightening Force in US release) is a side-scrolling horizontal shooter was released in 1992/93 for Genesis/MD which was developed by Technosoft, a developer teams behind Herzog Zwei, Dragon's Fury and Hyper Duel, and it is also a fourth title of the series.
You take control of fighter spacecraft called Rynex to battle against Vios forces throughout the 10 stages.
You can select any of these stages at the level select menu, and the game plays on the horizontal perspective view.
The game still retains the same upgradeable defaults, speed settings, and unique extra weapons from the previous third game, as you have ability to change the speed of the ship that suits for your playability starting from slow to fast settings making the ship's movement feels realistic.
You also have each types of weapons that gives you the advantage of using the powerful projectiles which ranges the level of firing system starting from twin shot to blades that shoots forward, back shot to rail gun which fires backward, snake that fires 2-ways angle, hunter that fires multiples of bouncy projectiles, and of course the free way that fires insane amount of missiles which I consider these firing system as being one of the ground-breaking things they ever done in any of Shoot-em-ups libraries had to offer.
It has 10 epic stages with intense action that are fast-paced and over-the-top, it has multiples of insane enemy's ships in the whole on-screen that fires amount of projectiles, has cool looking bosses that are ridiculously large, and has quite an atmospheric level design with in-depth environments going on starting from top to bottom of the areas are quite lethal to play thanks to numerous of hazardous objects and structures which is why it made the game so amazing to play.
The overall visuals is what I call it the bestest things that they ever done for SEGA's 16-bit machine in terms of heavy use of parallax scrolling, detailed environmental layouts from back to front, crystal sharp textures, and magnificent overall use of animation and special effects which I call it a biggest technical marvel of one of the SEGA's ultimate hardware console of 16-bit era.
The game also has epic use of heavy metal soundtrack that are sounds incredibly awesome especially with the title track such as "Metal Squad" which really blew everyone mind up with the heavyness of action-packed music that fits the game's Shoot-em-ups action.
Thunder Force IV is definitely one of my all-time favourite 16-bit Shoot-em-ups game that defines my gaming childhood, and it is definitely must play for Shoot-em-ups fanatics.
The copy for Genesis/MD goes from £40 to £50 more which is quite bit pricey, but also recommended for big game collectors out-there.
You can also get it on Saturn titled as Thunder Force Gold for more than £70 which is hella expensive, but the best way to play this game is the Switch release as part of the SEGA Ages collection (via Nintendo eShop) for £6 digitally.
Honourable Mentions:
Axelay
R-Type 3
Space Megaforce
Gleylancer
Gaiares
Vapor Trail
Lords of Thunder
Soldier Blade
Ginga Fukei Densetsu Sapphire (Galaxy Policewoman Legend Sapphire)
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