March 15, 2006

Shooters the old school way!

Why did Doom and its clones have to come along and call themselves First Person Shooters? Now every kid playing these types of games has truncated the name down to “shooter” thus soiling the original definition of a “shooter”. Real shooters have bullets flying everywhere, oh wait FPS’s do too… DAMN!

Anyhow, I am on a big “shooter” kick lately so I decided to make a list of my favorites. I chose one game per console that I owned at some point in my life, yes I even had an arcade cabinet. Also I know some of these games appeared on other platforms prior to the one I am listing them under but it’s where I experienced the game. Also Also I limited the choices to flight based games so I don't want to hear any bitching about games like Gunsmoke, Mercs, Heavy Barrel not making the list... I'll do a Run n' Gun list some other time. Finally the list was so hard to make, I feel like a loser for omitting Space Mega Force, Galactic Attack, Bangai-O, Forgotten Worlds, and I was called an “ignorant whore” by a friend for not putting 1943 on the list. Screw it; here is my list of sentimental “shooters”!

Ajax (konami) – Arcade
Zaxxon (sega) – ColecoVision
River Raid (activision) – Atari 2600
Life Force (konami) – NES
Un Squadron (capcom) – SNES
Starfox64 (nintendo) – N64
Ikaruga (treasure) – Gamecube
Afterburner (sega) – Master System
Thunderforce IV (technosoft) – Genesis
Lords of Thunder (hudson soft) – Sega CD
Radiant Silvergun (treasure) – Saturn
Mars Matrix (capcom) – Dreamcast
Aero Blasters (kaneko) – TurboGrafix-16
Einhander (square) – PS1
R-Type Final (konami) - PS2

Final verdict – UN SQUARDON #1

Tell me what else I missed because I know I forgot some gems…

On a side note I have found that it is damn near impossible to find any new “shooters” to play these days with the exception of Geometry Wars which I am considering dropping $500 to play right now. Craving a twitch based fix!

7 comments:

jchensor said...

I know it's REALLY an oldie, but Xevious is the first shooter that really made me realize I loved the genre. And though I haven't played it, Blazing Lazers on TurboGrafx is supposed to be one of the "Premiere" shooters, right? And do you count games like Star Fox for SNES? Though simplistic, Star Fox was pretty significant for its time.

But you got Ikaruga nad Radiant Silvergun, so I really don't have anything to add to the list.

omar kendall said...

While I don't consider myself a "shooter" guy, and I don't really have any that I would list as favorites (unless you count the Panzer Dragoon series), I am looking forward to these two games on the horizon:

Radirgy
This game uses a toon/cel style that really highlights the core mechanics of shooters (bullet dodging, powerup collecting, etc.), and it looks fantastic. It was just released on the Dreamcast, but it's getting ported to the PS2 and Gamecube this summer.

Senko no Ronde
I'm not sure why it took someone so long to figure this out, but Senko no Ronde is a VERSUS SHOOTER. Holy shit. Bullet dodging, big boss transformations, cool ship designs - this game has got it all. What's even better is that it's coming to the Xbox 360!!! They're overhauling the graphics to justify the next gen release, which will only add to this game's appeal. Hope it comes out in America (or they figure out how to mod the 360)!

omar kendall said...

Shit, I forgot about Rez . Go Sega!!!

YY said...

Cave. Cave Cave Cave. Cave! Dodonpachi, ESP Ra.De., Dangun Feveron, Guwange. Then Cave spiritual successor, Kenta Cho. Kenta Cho! Parsec47,rRootage, Noiz2sa.

Maj said...

The corner liquor/convenience store on the way home from school got 19XX at one point. I could get all the way up to the third or fourth stage on one quarter. Though i guess i'm not that good at shooters because i never beat the game using less than a dollar. Anyway 19XX would have to be my favorite in the genre.

Also, i played a lot of Cannon Spike when it came out on Dreamcast. But i'm all sorts of biased because that game has Sonic Booms.

- Maj
http://sonichurricane.com

Myke Greywolf said...

Are you buying a XB360 just for Geometry Wars? Here, try GridWars and save the money.

Unknown said...

Im glad someone else out there agrees UN-Squadron is #1. Heres a modern shooter based on UN-Squadron and R-Type, available for iPhone (2 players) and flash (6 players)

Toon Shooter by Mooff Games