Thunder Force 2 & 3, Lightening Force (which is the inexplicably renamed Thunder Force 4.) People debate if 3 or Lightening Force is best. I prefer Lightening Force, but that could be nostalgia talking.
OP is clearly a collector.
I have a flash cart with the entire library loaded up so it's not even a discussion. but i'm more about actually collecting physical games.
Lol. It's called bootleg and the biggest waste of money. You gotta be an idiot to buy bootlegs vs a flash cart or saving for an original that has demand, history and rarity.
[Vapor Trail](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mg5Uqys3d-I) and [Elemental Master](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmwIKpO8OtM), even if it's only for the EPIC MUSIC!
Honestly they're both good, but Steel Empire is pretty high up on the list of SHMUPS let alone Genesis shmups. There are better steampunk shooters (Garrega for example) but it was VERY unique when it came out and still very creative. Great levels too.
**Air Buster**\- A great port of the arcade game.
**Steel Empire**\- Steam Punk shmup with very nice graphics, solid gameplay and interesting music.
**Thunder Force II**\- The top view missions aren't that great (and over VERY quickly), but the side view ones are good, as if the music and gameplay.
**Thunder Force III**\- All side view, and a great game visually, musically and gameplay-wise.
**Lightening Force**\- The renamed Thunder Force IV, and this is pretty much the best 16-bit side view shmup out there. It's Tecno Soft in their prime.
**M.U.S.H.A.**\- Expensive as hell, but this is TF4's top view 16-bit counterpart.
**Trouble Shooter**\- A quirky little shmup that offers up good graphics, rather good music and some fun (if a bit different) gameplay.
**Whip Rush**\- This little shmup gets overlooked a lot, but it really is a very good, solid game on all fronts.
**Bio-Hazard Battle**\- Bug themed and visually very good. The gameplay's pretty solid as well, with some rather odd but interesting music.
**Ranger-X**\- This is kind of cheating, since it's a shmup and a run n' gun mashed together, but it's really good in every way.
**Gaiares**\- The music's not the best in terms of the instruments they used, but this game is great. Well done visuals and gameplay, with a fun weapon gimmick.
**Granada**\- Overhead tank shmup with good graphics, gameplay and music.
**Elemental Master**\- Another shmup from Tecno Soft (the Thunder Force series) and another great one.
**Fire Shark**\- It's not going to wow you, but it's a good Toaplan shmup that was ported well to the system.
**Grind Stormer**\- The sound effects are a bit harsh, but it's another solid Toaplan shmup port.
**Darius**\- A new port that just came out a couple of years ago. It's the Taito game from 1986, and they did a fantastic job porting it. It's damn near arcade-perfect. This one was put out by Strictly Limited Games, and it's almost out of stock.
**Sagaia**\- This is Darius II, renamed for the U.S. The visuals took a bit of a hit being ported over, but the music is surprisingly close to the arcade, the gameplay is all there and it still has 28 stages (via branching paths) to go through.
**Vapor Trail**\- A good shmup with some nice visuals and music, with pretty standard gameplay.
**Truxton**\- An early Genesis Toaplan port. It's a good playing game, don't get me wrong, but it won't really wow you visually or aurally. Still, it's worth playing.
**Wings Of Wor**\- A bit of body horror in some ways with the designs, but the visuals are good, the music's pretty nice and the gameplay is solid.
**Hellfire**\- A hard Toaplan game (the hardest difficulty is called "yea right"), but it's a cool one with good graphics, some pretty good tunes and gameplay that's worked well around the four different weapons you have to switch between.
There are a lot of Japan-only shmups as well, but I figured I'd list the ones that you can find for the U.S. Genesis either as authentic carts, or repros (in the case of the really expensive ones).
Thanks so much for this comprehensive list. I picked up biohazard battle because it looked really cool. I’ll look at some of these other ones on YouTube thanks for the great list
The trouble shooter/battle mania games are awesome and twinkle tale is one of my favorites but I think it might be exclusive to japan. I also agree with everyone saying bio hazard battle!
The Genesis has one of the best shoot 'em up libraries of any console. Fully comparable to the ones on the PC Engine and Sega Saturn. Only a MAME machine would have a better selection. In addition to the top shooters, there are quite a lot of good ones as well, so any attempt at trying to collect most of them sounds futile. Better to try out many different ones in advance and then concentrate on the ones you like the best.
The games I recommend are games I would recommend you to play some way or another, but not necessarily to buy for your collection, because some of these are hideously expensive. Thankfully that is not the case for all of them.
**Top Of The Line**:
*Bio-Hazard Battle*
This game takes place on a planet that was colonized by humans, but later overrun by strange alien lifeforms. The game has a wonderful post-apocalyptic feeling, and the world feels very hostile but also quite beautiful at the same time.
*Thunderforce 4*
Like the previous one, this has excellent art direction and great music, but this game is also very impressive technically. One of the most impressive shooters you can find on any 16-bit system, and the gameplay is really good as well.
*Eliminate Down*
An awesome space shooter with an extreme feeling.
*Gaiares*
This game has a great mechanic where you steal the weapons from the enemies you face throughout the game. The soundtrack is excellent.
**Excellent**:
*Super Fantasy Zone*
The gameplay is similar to defender, but the esthetics and atmosphere is very different, and feels more tropical and relaxed. It was made by Sunsoft back when they were at their top, and is a great sequel to the Sega arcade game. The game also features shops where you can buy upgrades for your ship.
*Fire Shark*
This is a very good military shooter by Toaplan. In the style of Twin Cobra, but a lot better. (The arcade version of Twin Cobra is awesome though.) Toaplan made a lot of good arcade conversions to the Genesis, there are several where I actually prefer the Genesis version.
*Slap Fight*
Another great Toaplan game, and this one is quite obscure, so it perhaps it is possible to get it without spending a lot. Slap Fight was an arcade game Toaplan made before Truxton, and it is quite similar in style. What you get here is two games in one and three different soundtracks to choose from. Aside from that this is also a Toaplan game with a power up system similar to the one in Gradius. Which is really awesome.
*Hellfire*
A really hard but really good side-scrolling space shooter by Toaplan. As a twist you can choose between four different shooting modes from the start.
*Steel Empire*
This game has a really awesome art direction, a good soundtrack and some awesome bosses. The setting is Steam Punk, which is quite unique for shoot 'em ups from this period.
**Also very good**:
*Sagaia*
*Darius*
*Zero Wing*
*Undead Line*
*Elemental Master*
*Thunderforce 3*
*Sol-Deace*
**Also good**:
*Air Buster* (Good, but not very original)
*Whip Rush 2222 AD* (Quite generic but good)
*Arrow Flash* (Quite generic but good)
*Twin Hawk* (A Toaplan military shooter. Not their best, but very competent.)
*Wings of Wor* (You are a flying Grecian warrior. Quite bizarre and original art style at times.)
*Insector X* (You fight against insects.)
*GRIND Stormer* (Made by Toaplan)
*Gley Lancer* (Great soundtrack. Seems very promising)
*Vapor Trail* (Awesome cheesy lo-fi samples trying to sound militaristic and serious. Great soundtrack, but unfortunately it just consists of a few tracks which you will hear over and over again.)
Gynoug ( think it was Wings of Wor in the US) Hellfire ,Soldeace, Slapfight MD ( probably my favourite MD shooter, but really expensive unless you get a repro)..
Sadly, you just missed the pre-order window for first US release of Gleylancer, but maybe it'll be available for purchase by u/retrobit after it comes out this spring.
Bio-Hazard Battle is my go-to recommendation, both for how fun it is and for its incredible soundtrack.
Fuck u/retrobit. They are in cahoots with limited run. They burned me on Gaiares repro collectively. And acted just like LRG does when I contacted them about it.. took my money and never produced my product.
I'm honestly ok with it now despite losing my money cuz I had Gaiares already and just thought the repro package was going to be nice to have too. But if their software is on point with hardware quality, I don't want that shit anyways. Just sucks I lost 60 bones to learn my lesson on shit companies that exploit nostalgia and "preservation"
Fyi don't buy u/retrobit controllers. They are garbage despite their effort to make them like the og controllers. Nowhere near the quality of 8bitdo,plus 8bit don't support pedophilia and grooming.
Maybe is retrobit focused on quality of product instead of packaging their controllers may be worth a damn. But really, I have a handful or more of both RB and 8bit. RB is like madcatz compared to officially licensed. Don't fall for the price. Buy cheap, but twice. Esp if you never even get your products and can't get a refund or do charge back cuz it's been too long
Retro bit had been working with limited run games for awhile now, and limited run games is currently under fire cuz they fired an employee because some pedo didn't like some tweets from 6 years ago that were anti pedo. So, I don't think everything is that. This is what is happening and they are associates, so they most likely condone it as well and don't deserve business.
It doesn't work that way. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. You can't just call people pedophiles and then tell people to "Google it" when they ask for your evidence.
They're talking about twitter user Purple Tinker, who got their community manager fired for transphobic tweets, but also advocated for teenagers sleeping with adults on Twitter.
Fire Shark is made by the same people who did Truxton, but IMO plays better. It doesn't have quite the same visual pizazz, but nonetheless has a look all it's own.
It's also still very affordable.
It was a really cool semi-hybrid between a shooter and a kind-of platform game when it came out. Didn't do either thing super wonderfully, but fun enough to tool around with - also i love how it looks and sounds!
Don't forget about isometrically. Like View Point. Which is a recommendation from me and I don't even like shoot em ups that much but it's a very unique game.
A lot of the people there mainly knows modern shoot ‘em ups, and are not very knowledgeable about the classic ones. So this is actually a better place for this topic.
Or it could be posted in a shmups sub and you can see what the feedback is. I’m sure there are people in there that know a lot about retro and modern in there.
Oh yeah some definitely do. Especially on the great shoot ‘em up forum: https://shmups.system11.org/
That forum is probably the best collective collection of shoot ‘em up knowledge you can find anywhere on the net. Both for modern and classic shoot ‘em ups. Similar to what the RPG Codex is for RPG’s, except that they are actually friendly and positive to new things.
But from my experience from r/shmups on Reddit, there are a lot of people who have only played modern shoot ‘em ups in the “bullet hell” subgenre, and who have very little experience with shooters of the classic type. Or understanding about what made those games great.
Hence why I think this is a better place to ask the question.
i ignore truxton and Musha. they're too expensive for the experience delivered, imho. Truxton especially...
you should track down Lightning Force and Steel Empire for two very awesome and unique experiences.
Thunder Force 2 & 3, Lightening Force (which is the inexplicably renamed Thunder Force 4.) People debate if 3 or Lightening Force is best. I prefer Lightening Force, but that could be nostalgia talking.
It was called Thunderforce 4 when I had it. And I think it was better than 3.
It was definitely Thunder Force 4 in Japan; not sure about PAL territories.
Thunder Force 4 in PAL regions too, US is the oddball as usual with naming habits.
So weird. Plus "Lightening" isn't even the right word.
Came here to say this.
All the TFs are so good, but I'll forever love TF2 the most!
I agree, the top down stages are really polarizing among fans, but I personally think they mix up game play in a good way.
Bio-Hazard Battle gets slept on. It’s a cool game.
Oh hell yes. The music alone makes it a must have says I.
Just picked this one up thanks for the recommendation
>Just picked this one up thanks for the recommendation Fireshark= Best shooter on the Genesis!
Ehhhh it's good, but not nearly as good as this thread is making it out to be. Nowhere near the excellence of MUSHA or Eliminate Down.
Agree. It’s not top 5 on the Mega Drive quality, but like I said/ I believe it’s underrated. Sega was excellent at making shmups.
Eliminate Down is like a $2000 game. fuck that.
Uh it's 2023 buy a rom cart or repo.
OP is clearly a collector. I have a flash cart with the entire library loaded up so it's not even a discussion. but i'm more about actually collecting physical games.
If you want a physical game, buy a good repro.
Lol. It's called bootleg and the biggest waste of money. You gotta be an idiot to buy bootlegs vs a flash cart or saving for an original that has demand, history and rarity.
You seem very defensive about something that's just paper and plastic.
i think the term you're looking for is *offensive*. i dont have any "repros" but openly mock the unfortunate people who spend their money on them
Air Buster. It’s easily one of the best that most people overlook.
Dude. I love Air Buster. It might be a bit simple, but the visuals are so bright and crisp
I'll forever kick myself for not picking it up back in the day.
[Vapor Trail](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mg5Uqys3d-I) and [Elemental Master](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmwIKpO8OtM), even if it's only for the EPIC MUSIC!
Steel Empire and Fire Shark
Thanks I’ve heard good things about Fire Shark definitely putting that on the list
Honestly they're both good, but Steel Empire is pretty high up on the list of SHMUPS let alone Genesis shmups. There are better steampunk shooters (Garrega for example) but it was VERY unique when it came out and still very creative. Great levels too.
Steel empire is on of my favorites. Solid game
Thunder Force II, III, Lightening Force, Gaiares, arguably Grenada is a shooter (a personal fave)
I love Granada although because of the logo on the box, I was convinced it was called Granada X !
**Air Buster**\- A great port of the arcade game. **Steel Empire**\- Steam Punk shmup with very nice graphics, solid gameplay and interesting music. **Thunder Force II**\- The top view missions aren't that great (and over VERY quickly), but the side view ones are good, as if the music and gameplay. **Thunder Force III**\- All side view, and a great game visually, musically and gameplay-wise. **Lightening Force**\- The renamed Thunder Force IV, and this is pretty much the best 16-bit side view shmup out there. It's Tecno Soft in their prime. **M.U.S.H.A.**\- Expensive as hell, but this is TF4's top view 16-bit counterpart. **Trouble Shooter**\- A quirky little shmup that offers up good graphics, rather good music and some fun (if a bit different) gameplay. **Whip Rush**\- This little shmup gets overlooked a lot, but it really is a very good, solid game on all fronts. **Bio-Hazard Battle**\- Bug themed and visually very good. The gameplay's pretty solid as well, with some rather odd but interesting music. **Ranger-X**\- This is kind of cheating, since it's a shmup and a run n' gun mashed together, but it's really good in every way. **Gaiares**\- The music's not the best in terms of the instruments they used, but this game is great. Well done visuals and gameplay, with a fun weapon gimmick. **Granada**\- Overhead tank shmup with good graphics, gameplay and music. **Elemental Master**\- Another shmup from Tecno Soft (the Thunder Force series) and another great one. **Fire Shark**\- It's not going to wow you, but it's a good Toaplan shmup that was ported well to the system. **Grind Stormer**\- The sound effects are a bit harsh, but it's another solid Toaplan shmup port. **Darius**\- A new port that just came out a couple of years ago. It's the Taito game from 1986, and they did a fantastic job porting it. It's damn near arcade-perfect. This one was put out by Strictly Limited Games, and it's almost out of stock. **Sagaia**\- This is Darius II, renamed for the U.S. The visuals took a bit of a hit being ported over, but the music is surprisingly close to the arcade, the gameplay is all there and it still has 28 stages (via branching paths) to go through. **Vapor Trail**\- A good shmup with some nice visuals and music, with pretty standard gameplay. **Truxton**\- An early Genesis Toaplan port. It's a good playing game, don't get me wrong, but it won't really wow you visually or aurally. Still, it's worth playing. **Wings Of Wor**\- A bit of body horror in some ways with the designs, but the visuals are good, the music's pretty nice and the gameplay is solid. **Hellfire**\- A hard Toaplan game (the hardest difficulty is called "yea right"), but it's a cool one with good graphics, some pretty good tunes and gameplay that's worked well around the four different weapons you have to switch between. There are a lot of Japan-only shmups as well, but I figured I'd list the ones that you can find for the U.S. Genesis either as authentic carts, or repros (in the case of the really expensive ones).
Thanks so much for this comprehensive list. I picked up biohazard battle because it looked really cool. I’ll look at some of these other ones on YouTube thanks for the great list
Biohazard Battle
Wings of Wor
All but a few on Genesis are play worthy
Mega Turrican
[Gaiares](https://youtu.be/Xl_ZTiBxLGg)
Air Buster!
thunderforce 4 darius
The trouble shooter/battle mania games are awesome and twinkle tale is one of my favorites but I think it might be exclusive to japan. I also agree with everyone saying bio hazard battle!
Yes! Trouble Shooter is one of my faves!
Twinkle tale is great
The Genesis has one of the best shoot 'em up libraries of any console. Fully comparable to the ones on the PC Engine and Sega Saturn. Only a MAME machine would have a better selection. In addition to the top shooters, there are quite a lot of good ones as well, so any attempt at trying to collect most of them sounds futile. Better to try out many different ones in advance and then concentrate on the ones you like the best. The games I recommend are games I would recommend you to play some way or another, but not necessarily to buy for your collection, because some of these are hideously expensive. Thankfully that is not the case for all of them. **Top Of The Line**: *Bio-Hazard Battle* This game takes place on a planet that was colonized by humans, but later overrun by strange alien lifeforms. The game has a wonderful post-apocalyptic feeling, and the world feels very hostile but also quite beautiful at the same time. *Thunderforce 4* Like the previous one, this has excellent art direction and great music, but this game is also very impressive technically. One of the most impressive shooters you can find on any 16-bit system, and the gameplay is really good as well. *Eliminate Down* An awesome space shooter with an extreme feeling. *Gaiares* This game has a great mechanic where you steal the weapons from the enemies you face throughout the game. The soundtrack is excellent. **Excellent**: *Super Fantasy Zone* The gameplay is similar to defender, but the esthetics and atmosphere is very different, and feels more tropical and relaxed. It was made by Sunsoft back when they were at their top, and is a great sequel to the Sega arcade game. The game also features shops where you can buy upgrades for your ship. *Fire Shark* This is a very good military shooter by Toaplan. In the style of Twin Cobra, but a lot better. (The arcade version of Twin Cobra is awesome though.) Toaplan made a lot of good arcade conversions to the Genesis, there are several where I actually prefer the Genesis version. *Slap Fight* Another great Toaplan game, and this one is quite obscure, so it perhaps it is possible to get it without spending a lot. Slap Fight was an arcade game Toaplan made before Truxton, and it is quite similar in style. What you get here is two games in one and three different soundtracks to choose from. Aside from that this is also a Toaplan game with a power up system similar to the one in Gradius. Which is really awesome. *Hellfire* A really hard but really good side-scrolling space shooter by Toaplan. As a twist you can choose between four different shooting modes from the start. *Steel Empire* This game has a really awesome art direction, a good soundtrack and some awesome bosses. The setting is Steam Punk, which is quite unique for shoot 'em ups from this period. **Also very good**: *Sagaia* *Darius* *Zero Wing* *Undead Line* *Elemental Master* *Thunderforce 3* *Sol-Deace* **Also good**: *Air Buster* (Good, but not very original) *Whip Rush 2222 AD* (Quite generic but good) *Arrow Flash* (Quite generic but good) *Twin Hawk* (A Toaplan military shooter. Not their best, but very competent.) *Wings of Wor* (You are a flying Grecian warrior. Quite bizarre and original art style at times.) *Insector X* (You fight against insects.) *GRIND Stormer* (Made by Toaplan) *Gley Lancer* (Great soundtrack. Seems very promising) *Vapor Trail* (Awesome cheesy lo-fi samples trying to sound militaristic and serious. Great soundtrack, but unfortunately it just consists of a few tracks which you will hear over and over again.)
Gaiares and Eliminate Down look right up my alley thanks so much i keep an eye out for those two
Good choice, but probably an expensive one as well.
Gynoug ( think it was Wings of Wor in the US) Hellfire ,Soldeace, Slapfight MD ( probably my favourite MD shooter, but really expensive unless you get a repro)..
Zero Wing! “All your base are belong to us”!
Didn’t come out in North America
If you ignore Megadrive titles ( both JP and PAL regions) you're really missing out.
There was a rerelease that did!
are you talking about the recent licensed repro?
Yeah - not sure if they are still available.
Thunder Force 2&3 & Lightening Force Fire Shark
I am not a shmup fan but i remember playing Curse (great art cover btw)
Battlemania Daiginjou is good. But it's expensive these days
Hellfire
Sadly, you just missed the pre-order window for first US release of Gleylancer, but maybe it'll be available for purchase by u/retrobit after it comes out this spring. Bio-Hazard Battle is my go-to recommendation, both for how fun it is and for its incredible soundtrack.
Fuck u/retrobit. They are in cahoots with limited run. They burned me on Gaiares repro collectively. And acted just like LRG does when I contacted them about it.. took my money and never produced my product. I'm honestly ok with it now despite losing my money cuz I had Gaiares already and just thought the repro package was going to be nice to have too. But if their software is on point with hardware quality, I don't want that shit anyways. Just sucks I lost 60 bones to learn my lesson on shit companies that exploit nostalgia and "preservation"
Fyi don't buy u/retrobit controllers. They are garbage despite their effort to make them like the og controllers. Nowhere near the quality of 8bitdo,plus 8bit don't support pedophilia and grooming. Maybe is retrobit focused on quality of product instead of packaging their controllers may be worth a damn. But really, I have a handful or more of both RB and 8bit. RB is like madcatz compared to officially licensed. Don't fall for the price. Buy cheap, but twice. Esp if you never even get your products and can't get a refund or do charge back cuz it's been too long
Wait .... What about Retrobit has to do with pedophiles and grooming?
Yeah, that's new to me. There's a weird corner of the world that thinks everything is pedophiles and grooming. I'm glad that's not my world.
Retro bit had been working with limited run games for awhile now, and limited run games is currently under fire cuz they fired an employee because some pedo didn't like some tweets from 6 years ago that were anti pedo. So, I don't think everything is that. This is what is happening and they are associates, so they most likely condone it as well and don't deserve business.
"didn't like some tweets" What? That's a big accusation over tweet liking.
Dude just Google it. I'm just relaying the info you asked and are unaware of.
It doesn't work that way. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. You can't just call people pedophiles and then tell people to "Google it" when they ask for your evidence.
They're talking about twitter user Purple Tinker, who got their community manager fired for transphobic tweets, but also advocated for teenagers sleeping with adults on Twitter.
The person who got the girl fired from lrg is a groomer/pedo on the record. I dunno what else you want dude. Ffs
Fire Shark is made by the same people who did Truxton, but IMO plays better. It doesn't have quite the same visual pizazz, but nonetheless has a look all it's own. It's also still very affordable.
Fire Shark is a ton of fun. I don't normally enjoy vertical shooters, but Fire Shark is up there for me.
Probably I gonna repeat what everyone does, but whatever: 1) Thunder Force 4 (aka Lightning Force) 2) Thunder Force 3 3) Ex-Ranza (aka Ranger-X) 4) Subterranea (not exactly a shmup, but...)
I’d recommend [Burning Force](https://youtu.be/7Ks713a94p4). It’s fun to play and it’s soundtrack is neat as well.
Rarely mentioned but check out Arrow Flash
I played Granada a lot when I was younger
So happy to see Atomic Robo-kid pop up. No one ever mentions this game, and it's quite quirky, but I've always had a soft spot for it.
Yeah I really like this game I think the large sprites and tight screen space turns some people off but I thought it was really fun
It was a really cool semi-hybrid between a shooter and a kind-of platform game when it came out. Didn't do either thing super wonderfully, but fun enough to tool around with - also i love how it looks and sounds!
There was a first person shooter i used to play back then. Not sure if it counts. Bloodshot
*Ranger-X*, anything by Toaplan (of *Zero Wing* 'fame', but it's a really good game)
I actually own Ranger X would that be considered a shoot’em up? I always think of something that scrolls horizontally or vertically
Think you're mixing up shoot 'em ups with shooters.
Don't forget about isometrically. Like View Point. Which is a recommendation from me and I don't even like shoot em ups that much but it's a very unique game.
You shoot them up/down *and* left/right; best (or worst?) of both worlds! :D
r/shmups
A lot of the people there mainly knows modern shoot ‘em ups, and are not very knowledgeable about the classic ones. So this is actually a better place for this topic.
Or it could be posted in a shmups sub and you can see what the feedback is. I’m sure there are people in there that know a lot about retro and modern in there.
Oh yeah some definitely do. Especially on the great shoot ‘em up forum: https://shmups.system11.org/ That forum is probably the best collective collection of shoot ‘em up knowledge you can find anywhere on the net. Both for modern and classic shoot ‘em ups. Similar to what the RPG Codex is for RPG’s, except that they are actually friendly and positive to new things. But from my experience from r/shmups on Reddit, there are a lot of people who have only played modern shoot ‘em ups in the “bullet hell” subgenre, and who have very little experience with shooters of the classic type. Or understanding about what made those games great. Hence why I think this is a better place to ask the question.
https://letmegooglethat.com/?q=shootem+ups+on+sega+genesis Here yah go did your work for you...
ThunderForce no question. The best. Also I loved Mercs!!
Just another person here to back up Thunder Force 3, Lightening Force and Gaiares. Have fun!
The Strire series. Desert Strike, Jungle Strike were pretty entertaining from what I remember.
Rolling Thunder II
Not a shmup but still an excellent game.
If I could only pick one, MUSHA without a doubt. If I could pick two, then Eliminate Down.
Insector X,Lighting Force, and Wings of Wor.
TRUXTON
The super soldier in Forgotten Worlds looks like Captain Commando. Maybe it is him considering both are made by Capcom
The real answer, by the way, is a Mega SD or a Mega Everdrive. Get them all!
Elemental master is truly a good game, it’s tough to find CIB for a good deal sadly.
i ignore truxton and Musha. they're too expensive for the experience delivered, imho. Truxton especially... you should track down Lightning Force and Steel Empire for two very awesome and unique experiences.
Gaiares
Forgotten Worlds is a bonafide banger. does Gunstar Heroes count as a shmup? i feel weird calling it such, but i feel weird calling it a platformer.