Vertically-scrolling Shooters

This article is concerned with shoot 'em ups that feature vertical screen-scrolling. Vertically-scrolling shooters can employ top-down, side-on, isometric, third-person or first-person perspectives. However, they most commonly employ top-down perspective.

Vertically-scrolling shooters have their origin in Namco's Xevious of 1982. The first auto-vertical-scroller was Xevious, which was inspired by Konami's Scramble of 1981, which was the first auto-horizontal-scroller.

Vertically-scrolling shoot 'em ups are contrasted with:

The article is only concerned with vertically-scrolling shoot 'em ups that appeared on Western computer game machines. The v-shooters are presented chronologically.

Xevious Apple 2 1984

Dan Hewitt ported Namco's Xevious of 1982 to 16K Apple 2 in 1984. This is a very good port; the best coinop port on the Apple 2.

Flak Atari 8 Bit 1984

Yves Lempereur of Funsoft Inc. coded Flak in 1984 for the Atari 8 bit family (400/800). Also available on C64 and Apple 2, Flak is an extremely difficult Xevious-like that may lead some to tear their hair out in frustration. :)

Yves Lempereur also coded the Commodore 64 version:

Targon 64 Commodore 64 1984

Andrew Pal of Net Electronic Technologies coded Targon 64 in 1984 for the Commodore 64. A raw and gritty Xevious-like, Targon 64 features enemy waves that come from all directions as well as progressive destructibility.

River Raid 1985 IBM PC Booter

Steve Hendricks ported Activision's River Raid of 1982 to IBM PC Booter in 1985. And while River Raid's ho-hum gameplay was most certainly old hat by 1985, the IBM PC version would not have gone by unplayed on such a platform. River Raid is a vertically-scrolling Scramble-like originally coded by Carol Shaw for the Atari VCS/2600.

Xevious ZX Spectrum 1986

Nick Bruty of Probe Software ported Xevious to the ZX Spectrum in 1986. While not as colorful the Speccy version runs smoother than the Apple 2 version, which is more important.

Xevious Amstrad CPC 1986

Unknown of Probe Software ported Xevious to the Amstrad CPC in 1986. Runs sluggishy in comparison to the Speccy version; graphics are more colorful but not as clear.

Xevious Commodore 64 1987

Namco's Xevious coinop of 1982 was ported to the Commodore 64 in 1987 by US Gold. This is a disappointing port for the C64 in 1987; I'd rather play the Apple 2 version that was released three years prior.

Ikari Warriors IBM PC 1986: Rambo Run n Gun

SNK's Ikari Warriors run and gun coinop of 1986 was converted to IBM PC Booter by Quicksilver Software. Ikari Warriors runs in 320x200 EGA graphics mode, but its vertically-scrolling playing field is only 208x132px, and its audio consists of naught but bleeps and blurps.

That said, this is a great port of the Ikari Warriors coinop in that it employs screen-draw tricks and compression techniques in order to maintain a colorful scrolling viewport, 8-way firing and two firing modes (gun / grenade) on a mere i808x with 256 kbytes of RAM.

The port features keyboard control or 2-button joystick input.

The C64 version of Ikari Warriors features better presentation and is much harder than the PC-Booter version; it often displays a dozen on-screen soldiers and several bullets simultaneously, clogging the playfield with action.

Alleykat Commodore 64 1986

Designed and coded by Andrew Braybrook of Graftgold pre-Uridium, Alleykat is a C64-exclusive shooter-racer hybrid and seminal super-scroller. Alleykat features gameplay verticality, extremely fast and smooth variable-rate scrolling, destructible landscapes, six rival craft and eight types of races, with each race-track varying in obstruction density, lap requirements and prize money.

Alleykat tech-specs are as follows:

Virtual Sprite System (VSS)
Flicker-free hardware & software sprites
Auto-detects & Enhances for C=128
50 FPS Super-scroller
Color-cycling "rainbow text"
3-voice audio
32 race-tracks
Playfields 20-screens in length
1-player or 2-player non-simultaneous coop

Light Force Commodore 64 1987

From its low-color titlescreen you can tell that Gargoyle Games' Light Force originated on the ZX Spectrum. It was also available on Amstrad CPC in 1986. Not sure why it wasn't developed as a C64 original in 1986. Afterall, the C64 had already proven itself more capable via 1942, Terra Cresta and Sanxion. At any rate, Light Force on the Speccy, Amstrad and C64 is a polished vertical-scroller and a tough-as-nails button-masher, but the Speccy version is the hardest of the lot.

Audio by Rob Hubbard.

The ZX Spectrum version of Light Force lacks smooth scrolling and sprite-shifting; it's basically a different shooter, but still great.

Bulldog Commodore 64 1987

Coded by Andrew Green of Gremlin Graphics in 1987, Bulldog is an original and innovative bi-directionally scrolling shooter for the C64. Give this one a whirl, for sure.

Slap Fight Commodore 64 1987

Taoplan's 1986 Slap Fight coinop was well-ported to C64 by John Meegan of Imagine; it was also released for ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC and Atari ST.

Plutos Amiga 1987: Space War Arcade Simulation

Coded by Derek Johnston in 1987 Plutos features smooth scrolling at 50 FPS and 2-player coop mode. However, in order to achieve that framerate the playfield is not full-screen but metal-bordered. Terrain in Plutos is height-mapped; that is, your spaceship can collide with buildings. In Plutos one must also access fuel dumps that are dotted about the terrain in order to maintain control of the craft.

Typhoon Amiga 1987

Coded by C. Sing and R. Wagner, Kingsoft's Typhoon of 1987 features smooth vertical scrolling, very fast sprite-shifting, digitized sound effects and 50 screens to blast through.

Goldrunner Atari ST 1987

Microdeal's Goldrunner of 1987 is another great shooter to grace the Atari ST.

Running on an 8 MHz Atari ST with as little as 256 kbytes RAM, Goldrunner features:

Super-smooth, super-fast vertical scrolling
2-way variable-rate vertical scrolling
Destructible terrain / Proper tiled playing field
Tight controls / Mouse or joystick control
Well-chosen color palette
Sampled speech / Good chip-tune music

What more could Atari ST owners ask for in 1987?

Featuring more of the same, Goldrunner 2 came out in 1988 on Atari ST and 1989 on the Amiga. Amusingly, Goldrunner 2 has a Top-99 High Score table. This is the Amiga version:

Xevious Atari ST 1987

Ah, devious Xevious on the Atari ST in 1987. This is a great conversion by Probe of the 1982 Namco coinop even though there is some slowdown when there are lots of on-screen sprites.

Xevious emphasizes drawing fire: enemy projectiles are relatively slow-moving but build up and home-in on you. Great shoot 'em up.

Hades Nebula 1987 Commodore 64

Paranoid Software's Hades Nebula stands as the one of the most difficult and underrated shooters on the C64. Hades Nebula is difficult for the following reasons:

It is all-too-easy to destroy your own power-ups before you collect them
The upgrades make the ship bigger, which makes the ship easier to hit
On-screeen space for maneuvering is limited

One nice touch is how the Laser weapon progressively rips through columns of enemies and installations.

Hades Nebula bosses:

1943: The Battle of Midway Amiga 1988

Capcom's 1987 coinop 1943: The Battle of Midway was converted to the ST/Amiga in 1988 by Probe. While nowhere near arcade-quality the 16 bit versions play well and incorporate the coinop's catchy tune.

Thunder Blade Amiga 1988

Sega's Thunder Blade coinop of 1987 was ported to ST/Amiga in 1988 by Tiertex. As with most of Tiertex's ports the 16 bit Thunder Blade ports are absolute garbage.

Sidewinder Amiga 1988-89

Sidewinder of 1988 was developed by Synergistic; Sidewinder 2 of 1989 by PAL. And since they were coded by different developers these are very different shoot 'em ups in terms of controls and graphics.

Sidewinder is especially difficult on Expert mode. Be prepared to get shot down on a regular basis. Sidewinder 2 is also no cakewalk due to its emphasis on destructible obstructions.

ST/Amiga and PC Booter versions were coded. This is the Amiga version:

Sidewinder IBM PC 1988

James McBride of Synergistic Software coded Sidewinder for IBM PC MS-DOS in 1988.

Sidewinder displays in 16-color EGA 320x200. And while its playfield may seem small at 248x200, it also scrolls horizontally to a degree, not just vertically, which means Sidewinder actually features more effective screenspace than most other v-shooters.

Flying Shark Amiga 1988

Flying Shark on the Amiga and Atari ST (1988) are better than Sky Shark MS-DOS, but still pale in comparison to Toaplan's 1987 arcade original. Put it this way: you'd rather be playing 1942 or 1943 on the C64, shown just above.

The Amiga version was ported by Bob Hylands and Rob Brooks from the ST port coded by Henry Clark and Karl Jeffery.

Xenon IBM PC 1988: Battletank & Fighter Jet takes on the Xenites

The Bitmap Brothers' Xenon of 1988 was one of the first great vertically-scrolling shoot 'em ups on MS-DOS / IBM PC. Xenon ran on i808x microprocessors and 384 kbytes RAM in MS-DOS 2.0, and displayed in 16-color EGA at 320x200px. However, it clearly does not take advantage of the EGA palette range.

Xenon's executable taps into about 300 kbytes of data files.

Xenon was ported to the Atari ST and the Amiga with much better audio-visuals. cf. Xenon 1 Amiga version.

And yes, that is a CGA titlescreen and EGA in-game graphics.

In Xenon players battle the Xenites by ground and by air over four sectors consisting of four zones each. The player can seemlessly transform their battletank into a fighter jet, and vice versa.

Xenon Weapons System acquired via Power Pills:

Cannon, Twin-cannons, Homing Missile, Laser, Side Lasers, Side Cannons
Armor, Fuel, Zapper, Movement Rate, Weapon Range, Rotating Balls (max 3)

Xenon Amiga 1988

Xenon (1988) on the Atari ST and Amiga made the EGA MS-DOS version look like a joke. Truth be told 16-color EGA Xenon looks like 4-color CGA, but it plays really well.

This is the Amiga version:

The ST version was just as good as the Amiga version.

Xenon graphics by Mike Montgomery; audio by David Whittaker.

Note that Xenon does not even begin to tap the Amiga's chipset. It is basically an ST game. Still, there wasn't much to choose from in 1988.

Hybris Amiga 1988

Hybris of 1988 was coded by Martin Pederson. As the First REAL Amiga game Hybris runs at 50 FPS and features super-smooth scrolling and sprite-shifting.

Hybris action is staged on a proper arcade-style playfield with overlaid score panel.

A difficult shoot 'em up with tight controls, Hybris is one of best blasters on the Amiga. Unusually, the armor-like power-ups get bolted onto the shuttle when collected, changing not only its appearance but also its movement rate, rate of fire and weapon-type.

As can clearly be seen, Hybris was influenced by Nichibutsu's Terra Cresta coinop of 1985, which was ported to the C64 by Imagine Software in 1986. However, the gameplay and audio-visuals of Hybris are far superior to C64 TC.

Battle Squadron Amiga 1989

Coded by an 18 year old Pedersen in 8 months Battle Squadron of 1989 thoroughly taps the Amiga chipset via sprite "predator cloaking", viewport tints and other uncommon graphics coding routines.

Hybris and Battle Squadron's graphics were drawn and animated by Torben Larsen.

Battle Squadron's non-standard 256 vertical-pixels display simultaneously shifts over one dozen projectiles, air units and ground units, for a sum-total of almost 50 on-screen objects. In addition, the objects are sizeable. And that is why Battle Squadron runs at 25 not 50 FPS. However, its display nevertheless smoothly updates.

The sound effects are loud, raw and gritty. Best of all, its controls are pretty much perfect. Thus, it is eminently playable and replayable. An amazing shoot 'em up across the board, just like Hybris.

Battle Squadron Weapons System (Pick-ups & Power-ups): Nova Smart Bombs (AoE), Magnetic Torps (Red), Anti-matter Particle Beam (Blue), Magma Wave (Orange), Emerald Laser (Green).

Sky Shark IBM PC 1989: P-90 Flying Fortress

Sky Shark of 1989 is an interesting shoot 'em up in terms of presentation and controls. For example, Sky Shark features joystick, keyboard and mouse control. In addition, it features a scripted tutorial with animations. And the scrolling is smooth enough. However, the MS-DOS port is nowhere near Taito's 1987 coinop.

Requiring 512 kbytes of RAM to run, Sky Shark runs in 16-color EGA graphics mode.

cf. Flying Shark Amiga.

Sky Shark Weapons System (P-90): 1-7 Shots, Bomb, 1-up, Yellow Formation.

Dragon Spirit Atari ST 1989

The 1989-90 Amiga/ST ports of the 1987 Dragon Spirit Namco coinop are quite poor, but the Amiga version plays more smoothly than the ST version. However, the Amiga viewport was inexplicably dimmed. Thus, I show you the ST version:

Dragon Spirit programmed by Consult.

Gemini Wing Amiga 1989

Tecmo's Gemini Wing coinop of 1987 was ported to ST, Amiga and 8 bit micros by Imagitec Design Ltd. in 1989. And while the Amiga version stands as the best home-computer version in terms of graphics, scrolling, sound and music, Gemini Wing remains an average shooter; most memorable is its music.

Xenon 2: Megablast Amiga 1989

Coded by the Assembly Line Xenon 2: Megablast (1989) does not run at full frames due to the number of sprites it shifts around its five-layer parallax playfield. Xenon 2 is one of the few shoot 'em ups in which players have (limited) reverse-scrolling control by pulling back on the joystick.

However, collision detection is off and some waves cheaply flank. You can also get stuck on walls (jittering); thus, the auto-scrolling can kill you.

Mark Coleman's Xenon 2 pixel art is stunning on ST, Amiga and MS-DOS. Xenon 2's levels range from pre-historic to metallic space-age themes.

Xenon 2 was advertised as having "coinop-quality action," but it only looks like a coinop in static screencaps. When you actually play Xenon 2, when you see it moving, you will realize that it does not play like a coinop because it lacks smooth scrolling and sprite-shifting. In fact, dating back to 1986 there are C64 shooters that play more like coinops than Xenon 2 does.

All the Assembly Line had to do was tone down the sprite-count and get rid of the parallax to put Xenon 2 on a whole other level. I'd sacrifice in-game music in pursuit of full-frames action as well.

Xenon 2 audio by David Whittaker.

Xenon 2 Weapons System for Megablaster ("Capsule" pick-ups):

Front Shot, Side Shot, Rear Shot, Cannons, Lasers
Super Nashwan Power, Electroball, Mines
Dive, Zapper, Speed-up, Power-up, Heart

The MS-DOS version lacks the digitized aka sampled Bomb the Bass soundtrack whereas the ST version has its own rendition.

Xenon 1 is better than Xenon 2 because you can switch between Fighter Jet and Tank. I defeated both Xenon games when they came out and without an auto-fire joystick (you can buy an auto-fire upgrade in Xenon 2).

Wings of Death Amiga 1990: Five Different Weapons Systems

Coded by Marc Rosocha of Eclipse, Wings of Death of 1990 brings a high-fantasy theme to ST/Amiga shoot 'em ups. Its palette peaking at 512 on-screen colors, Wings of Death moves about up to 90 on-screen objects at 50 FPS.

Wings of Death audio by Jochen Hippel includes speech synthesis, digitized sound effects and digital music effects totalling one megabyte as well as support for external Centronics D/A converters on the ST/STE.

Saveable High-score table.

Wings of Death Weapons System (transformation):

The Insect: Spread-fire
The Bat: Circleblast
The Eagle: Powerbeam
The Dragon: Dragonfire
The Gryphon: Thunderballs

Sonic Boom Amiga 1990: The World's Strongest Jetfighter

Sonic Boom was converted to the Amiga by Activision in 1990 from Sega's arcade-original. The Amiga version suffers from non-smooth scrolling, non-smooth sprite-shifting, poor collision detection and annoying music.

SWIV Amiga 1991: Arcade-quality Amiga shoot 'em up

Sequel to Silkworm, SWIV is one of my fave shoot 'em ups. And when I replayed SWIV in 2024 it still amazed me. SWIV was coded for the Amiga by Random Access in 1991, but it was also ported to the C64, Atari ST and Acorn Archimedes. And while the ST port is no slouch the original Amiga version and Archimedes version are superior.

Silkworm and SWIV programmed by Ronald Pieket Weeserik and John Croudy of Random Access / The Sales Curve Ltd.

Lethal Xcess Amiga 1991: Sequel to Wings of Death

Developed by Eclipse in 1991 Lethal Xcess Wings of Death II was not available on MS-DOS: only ST/Amiga. This is a proper 16 bit micro shoot 'em up.

Lethal Xcess coded by Claus Frein and Heinz Rudolf; audio by Jochen Hippel.

Overkill IBM PC 1992

Ste Cork of Tech-Noir coded Overkill for IBM PC MS-DOS in 1992. Overkill is a Xenon 2-like. Graphics by Martin Holland. Composed by Anthony Williams.

Major Stryker IBM PC 1993

Major Stryker by Apogee Software is a vertically-scrolling shoot 'em up that displays in EGA 320x200 and requires 640 kbytes RAM. Major Stryker features good controls, three layers of parallax scrolling, digitized sounds effects and cinematization.

Major Stryker programmed by Allen Blum.

The Last Eichhof IBM PC 1993

Released in 1993 as freeware, The Last Eichhof is a Xenon 2-inspired shooter developed by Alpha-Helix. TLE features high-quality sprite-shifting, weapon configs, digitized sound effects and a square-pixel 320x240 VGA display. TLE requires 4 megs of RAM but will use up to 8 megs of EMS.

Even though it does not support joystick control, TLE is a king-tier shoot 'em up.

The Last Eichhof programmed by Tritone and Zynax.

Raptor IBM PC 1994

Developed by Cygnus in 1994, Raptor: Call of the Shadows displays in 256-color VGA 320x200 and requires an i80386 and 2 megs of RAM, but an i80486 and 4 megs of RAM is recommended.

A 27-level blaster featuring seven weapon bonuses, five money bonuses and 10 purchaseable weapons, Raptor features high sprite-counts and smooth, parallax screen-scrolling. Control is via mouse, 3-button joystick or keyboard.

Raptor Weapons System:

Weapon Bonuses: Air-to-Air Missile, Air-to-Ground Missile, Dumb-fire Missile, Energy Pod, Mega Bomb, Missile Pod, Phase Shield.
Special Weapons: Bomb, Death Ray, Ion Scan, Laser Turret, Micro Missile, Mini Gun Turret, Mini Gun, Power Disruptor, Pulse Cannon, Twin Laser.

Raptor programmed by Scott Host.

Raiden IBM PC 1994

Coded by Steve Cullen for in 1994, MS-DOS Raiden was only a passable port of Seibu Kaihatsu's 1990 coinop; nowhere near arcade-quality. In 1994 MS-DOS Raiden should have been close to arcade-perfect. For example, on the first level you don't even take off from an aircraft carrier at the start; nor are there two boss units. There is just too much missing, even for a port. Still, beggars can't be choosers.

At minimum Raiden requires i80386, 384 kbytes RAM and MS-DOS 3.0.

To prove that MS-DOS Raiden could have been close to arcade-perfect in 1994, we can simply cite MS-DOS Street Fighter 2 of 1992.

Banshee Amiga 1994: A1200 & Amiga CD32

Banshee is an Amiga AGA-exclusive developed by Core Design in 1994. Most people played this on an Amiga 1200 with 2 megs of chip ram. While Banshee features prerendered rotating objects (ray-traced), its controls and collision detection are somewhat off.

In fact, Banshee was one of the biggest disappointments on the ailing Amiga platform of 1994.

Banshee Weapons System (Pick-ups & Power-ups):

Double Shot, Triple Shot, 45° Shot, Side Shot, Heavy Missile, Homing Missiles
Bombs, Smart Bomb
Points, Fire Power, Build Up, Speed Up, Loop, Extra Life, Extra Shield

Banshee programmed by Søren Hannibal.

Raiden Amiga 1994

While Raiden on the Amiga was not shaping up to be an accurate port of Seibu Kaihatsu's 1990 coinop, it was shaping up to be a decent shoot 'em up even though it employs a sidepanel that reduces the size of the playfield. In addition, the Amiga port does not feature the original arcade music. However, there was a possibility that Amiga Raiden would come complete with a level editor, which would have been cool, but the game was never released.

Tyrian IBM PC 1995

Developed by Eclipse in 1995 Tyrian displays in 256-color VGA 320x200 and requires i80386/33 and 4 megs of RAM. Tyrian is a full-featured shoot 'em up; indeed, it includes the kitchen sink.

Running on MS-DOS as well as Windows, Tyrian 2000 of 1999 added even more features and another episode, but Quake had well and truly taken over PC Gaming from 1996 onwards, and so barely anyone gave a damn.

Running at 60 FPS Tyrian features smooth sprite-shifting, parallax scrolling and transparency effects. Tyrian also supports serial and modem networking.

Tyrian Weapons System (upgradeable):

Front Gun, Rear Gun, Shield, Generator, Sidekick Weapons.
Special Weapons: Retractor, Repulsor, Ice Beam.
2-Player ships: Dragonhead and Dragonwing.

Tyrian programmed by Jason Emery and Andreas Molnar.

The Flying Tigers IBM PC 1995

Coded by Jay Kramer The Flying Tigers is a 1995 vertical-scroller that displays in 256-color VGA square-pixel 320x240 and requires an i80386 and 4 megs of XMS RAM.

Control and collision are fine, the scrolling is smooth, the sprites are well drawn and every projectile is drop-shadowed, but the waves are repetitive and winning is too easy. Control via joystick or keyboard.

Mega Typhoon Amiga 1996

Mega Typhoon was coded by Bernhard Braun of Nordlicht for ECS/OCS Amigas in 1996. Mega Typhoon is one of the most advanced Amiga shoot 'em ups in terms of 2D graphics coding; and its audio-visuals are raw and gritty.

Mega Typhoon shifts around up to one hundred 16-color objects (bobs and sprites) simultaneously while maintaining 50 FPS -- and yet it runs on an Amiga 500 with 1 meg RAM.

Mega Typoon is a super-scroller.

If Mega Typhoon came out just a few years earlier, it would have taken the Amiga gaming world by storm.

Mega Typhoon Weapons System (Pick-ups & Power-ups):

Spread Shot (S), Sinus Laser (L), Homing Missiles (H), Power Missiles (M)
Smart Bomb (B), Get Full Weapon (P), Extra Life

Apano Sin Amiga 2000

Developed by Level One Entertainment in 2000, Apano Sin is a bi-directional vertically-scrolling shoot 'em up that runs on Amiga 500s with 1 meg of RAM. Apano Sin is another technically impressive shoot 'em up that came out post-prime Amiga.

Apano Sin programmed by Alex Piko and Alexander Eberl.

cf.

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Vertically Scrolling Shoot 'em ups