Is that the roar of a thundercrash?: Thunder Force II | Segaiden 92
893A second shooter with "thunder" in the title for the Genesis launch? Sega should have considered a different naming scheme as a way of Lightening the burden for consumers...
Well, despite the similar names, there's little danger of mixing up Super Thunder Force and Thunder Blade II. Sure, they both involve little shooty ships blowing things into shreds, and yes, they both feature dual-mode gameplay to supplement their top-down combat, but in action they look and play a lot less alike than that glib overview would suggest. It's Thunder Force II that feels closer in execution to the reputation for high-speed, uncompromising, unrelenting, arcade-style combat that Genesis would develop.
This, despite it (1) not being a Sega-developed game, (2) a game conceived and originally released for Genesis, and (3) actually sincerely compromised from the game's original version. But since absolutely no one buying a Genesis on day one in America had played the original X68000 home computer release of Thunder Force II as a way to compare their outcomes, no one cared! All we saw was a (literally) dizzyingly fast all-range shooter with impressive visuals and a really compelling power-up system. Forget the beefy brawlers of Altered Beast or the floaty surrealism of Space Harrier II: this, right here, was the true promise of 16-BIT.
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Genesis footage captured in RGB from real hardware, Analogue Mega Sg, and MiSTer FPGA. Upscaled via Framemeister and RetroTink 4K.