SAR Search And Rescue, 1989 SNK
13Decent top-down run and gun game with dual rotary joysticks, a scheme SNK and Data East used for numerous games of the genre. In fact, this was the last game SNK would put out that used them. Also, this was the last game SNK released before they put out the MVS hardware that was featured in NEO GEO games. In this game you must really make FULL use of the rotary joysticks, since enemies like to attack front and back, and some of the enemies are much faster than others! Your basic goal is to find an exit that takes you a floor closer to a boss fight-- which does NOT give you a breather after you kill it! Your space soldier gets a total of 3 weapons that can be picked up here and there in the game: Fast Fire (NOT auto or rapid fire), Fireballs, and Missiles. And for each weapon you can hold the fire button down for a few seconds to charge it up for a special effect. For Fast Fire, you can create a big blue ring of fire (which burns, burns, burns); with Fire Balls you can charge for a VERY helpful temporary shield which diminishes/disappears after a few hits or after a handful of seconds but is still quite useful; and with Missiles you can charge for a cool black hole to suck up weak enemies into it. A warning-- a couple times you will be sent to a strange mysterious room with almost no space to move, and enemies will start to crowd your platform! This is just an area where you must survive for a short amount of time, then you're teleported out.. but it's still very tough. This was kind of a done-to-death genre at the time of its release, but the charge weapons and gooey, bloody alien atmosphere might draw you in. Suggested by YouTube user Charlie Cat.