GOTD 6/17/2016: Twin Cobra (NES, Genesis, PC Engine, PS1)
Twin Cobra, also known as Kyuukyoku Tiger in Japan, is a Toaplan-developed arcade vertical shooter. Designed as the sequel to Tiger Heli, it puts you in the cockpit of a helicopter with a burning desire to make things explode. Far improved from Tiger Heli, it was popular enough to be ported to the NES and Genesis in the US, and to the PC Engine and PS1 in Japan.
As a shooter, Twin Cobra has a similar feel to Raiden in a lot of ways. Your helicopter isn't particularly speedy, your bombs have a very similar circular pattern and effect, and there are only a few different shots to power up. By default you use a red vulcan shot that gets increasingly wide with each power-up, eventually covering about half of the screen at full bore. The blue power-up gives you a fanning spread shot, the green gives you a focused laser-like attack with great power, and yellow gives you a four-direction shot that becomes a homing attack when sufficiently empowered. All of these attacks are useful, but you do lose your weapon when you die. Your default shot is at least good enough to keep you in the game to get back your guns, but it does become significantly more difficult.
This one really reminds me of Fire Shark in a lot of ways, as it similarly has you land and take off again in between stages. Bosses are pretty modest in size, and the first time I encountered one, I didn't realize I was at a boss until I noticed that the scrolling had stopped. Still, the challenge is there and tough, as death will take you to the most recent checkpoint as opposed to a quick re-spawn. The stages offer a nice mix of ground turrets and flying enemies, and the enemy helicopters get increasingly tricky as the game progresses, manevering to line up a shot instead of just flying off-screen. This helps keep things fresh, as the stages don't throw a ton of visual variety at you in the background.
The screenshots here were taken of the PC Engine version, which is probably the best outside of the PS1 collection, as it plays closer to the arcade game in both speed and looks. The game has solid sprites and easy to see bullets, and looks grwat in action. As shooters go, it's a well-executed classically-styled game, but is bereft of any sort of unique gameplay hook. It does absolutely destroy Tiger Heli in quality, though, and any Toaplan or Raiden fan will probably find a lot of reasons to enjoy it. It also happens to be realatively inexpensive in any of its individual releases, so if you enjoy that style of shooter, it's an easy one to snap up and try.
Played it? Anyone have that PS1 compilation or an arcade memory?
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