Blazing Lazers

Blazing Lazers (Gunhed (ガンヘッド) in Japan) is a shoot 'em up video game developed by Hudson Soft and Compile. It was released in 1989 for the TurboGrafx-16 (also known as the PC Engine) video game console and later on the Wii's Virtual Console on May 21, 2007 (2007-05-21) in North America and on May 25, 2007 (2007-05-25) in Europe. It is based on the Japanese film Gunhed (only referenced in the Japanese version). In the game, a fictional galaxy is under attack by an enemy space armada called the Dark Squadron, and this galaxy's only chance for survival is the Gunhed Advanced Star Fighter, who must destroy the Dark Squadron and its Super Weapons. The gameplay features fast vertical scrolling and a wide array of weapons for the player to use.

Blazing Lazers was developed by the same personnel who developed other video game series such as Puyo Puyo and Super Bomberman as well as other games such as Zanac, The Guardian Legend, and DoReMi Fantasy: Milon's DokiDoki Adventure. It was one of the first games released for the TurboGrafx-16 and has received critical praise for its graphical capabilities, lack of slowdown, intense gameplay, and sound.

The player takes control of the Gunhed Star Fighter through nine vertically-scrolling areas. The player's mission is to destroy the Dark Squadron and its eight enemy Super Weapons. Every area contains one or more bosses, all of which must be destroyed before continuing in the game.^[1] Players lose a life if they are hit by an enemy or projectile, with the game continuing at a previously–crossed checkpoint. The game ends when all lives have been lost, but the game awards 1-ups when the player scores a particular number of points. The game provides four continues in which players can restart the game at that level in which their previous game ended provided the system is not turned off.^[2]

The player controls a rapid-fire main cannon, which can either be upgraded or changed to other types of weapons by collecting various numbered power-ups and purple orbs called "gel capsules."^[3] Players can collect optional power-ups to help fight through the game such as "multibodies" that shadow their actions, homing missiles, shields, and enhanced firing capabilities known as "full fire".^[4] The player carries a limited supply of "cluster bombs" that can be deployed, destroying large quantities of enemies and bosses within the player's vicinity. Players have the function of selecting the speed of their ship, which can be toggled by pressing a button on the gamepad, among five different speeds (the button cycles between them in order). The number of triangles that appear below the player's score designate the speed of the player's ship. This allows players to customize the behavior of their ship at any time, trading off freedom of movement against ease of control: a faster ship is more agile, a slower ship can be maneuvered precisely.^[3]

Blazing Lazers was co-developed by Hudson Soft and Compile. Notable developers include Masamitsu "Moo" Niitani, president of Compile and creator of Zanac, The Guardian Legend and the Puyo Puyo series;^[10] Mikio Ueyama, director of the Super Bomberman series for the Super NES,^[11] and Tadayuki Kawada, designer of the Super Famicom game DoReMi Fantasy.^[12] The game was released as Gunhed on July 7, 1989 (1989-07-07) for the Japanese PC Engine console as a tie-in to the animated film of the same name. It was subsequently released in North America as Blazing Lazers later that year, with the game localized for the North American audience by removing the references to the Gunhed film.^[13] The game was rereleased on the Wii's Virtual Console service on May 21, 2007 (2007-05-21).^[14] During development of the game Super Star Soldier, NEC considered calling the game Blazing Lazers II because of the similarity in gameplay with Blazing Lazers.^[15]

The game has been considered by game reviewers as one of the better shoot 'em up video games in the genre as well as one of the best games on the TurboGrafx-16 gaming console. Brett Alan Weiss from Allgame considered this game as "one of the most highly regarded games in the TurboGrafx-16 library."^[5] Mike Fahey from Kotaku describes the game as the "best damn shooter on the TurboGrafx, if not best game overall".^[16] Lucas Thomas from IGN referred to the game as superior to other shoot 'em up games such as Super Star Soldier, Gradius III, and the R-Type series. Thomas further asserts that the game had "pushed the [TurboGrafx-16] to its limits".^[7] Frank Provo from GameSpot also gave positive reviews for Blazing Lazers, saying that the game, despite the plain graphics and aesthetics, compensates with intense gameplay and a "ridiculous orgy of firepower". He also lauds the game for its diverse weaponry, lack of graphical slowdown seen in some older console games, and the superior, futuristic audio, which he says has an "optimistic quality" to it.^[8]

Jeremy Parish from the site 1UP.com praised Blazing Lazers, saying that the game is "drowned in goodness".^[17] Justin Leeper from GameSpy especially praised the game also for its lack of slowdown, stating that prior to 1989 players could only experience the same in arcades. He claimed that the game surpassed any game on the Nintendo Entertainment System at that time. He lauds the smooth scrolling, lush background graphics, and "catchy tunes."^[18] Kenneth Wesley of the LA Video Game Examiner listed Blazing Lazers as having one of the best video game soundtracks of the 16-bit era, saying that "the [game's] soundtrack is just as awesome as the action".^[19] Paul Glancey from the UK-based magazine Computer and Video Games gave it a score 96%, praising the gameplay, difficulty, graphics and sound, calling it "utterly incredible" and stating "Anyone on the quest for the ultimate shoot 'em up—this is it! THIS IS IT!!".^[9]

• Blazing Lazers Instruction Manual (PDF). NEC. 1989. TGM022989120M. Retrieved 2008-06-08.

• Blazing Lazers at MobyGames
• Masamitsu "Moo" Niitani at MobyGames
• Hudson Soft homepage
• Online Instruction Manual