ThunderForce Review Retrospective

Thunder force the shoot-'em-up series by Technosoft that made every Sega fans heart race the series is known and appreciated for its mind-blowing music fast-paced action and intense gameplay let's go back to 1980 three years before Gradius and r-type made their introduction in the shoot-'em-up genre.

Thunderforce made its humble start on the relatively obscure sharp and NEC home computers. You pilot a small galaxy federation fighter in the struggle against the Orang imperial forces The gameplay consists solely of top-downview free roaming levels but the music in particular still had a long way to go ThunderForce 2 was first released on the sharp x68000 and soon afterward ported to the Megadrive in 1989 shortly after the launch of Sega's 16-bit console Making TechnoSoft one of the first third-party developers for their new system The top-down perspective stages in which you have to destroy a number of enemy targets were intertwined with side-scrolling levels like other games in the series you can continue directly after your ships explode instead of being sent back to a checkpoint and you can switch in real-time between all your acquired weapons.

Knowing specifically when to use each weapon is key to mastering the game. The power of the 16-bit systems led to a huge leap forward from the first title. The soundtrack already began developing that famous Technosoft touch Thunderforce 3 for the Megadrive hit store shelves in 1990 it was considered graphically another big step forward for the series the lava effects especially were quite impressive.

Levels scroll horizontally vertically and even diagonally The developers decided to drop the top-down perspective levels completely making way for the more intense side view levels Thunderforce 3 brought new improvements to the series for example you no longer lose all your weapons when you die just the ones you had selected and you can manually change the speed of your ship during gameplay.

There's also a level select option allowing you to pick the order of the first batch of planets all making game more accessible and enjoyable to newcomers to the shoot'em up genre Combine that with a stellar score and great level design and you have one of the best shoot-'em-ups for the Megadrive Thunder force 3 was ported over to the arcades with a new name ThunderForce AC and came with a few tweaks here and there for example two stages were completely redesigned with new music there was also a port for the Super Nintendo again released under a different name Thunder spirits some additional changes were made but the game suffers from slowdowns and the music likes the famous Mega Drive punch the series gained new heights with the fourth installment this time exclusive to the Mega Drive.

After the opening you find yourself at a blazing speed blasting hordes of orange ships between the clouds with jaw-dropping parallax scrolling effects putting the infamous Mega Drive blast proccesing in overdrive. Through clever programming the developers were able to give more depth to the backgrounds to get the most out of the Mega Drive video layers Many of the proven gameplay elements from the previous game return in this 4th chapter and are further perfected The gameplay is faster than ever and the dynamic levels offer a variety of challenges after the 5th stage will acquire the Thunderblade a powerful burst attack which you can unleash after your claws are charged, a weapon that adds a new dynamic to the gameplay Thunderforce 4 may be considered the pinnacle of 16-bit shoot-'em-ups released in an era where this genre peaked in terms of popularity for the Mega Drive alone there were almost 60 shoot-'em-ups in total released the PAL release of Thunderforce 4 was optimized for 50 Hertz which means it ran at the same speed as the original Japanese version A treatment few Mega Drive titles experienced.

The composer's made their final return to deliver a rich score for this game consisting of almost 50 tracks that make up a whopping 1.5 hours of music from the intense rock boss battle music to the jazz infused tracks of stage 2 and 3 they were able to push the hardware further than most other companies utilizing both the PCM and the PSG audio chips inside the Mega Drive the latter was an extra audio chip that was added to the system for backwards compatibility with the 8-bit master system an original soundtrack was released in Japan which included a couple of arrangements most noticeable is the maniac ending theme which included vocals there's also a best-of album with even more arrangements Thunderforce 4 ended with a strange disrupted screen leaving fans waiting for 5 years to learn what exactly happened Released in 1997 Thunder Force 5 returned on a new generation of consoles the 2d sideview gameplay still has the same traditional feel although the enemies are comprised of 3d polygons the weapons system underwent a couple of additional upgrades Free Range for example is now an extremely powerful weapon which can be rotated 360 degrees it takes a little while to get used to but it's an effective weapon especially during boss fights Your satellites also have a new function you can draw their power to activate the over weapon a more powerful version of your selected weapon the storyline is by far the most complex of the series involving the Rynex The ship from the previous title which spent centuries floating through space in rough condition it was discovered by Earthlings who tried to reverse-engineer the highly advanced alien technology they built a special facility on the moon controlled by an artificial intelligence which ultimately rebelled and started a war against earth.

All the ships are stylishly designed and model kit versions of the various ships were sold in limited quantities by Japanese toy manufacturer Takara Thunderforce v was another strong installment in the series the new composer managed to produce the same Thunderforce feel and made some new and memorable music in the process.

But by the end of the millennium interesting games supporting traditional 2d style gameplay saw a dramatic decrease so the saturn release of Thunderforce V never made it outside of japan but the game was ultimately ported over to the playstation by Working Designs who were famous for releasing many hidden japanese gems in the West there were plans to develop a thunder force game for the Sega Dreamcast but when the console failed to become success that project was cancelled the music however was eventually released on album called Broken Thunder many years later in 2010 thunderforce 6 finally saw the light of day on the ps2 a game which sadly was only released in Japan.

Technosoft no longer produced video games by that time so Sega handled the development.
Thunderforce 6 pays tribute to the earlier titles with several returning bosses and stages however the game was criticized for being too easy as the player had constant access to all weapons from the start despite the dynamic 3d camera movement the overall experience feels a bit to blame compared to its predecessors although not as widely known as Gradius or R-type nowadays Thunderforce still ranks among the top shoot-'em-up series.