''Beast Busters'' (ビーストバスターズ) is a

rail shooter Rail shooter, also known as on-rails shooter, is a subgenre of shoot 'em up video game. Beginning with arcade games such as the 1985 '' Space Harrier'', the gameplay locks the player character into a set path, only allowing for limited or no di ...

horror game A horror game is a video game genre centered on horror fiction and typically designed to scare the player. The term may also be used to describe tabletop games with horror fiction elements. Unlike most other video game genres, which are classif ...

released by SNK for arcades in 1989. It was the first three-player

light gun shooter Light-gun shooter, also called light-gun game or simply gun game, is a Shooter game, shooter video game video game genres, genre in which the primary design element is to simulate a shooting gallery (carnival game), shooting gallery by having ...

video game. Ports were released for the

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers produced by Commodore International, Commodore from 1985 until the company's bankruptcy in 1994, with production by others afterward. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16-b ...

and

Atari ST Atari ST is a line of personal computers from Atari Corporation and the successor to the company's Atari 8-bit computers, 8-bit computers. The initial model, the Atari 520ST, had limited release in April–June 1985, and was widely available i ...

in 1990.

Plot

In the year 199X, an unprecedented incident happened. Strange reporting of dead people (codenamed Beasts) coming back to life and attack the living. Realizing the unconventional nature of the incident, the mayor of the city where the outbreak occurred offered an immense reward to whoever manages to solve the mystery and contain the outbreak. Three heavily armed bounty hunters Johnny Justice, Paul Patriot and Sammy Stately enter into the Beast-infested city.

Gameplay

In the game, players control one of three mercenaries named Johnny Justice, Paul Patriot and Sammy Stately, who must discover the cause of a bizarre outbreak and shoot their way out of a city that has been invaded by the

undead The undead are beings in mythology, legend, or fiction that are deceased but behave as if they were alive. A common example of an undead being is a cadaver, corpse reanimated by supernatural forces, by the application of either the deceased's o ...

called Beasts. The original arcade machine allows for up to three players to play the game at the same time. Guns are mounted to the machine and look like machine guns. Players can earn a number of

power-up In video games, a power-up is an object that adds temporary benefits or extra abilities to the player character as a Game mechanics, game mechanic. This is in contrast to an Item (game), item, which may or may not have a permanent benefit that ca ...

s through the course of each stage to aid them in battle such as

rocket A rocket (from , and so named for its shape) is a vehicle that uses jet propulsion to accelerate without using any surrounding air. A rocket engine produces thrust by reaction to exhaust expelled at high speed. Rocket engines work entirely ...

grenade A grenade is a small explosive weapon typically thrown by hand (also called hand grenade), but can also refer to a Shell (projectile), shell (explosive projectile) shot from the muzzle of a rifle (as a rifle grenade) or a grenade launcher. A mod ...

s, armor, health packs, and ammo. The game has seven sections for players to shoot their way through. In between stages players are shown

cutscene A cutscene or event scene (sometimes in-game cinematic or in-game movie) is a sequence in a video game that is not interactive, interrupting the gameplay. Such scenes are used to show conversations between characters, set the mood, reward the ...

s explaining the events of the

zombie A zombie (Haitian French: ; ; Kikongo: ''zumbi'') is a mythological undead corporeal revenant created through the reanimation of a corpse. In modern popular culture, zombies appear in horror genre works. The term comes from Haitian folkl ...

infestation that has overtaken the city. Each stage has a sub boss as well as an end boss to defeat, all of which have 2 forms to defeat. The game was known for having unusual bosses, such as a zombie punk who mutates into a

dog The dog (''Canis familiaris'' or ''Canis lupus familiaris'') is a domesticated descendant of the gray wolf. Also called the domestic dog, it was selectively bred from a population of wolves during the Late Pleistocene by hunter-gatherers. ...

, or a

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which starts coming to life. One stage ends with the militiamen having to rescue a female

CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA; ) is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States tasked with advancing national security through collecting and analyzing intelligence from around the world and ...

agent from that stage's boss.

Reception

In Japan, ''Game Machine'' listed ''Beast Busters'' on their January 15, 1990 issue as being the most-successful upright arcade unit of the month. It went on to become Japan's fifth highest-grossing dedicated arcade game of 1990 and ninth highest-grossing dedicated arcade game of 1991. In North America, the game became the second top-earning arcade game in early 1990, below ''

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ''Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles'' (''TMNT'') is an American media franchise created by comic book artists Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird. It follows Leonardo (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), Leonardo, Donatello (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), D ...

''. The game drew comparisons to '' Operation Thunderbolt'', '' Line of Fire'' and SNK's own '' Mechanized Attack''. '' ACE'' rated it 4 out of 5 and reacted positively to the game's horror theme and story, calling it '' Operation Wolf'' meets '' Splatterhouse''. According to

Paul Theroux Paul Edward Theroux ( ; born April 10, 1941) is an American novelist and travel writer who has written numerous books, including the travelogue '' The Great Railway Bazaar'' (1975). Some of his works of fiction have been adapted as feature films ...

Michael Jackson Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Michael Jackson, one of the most culturally significan ...

owned a ''Beast Busters'' arcade machine and frequently took it with him on tour via cargo plane.

Legacy

A sequel entitled ''Beast Busters: Second Nightmare'' (ビーストバスターズセカンドナイトメア) was released in 1999 on the

Hyper Neo Geo 64 The Hyper Neo Geo 64 is an arcade system, arcade system board created by SNK, and released in September 1997. As the successor of the popular Neo Geo MVS, Neo Geo (MVS), it was the first and only SNK Computer hardware, hardware set capable of 3 ...

. A handheld spin-off called '' Dark Arms: Beast Buster'' was released in 1999 for the

Neo Geo Pocket Color The Neo Geo Pocket series is a line of handheld game consoles developed and manufactured by SNK between 1998 and 2001. It began with the monochrome released in Japan on October 28, 1998 as SNK's first handheld system and a direct competitor to N ...

in the form of an Action RPG. ''Beast Busters featuring KOF'' was released in December 2014 for iOS and Android devices as a

free-to-play "Free-to-play" ("F2P" or "FtP") video games are games that give players access to a significant portion of their content for free. The term "free-to-play business model" or simply, "free-to-play model", refers collectively to business models tha ...

download. On June 8, 2015, a buy-to-play version called ''Beast Busters featuring KOF Deluxe'' was released. The game ended its service in August 2015.

References

External links