''Super Thunder Blade'' is a 1988 rail shooter game developed and published by

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for the

Sega Genesis The Sega Genesis, known as the outside North America, is a 16-bit Fourth generation of video game consoles, fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega. It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master Sys ...

. It sees players controlling a

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which Lift (force), lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning Helicopter rotor, rotors. This allows the helicopter to VTOL, take off and land vertically, to hover (helicopter), hover, and ...

as they gun down military vehicles in various different environments. The gameplay follows the structure set by its

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predecessor '' Thunder Blade'' (1987), with every stage featuring traditional rail shooting segment ending off with a vertically scrolling

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boss battle In video games, a boss is a significantly powerful non-player character and computer-controlled enemy created as an opponent to players. A fight with a boss character is referred to as a boss battle or boss fight. Bosses are generally far stro ...

. The game was later released for the

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on September 17, 2007, and on the

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service on April 11, 2025. It was also included in the ''

Sega Genesis Collection ''Sega Genesis Collection '' (''Sega Mega Drive Collection'' in PAL regions) is a compilation of video games developed by Digital Eclipse and published by Sega for PlayStation 2 and PlayStation Portable. The collection includes twenty-eight Sega ...

'' for

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and

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in 2007 and in ''

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'' for

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and

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Gameplay

''Super Thunder Blade'' is a rail shooter game. As in its predecessor, the player takes control of a helicopter which is used to attack a group of guerrillas. The helicopter itself uses guns and missiles, and can also air brake. A distinctive feature that also appears in the arcade game is the use of different viewpoints during normal gameplay and when fighting sub-bosses. The game utilizes a third-person perspective from behind the helicopter, similar to ''

Space Harrier is a third-person arcade rail shooter game developed by Sega and released in 1985. It was originally conceived as a realistic military-themed game played in the third-person perspective and featuring a player-controlled fighter jet, but techni ...

'', but the camera changes to a top-down perspective when fighting bosses. The game has four stages to play.

Reception

The game received positive reviews upon release. ''

ACE An ace is a playing card, die or domino with a single pip. In the standard French deck, an ace has a single suit symbol (a heart, diamond, spade, or a club) located in the middle of the card, sometimes large and decorated, especially in the ...

'' magazine rated it 880 out of 1000 and listed it as one of the top five best games available for the Mega Drive in 1989. ''

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'' rated it 80% and called it the "best version" of ''Thunder Blade'' on "any" system. The game later received mixed retrospective reviews in the 2000s. In 2007, ''

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'' gave the game a 4 out of 10, citing a framerate that was "far too jumpy" and lamenting that the game "just couldn't make the jump to console" from its arcade cabinet counterpart.

Other versions

''Super Thunder Blade'' is the title of the Mega Drive release. This was done to differentiate it from the

Master System The is an 8-bit Third generation of video game consoles, third-generation home video game console manufactured and developed by Sega. It was originally a remodeled export version of the Sega Mark III, the third iteration of the SG-1000 series ...

release, known as ''Thunder Blade'', which was a port from the arcade version. There were few differences between the arcade and Mega Drive versions, save for some minor level development changes and the gameplay. The initial top-down sections (occurring before the third-person sections) were omitted from the Mega Drive version.

Notes

References

External links

Official Virtual Console website

MobyGames entry on the game
{{Authority control 1988 video games Helicopter video games Nintendo Classics games Scrolling shooters Sega Genesis games Sega video games Video game sequels Video games developed in Japan Virtual Console games