Gun & Frontier
released on Feb 10, 1991
Gun Frontier is a 1990 arcade vertical shoot-'em-up developed by Taito. Taking place on the planet gloria, a newly colonised planet with a manner of living similar to that of the american west, the player fights to defend settlers from airborne pirates, many of which are shaped after guns of the old west. Guns and bombs are levelled-up and collected by dropped power-ups, which are money-themed, with the gun upgrades shown as American dimes and bombs as gold bars.
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I was initially attracted to Taito's STG Gun and Frontier due to its striking ad art—a huge flying pistol. The setting is really unique, mixing somewhat steampunk style science-fiction with Wild West themes. All the vehicles are mixtures of early 20th century war machines—biplanes, tanks—with iconic Western weaponry. Planes are rifles with wings, tanks are revolvers on wheels. Throughout the game, I was surprised and delighted by the enemy and boss designs.
The shooting part is usually pretty strong, but often falls into unfair arcade difficulty that killed me over and over. There's a checkpoint system in this game which can take you pretty far back during difficulty segments which was frustrating. Still, I felt compelled me to play on. The world is really cool, the art is excellent, and there are lots of neat little touches, like the random film being projected when you blow up a certain building. (I got to see all the random film clips because I kept dying.)
This games development is really interesting. This whole shmuplation interview is worth reading. Takatsuna Senba's first original game after Darius 2, and before Metal Black, was a real work of passion—Senba, who by happenstance ended up being an animation director on Mobile Suit Gundam: Char's Counter Attack, did the character art alone in his underwear because Taito was too cheap to turn on the air conditioning; he had to save his work to floppies and change computers because they would eventually overheat. I'm really looking forward to playing his other STG baby, Metal Black.
The shooting part is usually pretty strong, but often falls into unfair arcade difficulty that killed me over and over. There's a checkpoint system in this game which can take you pretty far back during difficulty segments which was frustrating. Still, I felt compelled me to play on. The world is really cool, the art is excellent, and there are lots of neat little touches, like the random film being projected when you blow up a certain building. (I got to see all the random film clips because I kept dying.)
This games development is really interesting. This whole shmuplation interview is worth reading. Takatsuna Senba's first original game after Darius 2, and before Metal Black, was a real work of passion—Senba, who by happenstance ended up being an animation director on Mobile Suit Gundam: Char's Counter Attack, did the character art alone in his underwear because Taito was too cheap to turn on the air conditioning; he had to save his work to floppies and change computers because they would eventually overheat. I'm really looking forward to playing his other STG baby, Metal Black.
It ain't yur lucky day, pardner.
Acho que o primeiro “western punk” que eu joguei na vida. É… OK. Seria mais OK se não fosse desbalanceado pra caramba. Mas o último chefe é bem massa.
Doesn't feel particularly great to play, though it's a competent-enough shmup... It pretty much gets by on rad wild-west-meets-sci-fi atmosphere and cool ship designs alone.
Absolutely kino presentation and served as a pretty big gameplay inspiration for Battle Garegga, so it may be worth checking out on those two fronts, but unfortunately unlike most other Taito shooters this game is just not fun to play. There's little in the way of actual level design and most of your time is spent mowing through repetitive waves of the most annoying popcorn enemies you've ever seen.