Nostalgic Vacation: 1987 - Ikari Warriors/Sky Shark

On 09/16/2014 at 04:25 PM by KnightDriver

I had a pretty reasonable pool of games I wanted to play from 1987. Arcade games: Contra, Street Fighter (begining of the fighting game scene?), Double Dragon, 1943, R-Type, Sky Shark and Xenophobe; NES: Mega Man, Legend of Zelda, Ikari Warriors, Rygar, Arkanoid, Kid Icarus, Wizards and Warriors, R.B.I. Baseball, Metroid and Castlevania (what a year for NES!); Nothing for Sega Master System's debut; and PC games: Leisure Suit Larry, Dungeon Master, Head Over Heels, and Maniac Mansion. I decided to go with Ikari Warriors, but when that went too fast, I added Sky Shark.

ikari

Ikari Warriors plays exactly like Taito's Front line but with slightly better visuals. You crash your plane in a jungle and have to fight your way to the village of Ikari. You move vertically and shoot at enemy soldiers with guns and grenades and then jump in a tank and take down machine gun nests and other tanks. I found the game pretty difficult. Most of it was due to the fact I couldn't figure out how to exit a tank when it was hit. I tried everything. Also you can only shoot in 8 directions like the arcade cabinet's joystick. This leaves big angles you can get shot in. I got a little ways into the game but not far. You can play two-player which is probably best way to play it since it's so hard.

skyshark

Sky Shark is a veritcally scrolling shooter like Xevious which I played a bunch while in college because it was the only arcade machine in the little town I was in. You fly a biplane and shoot planes and bomb ground targets. I was always sure this was a WWI themed game, but now that I look at it, with its WWII tank designs, I'm not so sure. This could be the story of a WWI flying veteran who decides to take to the skies again in his outdated bi-plane to fight the good fight against The Third Reich. Who knows.

skysharknes

I played the only port of this game on NES (this port released in '89) and it was better than I imagined it to be. The graphics aren't too bad. The motion of your plane is a bit sluggish though and you can't shoot while your bomb is exploding, probably to save processing speed, which is a critical downside. Little visual hiccups happen too like the blocks containing incoming plane graphics obscure ground details sometimes.

flysharkarcade

This is the arcade graphics and that is the tank that stopped me in the NES version.

Playing this really brought me back. I love the way this game was drawn in the arcade version and it handled perfectly there too. There is a sequel called Fire Shark in N.A., which is available on Sega Genesis. I'll have to get that for sure.

Cary Woodham

09/16/2014 at 07:29 PM

I don't really remember Sky Shark, or it didn't stand out to me, but then, a lot of vertically scrolling shooters just kind of mush together for me. I do remember Ikari Warriors, though. I saw it everywhere. In the arcades, on the NES, and a neighbor friend and I played it a lot on the PC. I played it again recently and it wasn't as good as I remembered it. SNK games were very prominent where I live for some reason. The characters in Ikari Warriors are still being used today in games like Metal Slug and KOF!

KnightDriver

09/17/2014 at 01:05 AM

I liked the shmups that had realistic environments that you flew over I think.

I must've not seen many Japanese arcade games in my town, because when i saw the Konami stuff on Xbox's Game Room, I didn't know hardly any of them. I never saw Ikari Warriors in the arcades either.

09/17/2014 at 07:27 AM

Really? I saw Ikari Warriors a lot, along with its sequels Victory Road and Ikari 3.

Konami had some really rare stuff in Game Room. Most of it I had never heard of either!

09/17/2014 at 12:51 PM

It's possible I didn't see Ikari Warriors because I wasn't going to arcades much in the second half of the 80's. During that time I remember 1943, Hat Trick, maybe the four player Gauntlet and Sky Shark.

jgusw

09/16/2014 at 07:45 PM

Never played Sky Shark. I'll have to look for that one.

09/17/2014 at 01:09 AM

Only on NES I'm afraid and it's sequel Fire Shark only on Genesis. It sucks neither were put in any Taito Legends collections in N.A..

Of course there's emulation on PC. I guess I should try that sometime.

09/17/2014 at 07:59 PM

Yeah. I'll look for the roms. I can play them on my Ouya.

09/18/2014 at 02:25 AM

That's cool use of the Ouya. Makes me want to get one now.

Matt Snee Staff Writer

09/17/2014 at 08:39 AM

me and my little bro played Ikari Warriors endlessly. great co-op game for kids back then. Getting stuck on walls sucked though.

09/17/2014 at 01:01 PM

Yea, that happened to me too. Got stuck on the edge of a machine gun nest for a second or two. I like the opening where you see the plane crashing in the forest. Don't know why.

09/17/2014 at 01:02 PM

that was hardcore for back then man! AAA shit!

NSonic79

09/17/2014 at 12:43 PM

Don't recall sky shark. I think I missed that one back in the day.

but Ikari warriors. who could forget that. even thought the NES version was no where near the awesomeness that was the arcade. Too hard too quickly. give me time warriors instead.

09/17/2014 at 01:15 PM

I was looking at the distribution company for Sky Shark, Romstar. They were based in California and licensed lots of games I never saw in the arcade on the East Coast.

goaztecs

09/23/2014 at 10:49 AM

I have Fire Shark on the Genesis, and I think it might have been a sequal to Sky Shark. Didn't know it was on the NES, and it will be a game I want to look for at the local Swapmeet. Fire Shark was cool because it used biplanes. Talk about a fun game.

09/23/2014 at 04:23 PM

Oh I can't wait to find a copy of Fire Shark. It was the sequel to Sky Shark for sure.

PixlBit