90's arcade game...

fourier jr

could it be CARRIER AIRWING?? i remember throwing away many quarters playing that one & raiden.

Moonbear

I'm going to date myself, but that description made me miss Space Invaders! (I know, it's about a decade too early to be the one you're describing, and I don't think it was in color either.)

Weave

Yah carrier airwing has the right idea, but the game I am talking about shows a top view of aircraft. You are facing off against other aircraft and there are tanks on the ground as well. I remember one of the cool upgrades was one that would let you have shots spread out form various directions. Nope not space invaders, good stuff though.

verty

By what mechanism did you get upgrades?

verty

Well Slap Fight was a vertical scroller with ground enemies...

fourier jr

sounds a lot like raiden but it could be many others. in raiden there were ground enemies as well as aircraft, and there were 3 weapons you could get. one was a blue laser, there were bullets after upgrading them enough they would shoot a wide (~90 degree) swath across the screen. i can't remember the 3rd one, maybe missiles of some sort.

fourier jr

here's a clip of raiden 2 (i always loved that purple laser lol )
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vfvmt2okNAU

Weave

MMM....well I also remember that he fighter was either red or blue

fourier jr

hmmm sounds a bit more like raiden now

Weave

No..but it is very close to it

Lifeforce

Maybe you are thinking of the game Lifeforce.

VeeEight

UN Squadron, Mars Matrix, Giga Wing 2, Gunbird?

Edit: Just realized this is a very old post!

turbo

Check on "Raptor". That might be it. Vertical scrolling game with upgrades for successful completion of levels, and with upgrades that you can "pick up" along the way. If you make it to the end of a level you have to face a "mother ship" with lots of firepower.

Logger

I think you are talking about 1942 which was made by Capcom?I used to love this too.

Hepth

Its been almost 4 years, I don't think he's still looking :)

czelaya

I know where you can find the identity of the game. It would be very helpful if you remembered the game developer. Was it Taito, Data East, Sega, Irem Corp., Konami, Leland Corp., and so forth.

Here's the website. You will be quite surprised how many games have been developed by your favorite arcade manufactures that you never saw the light of day.

http://www.system16.com/

Awesome website! It tells you all about the hardware involved with arcade technology.

Just a little F.Y.I. In 1988, Sega Y-Boards, while technically just 16-bit systems, were already pushing the output of later 32-bit systems. Arcade technology was about 10-15 years more advanced than the home consumer systems.