Air Busters

Every level ends with a boss and some sections speed up the gameplay, offering fast obstacle courses both horizontally and vertically scrolling.

Flying orange pods release many power-ups at once, enhancing the ships with new or more powerful lasers, wing men and shields. The player can also hold the fire key to charge a blast that removes all enemy bullets from the screen and deals damage to all enemies.

With an unforgiving difficulty, every hit is fatal, but the game can be continued from any point as long as there are lives and credits left. The game can be played with two players cooperatively.

The weapons include the Striker weapon which adds additional firepower through vertically aligned Options, the Reverse shot which fires two diagonal shots from the rear of the ship, the Six Way Shot which fires semi-automatic shots in six directions and the Homing Shot which tracks enemies all around the screen.

The other three weapons are Missile-based which vary from Red straight-firing Rockets and Green Homing Missiles.

There is also the Border item which surrounds the front of the ship, keeping it from crashing into foreground objects. The only other Items include Power-Ups which increase the ship’s standard shot power and Bonus Points that appear in the sign of Dollar signs.