ARCADE LONGPLAY - BATSUGUN (TOAPLAN 1993) 抜群. ばつぐん

ARCADE LONGPLAY - BATSUGUN 抜群. ばつぐん

Batsugun is a 1993 vertically scrolling bullet hell arcade video game originally developed and published by Toaplan in Japan and Europe by Taito, as well as in Korea by Unite Trading. The last Shoot 'em up created by Toaplan, the title takes place on a distant Earth-like planet where a global takeover operative led by King Renoselva A. Gladebaran VII is set into motion, as players assume the role of one of the six fighter pilots conforming the Skull Hornets squadron taking control of submersible jets in a last-ditch effort to overthrow the invading military force from the planet. Its gameplay mainly consists of shooting mixed with role-playing game-esque elements using a main two-button configuration.

Headed by Fire Shark designer Yuko Tataka, Batsugun was created by most of the same team that previously worked on several projects at Toaplan and who would later go on to join one of its offshoots after the company declared bankruptcy in 1994 to continue working in the bullet hell sub-genre. Though first launched for the arcades, the game was later ported to the Sega Saturn by Gazelle and published exclusively in Japan by Banpresto on 25 October 1996, featuring various changes and additions compared with the original version.
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Developer(s) Toaplan
exA-Arcadia (EXA Label)

Publisher(s)
JP: Toaplan
EU: Taito
KOR: Unite Trading
WW: exA-Arcadia

Producer(s) Yuko Tataka
Designer(s) Junya Inoue
Takeshi Kawamoto

Programmer(s) Satoshi Kōyama
Seiji Iwakura
Tsuneki Ikeda

Composer(s) Yoshitatsu Sakai
Platform(s) Arcade, exA-Arcadia, Saturn, PS4, Switch, Microsoft Windows, MacOS, Linux

Release
WW: December 1993
exA-Arcadia
WW: June 16, 2023