Hudson Soft was one of the driving forces in the TurboGrafx-16 library, developing and publishing tons of fantastic titles for the system. They were responsible for the Ys ports, the Star Soldier games, and of course, Bomberman and Bonk’s Adventure. For me, Hudson Soft was what set the TurboGrafx-16 apart from the other consoles of the era. Once in a while their games seemed a little bit too close to some other franchises. One such game was oddly reminiscent of the Thunder Force series: Gate of Thunder.
Gate of Thunder came out in 1992 and was co-developed by Hudson Soft and Red. It was a pack-in-game for the TurboDuo, which was a TurboGrafx-16 and TurboGrafx-CD combo unit. The disc also included Bonk’s Adventure and Bonk’s Revenge. They weren’t any different from their TurboChip versions. However, If you entered up, right, down, left, and II on the game select screen you also play Bomberman. How cool is that?
Sort of like how Neutopia took copious amounts of inspiration from The Legend of Zelda, Gate of Thunder bears a glaring resemblance to the massively popular Thunder Force series. There are so many similarities one might almost mistake it as a lost sequel. From the color scheme and design of the ship, to the add-on devices that show up on your sides to give you extra fire power, to the red power-up dropping buddies that help you out. There’s even a voice that announces the weapons you pick up and shouts “emergency” when a boss is about to appear. Even the design of your shots look like they could have been lifted straight from Thunder Force III.
I really don’t blame Hudson Soft. I also wish I made Thunder Force.
Much like most shooters, there is a background plot that really has no bearing on the game whatsoever. Playing a shooter for the story is like going to an amusement park for the concession stand food. It’s part of the experience, but it’s not why you’re there. You take control of Hawk, who flies the “Hunting Dog”. Your partner, Esty, flies the “Wild Cat”, which is the ship that drops those much needed power-ups. The Planet Aries is being attacked by General Don Jingi and the army of Obellon fighters. He’s trying to steal the “Starlight”, which is an energy source capable of destroying the universe. Pretty straightforward, right? You battle hundreds of enemies with your item fetching girlfriend so you can save the planet and stuff! Really, the story could have been “BAD GUYS!!! PEW PEW PEW!! DAKKA DAKKA DAKKA! BOOM!” and nothing would be lost.
The giant sprites and the beautiful scrolling really showed off the power of the TurboGrafx-CD.
I’ve always seen Thunder Force as the apex of horizontal shooters. Gate of Thunder doesn’t just try to emulate the fast and smooth control experience of Thunder Force, it nails it. It also mixes things up a bit, too, giving its own unique spin on things. The weapon power-up system is similar to the Star Soldier games. There’s three different weapons you can use which you can switch between freely once you get them all. You’ll also get some chaser missiles for some added boom and a CRAW…oh right…”units” that expand upon the type of shot you’re using. You can also switch their direction by giving a double-tap to the fire button. All your main weapons can be upgraded multiple times, but if you die, you lose it all for the weapon you were using at that time. Once you have your weapons maxed out, you can still grab the power-ups for a nice explosion that damages everything on the screen. There’s shields, too. You’re going to want those.
Those side units really help you you clear out those hard to reach places.
There’s seven stages in total, and they’re pretty lengthy. They’re all very unique from each other and most of them change pretty dramatically about halfway through. For example, the third stage goes from a cavelike structure to a mechanical mining facility. Things also like to close in on you, too. Even the beginning of the game has a giant mothership is bearing down on you forcing you to navigate through tight spaces. Some stages make you dodge things from the background. Stage 2 has some giant gates that move into the foreground to crush you. As you move on, things just get crazier. Enemies will pop out of background through doors, and missiles will be firing at you.
The backgrounds do more than just look cool. You need to time your flight though those barriers.
While Gate of Thunder has a nice progression of difficulty, the default is a little bit on the easy side. There’s three difficulty modes; normal, hard and devil. They do more than just increase the number of enemies and the speed of incoming fire. Enemy and boss patterns change up as well. On normal, I felt like they tossed in some different patterns than other horizontal shooters, but there’s a significant improvement when playing on hard or devil.
Oh my God, it can shoot around corners!
The graphics are nice, up to par with the other games of this genre in the early 90’s. The one thing that stands out for me are the layers upon layers of parallax in the backgrounds. It gives a feeling of depth that really brings the stages to life. It’s very impressive to see that on the TurboGrafx-16, as even many of the later Super CD-Rom titles had issues with background scrolling. The graphics actually get better as you move along. Some of the earlier stages look a little drab while later ones get a lot brighter and more colorful. The enemy designs vary from robots to bug-like to aquatic looking things to huge ships that look like they should be bosses.
The thing I find the most striking about Gate of Thunder is the music. As an early 90’s shooter should be, it’s all rock and heavy metal inspired. You definitely want to crank this one up and get your adrenaline pumping. Right from the start, the music pulls you in and makes you go “awww yeah!!” and gets you into that zone you want to be in when you play these kinds of games. It’s the icing on the cake that ties the whole package together.
Get used to seeing this a lot on the harder difficulties, especially if you’re not in “the zone.”
Gate of Thunder is one of my favorite shooters for the TurboGrafx-16. Part of it might be because of the inspirations it draws from Thunder Force, as that’s another one of my favorites. I don’t think it’s very rare, considering it was a pack-in game. Sometimes I think it’s overshadowed by some of the more obscure shooters on the system, like Sapphire, Soldier Blade, Nexzr, and even Lords of Thunder. If you don’t have a TurboGrafx-16 you can check out this gem on the Wii’s Virtual Console. If you’re in Japan, you can also snag it on PlayStation Network. It’s an awesome game to have in your collection whichever way you can get it.
Seen it? Defeated it? Wondering who forgot to proof read the ending text? I want to know! Comment below or drop me a line on Twitter or Facebook.
