Shienryu

Overview

Shienryu, also known as Shienryū and Steel Dragon, is a sci-fi vertical-scrolling shoot-'em-up developed and released by Warashi for arcades (using Saturn-based ST-V hardware) on February 1997.

The first shoot-'em-up developed by studio Warashi, Shienryu is a spiritual successor to the 1993 Athena game Daioh. Set in the distant future, players control "Burn Dragoon" ships as they defend their colony on Mother Planet from an alien force led by the mysterious "Shienryu". The game is notable for its checkpoint system, which only applies to single-player mode outside of most boss battles.

Along with a Japanese-exclusive home port to the Sega Saturn on June 27, 1997, it received an enhanced port to the Sony PlayStation in Japan on May 20, 1999 as Geki-Oh: Shienryū. The PS1 version, featuring numerous bonus game modes, was later released outside of Japan by Natsume in both North America (on December 2002) and Europe (on November 2003), both under the name Gekioh: Shooting King, as well as a re-release in Japan by Hamster (as part of their MajorWave Arcade Hits series) under the original Shienryu name, and received a digital release for the PlayStation Network (as a PSone Classics title) in Japan on April 2008, North America on October 2010, and in Europe on October 2011.

It also received a port to the PlayStation 2, where it was bundled with a new 3D sequel (known as Shienryū Explosion). The original Japanese version, released on October 2003, was part of D3 Publisher's Simple series and was released as Simple 2000 Series Vol. 37: The Shooting ~Double Shienryū~. It later received a European release on October 2005, released by Midas as Steel Dragon EX. The European version is notable for changing the original game's name to Steel Dragon.

Bonus Game Modes (PS1)

Along with the standard "Geki Mode" (along with "Easy Mode" and "Hard Mode" options), the game includes multiple bonus game modes:

• Pocket Mode / Jienryū - A demake of the game made on a tiny console resembling the PocketStation. Unlike the other game modes, this one is a mini-game and not a modification to the main game.

• Comical Mode / Koenryū - Replaces the music and sound effects with comical sound effects based on traditional Japanese theater (such as rakugo).

• Stingy Mode / Sekoiryū - Players have only one credit, one life, and one Bomb. Power-ups are removed and scoring is heavily reduced.

• No Mercy Mode / Zuruiryū - Enemy bullets are very fast.

• Slow Mode / Noroiryū - Adds a dark filter and horror-themed sound effects. In addition, the game's speed is slowed down while enemies fire larger barrages of bullets.

• Ancient Mode / Furuiryū - Adds a sepia tone filter.