ESP RA.DE.

Choose from one of three ESPers (ESP=ExtraSensory Perception) gifted with incredible psychic powers (including the ability to fly), each with the same goal though for different reasons. Take control of either Yusuke Sagami (a high school student), J-B 5th (a Russian assassin), or Irori Mimasaka (a little girl devoted to peace) and fight your way through five stages to eliminate an evil ESPer uprising.

Depending on the character you choose, your firepower will vary (Yusuke has a powerful narrow beam, J-B has a spreading beam, and Irori has a wide beam). You might fight both machinery and other ESPers in your quest to stop the uprising. Along the way, you can collect power-up tokens, bonus tokens, and psychic energy for your special attack.

Each character has three different attacks: the unique primary attack mentioned previously (which you can hold down for continuous fire), a secondary attack that launches small but powerful bombs (ammunition for this attack is limited but recharges quickly; capacity depends on the character), and the special attack. Once you hold down C, you use some of your psychic energy to build an aura around you to protect you. Any enemy fire that comes into contact with this aura will change into bonus tokens you can collect. Maintaining this aura costs additional psychic energy until you release C to launch a massive psychic wave straight ahead. The larger the aura, the more powerful the attack (the aura will flash when at maximum).

Bonus tokens you collect will accumulate until you reach a certain level, at which point it will start counting down. If you can release powerups at this time, they will all be psychic energy.

Each character has a specific starting stage. Yusuke starts at the High School, J-B the Mall, and Irori the Bay. The next two stages are in random order, then there is the subway and then the final stage: Yaksa Fortress, which is itself in two parts. At the end of each stage, you must confront either a massive machine (one large life gauge) or a powerful ESPer like yourself (multiple smaller gauges). Both will assail you with varying attacks and techniques. ESPer bosses are tricky, as each gauge represents a psychic barrier you must break down. Each time you break down a barrier and wound the boss, he/she will change strategies, making it more difficult. You must break down all the barriers to kill an ESPer boss. The game ends when you lose all lives or complete all five stages.

This game uses an M68000 at 16MHz for the CPU. All sound is produced by a YMZ280B 8-channel ADPCM sound system.

There are no DIP switches on this machine. All settings are done by service mode, which is activated by holding down a service switch while powering up. The service mode offers testing and difficulty settings.