Museum of the Game ®

International Arcade Museum® — Killer List of Videogames®

Operation Thunderbolt

Description

Roy Adams and Hardy Jones must shoot waves of attacking enemies in order to save American hostages from a hijacked airliner. The object is to take over all six bases and save the hostages along the way.

Operation Thunderbolt was produced by Taito in 1988.

Taito released 486 machines in our database under this trade name, starting in 1967. Taito was based in Japan.

Other machines made by Taito during the time period Operation Thunderbolt was produced include: Tokusyu Butai UAG, Full Throttle, Contintental Circuit, Exzisus, Wardner No Mori, Bonze Adventure, Chase H.Q., Chuka Taisen, Cloud Master, and Fighting Hawk

Specs

Name	Operation Thunderbolt
Developer	Taito (Japan)
Year	1988
Type	Videogame
KLOV/MOG #	8925
Class	Wide Release
Genre	Shooter
Monitor	Orientation: Horizontal Type: Raster: Standard Resolution Color: Color 19-inch Wells Gardner, mirrored-in
Conversion Class	unique
Game Specific	Operation Thunderbolt Pinout
# Simultaneous Players	2
# Maximum Players	2
Game Play	Joint
Control Panel Layout	Multiple Player
Controls	Gun: Positional with trigger and two buttons - GrenadesMissiles
Sound	Amplified Mono (one channel)
Cabinet Styles	Upright/Standard
PCB	Operation Thunderbolt PCB Image

Game Introduction

In this sequel to Operation Wolf, Roy Adams the hero is joined by another green beret, Hardy Jones. Together their new mission is to save American hostages from a hijacked airliner. The object is to take over all six bases and save hostages along the way. If this is completed, the game starts over but the difficulty level increases.

Game Play

As the terrorists move across the screen on foot, in jeeps, helicopters, and tanks the player must shoot them using the machine gun or greenade launcher. Avoid being hit by terrorist bullets, grenades or rockets.

Operation Thunderbolt KLOV/IAM 5 Point User Score: 3.33 (2 votes)

Fun Factor: 3.40

Overall Like	4.00
Fun (Social)	4.50
Fun (Solo)	3.00
Collector Desire	1.50

Technical Rating: 3.25

Gameplay	4.00
Graphics	4.00
Originality	2.00
Sound/Music	3.00

Personal Impressions and Technical Impressions each account for half of the total score. Within the Personal Impressions category, Like carries a little more weight than the other factors.

Images

VAPS Arcade/Coin-Op Operation Thunderbolt Census

There are 15,264 members of the Video Arcade Preservation Society / Vintage Arcade Preservation Society, 9,669 whom participate in our arcade census project of games owned, wanted, or for sale. Census data currently includes 166,973 machines (7,000 unique titles).

Very Common - There are 82 known instances of this machine owned by Operation Thunderbolt collectors who are active members. Of these, 66 of them are original dedicated machines. One is a conversion in which game circuit boards (and possibly cabinet graphics) have been placed in (and on) another game cabinet. 15 of them are only circuit boards which a collector could put into a generic case if desired.

For Sale - There are 5 active VAPS members with a Operation Thunderbolt machines for sale. There are 4 active VAPS members with a Operation Thunderbolt circuit boards for sale.

Wanted - There is one active VAPS member currently looking for Operation Thunderbolt. There is one active VAPS member looking for a Operation Thunderbolt circuit board set.

This game ranks a 13 on a scale out of 100 (100 = most often seen, 1=least common) in popularity based on census ownership records.

This game ranks a 3 on a scale out of 100 (100 = most often seen, 1=least common) in popularity based on census want list records.

Rarity and Popularity independently are not necessarily indications of value. [More Information]

Flyers

Another Bombshell from Electrocoin

1989

Technical

The boardset may appear to use a JAMMA pinout but the video lines have been remapped to different locations.

Fixes

Like Operation Wolf, the vast majority of problems revolve around the guns. Being mechanical devices, they are prone to failure. For example, there are four springs that hold each gun up, but under heavy usage these springs tend to break. The guns have a motor designed to give them a rachet effect and these motors commonly failed after a few years. Additionally, the gun's photo-light sensor PCB is prone to failure.

Legacy

Operation Wolf
Operation Thunderbolt
Operation Wolf 3

Manuals

Operating ManualGuncab assy - Operation Thunderbolt Manual — **Operating ManualGuncab assy**
(27 pages, 1.4 MB File)

Schematics - Operation Thunderbolt Manual — **Schematics**
(26 pages, 2.33 MB File)

Cabinet Wiring Diagrams - Operation Thunderbolt Manual — **Cabinet Wiring Diagrams**
(3 pages, 1.09 MB File)

Additional References (logged in members often see more)

3D Model (External): Dedicated (6f9c117a968fc13ae6608bc112e4c27)

eBay Listings

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