Raiden Fighters

Choose from among seven high-powered fighters (including the Raiden MkII and Judge Spear from Viper Phase 1) and take to the skies in three dangerous missions. The first two missions are comprised of three stages each, the first two of which may appear in either order. Stage 1-3, Stage 2-3, and the final mission are all the same.

This game is often referred to as "Raiden on steroids."

Maneuver your plane through the enemy's territory, dodging the vast amounts of fire directed at you. Take out each of the enemy's huge weapons to move on to the next stage. Each mission culminates with an assault on a huge enemy vehicle or fort that requires attacking multiple points. Once this super vehicle has been defeated, the mission is complete. Finish the game by completing the final mission.

You can choose from any of seven different fighters. Two of them, the Raiden and the Judge Spear, come from prior Seibu games, although the Judge Spear will not perform like it does in Viper Phase I. The remaining five are new.

The Raiden MkII and the Judge Spear have both lasers and missiles, which can be combined together. They each also possess their own signature bombs (Raiden's Thermonuclear Bomb and Judge Spear's Plasma Bomb) and start each life with three of them. For all the other planes, you either have missiles or a laser (not both), but in return you have the ability to charge (hold down the fire button until an aura forms) and release massive power shots. The planes also share the Firestar bomb and start each life with two of them. By holding down Bomb, you can allow the bomb to fly forward and then detonate it by releasing the button.

Quickshot Bonus - Take out a large plane before it gets a chance to shoot.

Defended the House Bonus - A large tank in a forest will start firing on houses. Keep a house from going down to receive a bonus.

When approaching the second mission objective (the flying fortress), Quickshoot all the big planes you come across.

If you destroy all the targets on the air fortress, it will actually explode.

When you come up to the big gun (main gun in the center of the boat) destroy the gun before you are forced away from the ship and a fairy will pop up catch it, but be careful as you can kill it if you shoot it.

If you destroy the second big gun on the main boat before you are forced to move to the left of it you will get another fairy.

The Seibu SPI system is cartridge-based with all game data on the daughterboards, so a game can easily be switched in except for Raiden Fighters Jet, which uses a modified version of the SPI motherboard. To switch a game, simply swap the daughterboard.

SPINOFF OF Raiden

Licensed to Fabtek for US manufacture and distribution.

During development, the game was tentatively titled Gun Dogs but was later changed to its current title to take advantage of the popular Raiden name. It cannot be truly considered a sequel of Raiden DX but rather a spinoff of the series in general.

Raiden Fighters runs on Seibus SPI architecture. Its main CPU is an Intel 386DX at 25MHz. A Z80 at 8MHz functions as the sound CPU driving a YMF271 8channel digital sound chip. It features the Dallas MCU for strong protection and a backup battery to save high score data. Contrary to popular belief, though, this is not a suicide battery.