Twin Hawk

Even on the hardest difficulty(And it is) I freakin love this game! No matter how many times I get game overs! Never played this Toaplan game before. Simplistic yet challenging, so good.

大旋風はタイガーヘリやスラップファイトの同様の敵は全部地上物、船舶・戦艦という飛行物が一切出ないシューティングです。 大旋風のグラフィックは飛翔鮫に近く、かつ飛行物が出ないので当時同時期にリリースされた達人と比べて地味に映った感じがありますがゲームのシステムは丁寧に作られています。 中でも緊急回避用のボンバーにも永続的な火力増加の援護射撃編隊にもなるヘルパーがこのシステムの特徴でありヘルパーの使い方がゲームの難易度を左右させるといっても過言ではありません。 ただしヘルパーは最大２までしかストックが出来ないのと出現数が少ないので貴重なヘルパーをどのように使うかがとても重要です 大旋風は他の東亜作品と比べて一見比較的大人しい感じはしますがバランスはしっかり練られていますので興味ある人はこれを機に一度遊んで見られたらいかがでしょうか。

Let's see here. Badly-programmed emulation that's choppy and not accurate to the original instrumentation? Check. Badly-programmed extra features that don't ever work? Check. Lacking "pixel-perfect" options for a game with a non-standard pixel aspect ratio?! ...Check. The best results I could get were Frame aspect ratio, Steam Deck 1280x800, and that still had two very annoying shimmery lines in sharp pixel mode. There is no pixel aspect ratio option and it's absurd. Though this port is three times as rushed as any of Bitwave's previous volumes of abberations so I knew they'd never get anything right.

This is the best release of this game. The emulator runs with no stupid envelopes so you can play full screen on your vertical 3//4 monitor. There's rewinds, saves, difficulty selectors, accessibility selectors, multiple binds and multi-binds. It's the same plane-shoots-tanks Toaplan game. All the familiar set-pieces and enemies. But it is not fun. There's a lot of medium and large size enemies that are absolute bullet sponges. And they just fill the screen with bullets. One of the enemies is just a box with a fan that spews a stream of bullets. Instead of the bosses it's usually big dual bullet sponges with a boring design. Instead of screen-clearing bombs you just summon additional planes that can be shot down, so the second you press the button a half of them just dies. The other half follows. Half of everything is a bullet sponge when you have maximum firepower. But on death your firepower resets, so no matter how many lives you have, you are done for. And the death unanimation is very long is unsatisfying. There's no new material and the balance is not fun. It's a typical arcade coin-muncher, and this entry in the plane-shoots-tanks series they were just going through the motions.

I'm about 10 games into Toaplan's shooter library, and this is easily the worst of the bunch. The first impression I got was that I've played this kind of Toaplan game before... but it never felt so sub-par. From there, [i]Twin Hawk[/i] goes pedal-down on the repetitive elements for half an hour, topped off with a crappy soundtrack that just farts along in the background. Nothing new, or at least anything exciting to make up for lack of imagination. The quality just isn't there. (Even the near-ancient [i]Tiger-Heli[/i] is more engaging and still has something going for it.) Considering the huge wealth of quality shooters in the past forty years and in comparison to its own ilk, [i]Twin Hawk[/i] feels like a stale, quarter-munching relic of the arcade era that players ought to leave buried in the past. To quote Jud Crandall: "Sometimes... dead is better."

Big Classic - Twin Hawk - I love this kind of games and i collect them ALL , even on Easy mode its challenge and that is good , i completed the full game whiteout losing all the Lifes and i even got a new record Top Score ( 559870 ) for this performance it took me 10 hours, Practice and Practice makes you good.

オープニングの離陸するところ等で実機にはない「ジ～」ってノイズが入ってるので直して欲しいです。 それ以外は良いと思います。

A solid emulation, no complaints. The original game's design itself is quite tough. Enemy projectiles often blend in with the scenery making it exceptionally difficult to dodge at times.

One of the better Toaplan games, but it comes with issues. Firstly, I found the Japanese release was the only version playable due to it's slightly improved colour palette easing the problem of bullets blending into the background. Secondly, if you're playing Twin Hawk on a Steam Deck (hand-held or docked) then you'll need to edit the supplied controller layout to remove the insane amount of left stick deadzone because the initial 'soapy' movement makes it pretty much unplayable. Good news though! Once you've gotten over those initial hurdles there's one helluva good game to look forward to. Sure, It's not the greatest shooter ever made and if truth be told it's not even the best Toaplan game ever made - but it's still challenging, fun, highly addictive and has online leaderboards to add to the longevity. Oh, and one other thing included in the price was a polite reminder that my ancient eyes, dithering thumbs and mushy brain are well past the point of being able to stay in sync with one another😵‍💫 A highly recommended game if you come from an era where 'hard' was the default difficulty setting, 'rewind' was just something you did to a cassette tape and 'easy' was, erm, a tomboy called bendy Wendy after a half a bottle of Woodpecker.

✍️ A Theory of Shmup Evolution By: Joseph Salomonsen Gradius → R‑Type → Darius → Toaplan → Cave / Treasure / G.rev 🟨 Foundations — Designed Space Gradius (Konami, 1985) The origin of control: resource systems, checkpoints, and authored space. The player shapes their ship to survive the level. R‑Type (Irem, 1987) The Force system: space becomes weaponized. A slow, methodical philosophy—positioning over reflex. Darius (Taito, 1987) Branching structure and spectacle. The first step toward non-linear shmup identity. 🟥 Line 1 — Density → Pattern → Bullet Hell (Toaplan → Cave) Twin Cobra (Toaplan, 1987) The definitive military shooter. Discipline, routing, survival. (my personal fave) Truxton / Tatsujin (Toaplan, 1988) The birth of the “Mega-Bomb” aesthetic—power as expression. Batsugun (Toaplan, 1993) The bridge to Bullet Hell. Density begins to dominate space. DoDonPachi (Cave, 1997) The system is complete. Patterns become language. Mushihimesama (Cave, 2004) The organic extreme. Bullets form ecosystems, not just obstacles. Deathsmiles (Cave, 2007) A divergence: horizontal design fused with atmosphere. Bullet hell becomes mood, not just system. 🟩 Line 2 — Weight → Realism → Physicality (Seibu → G.rev) Raiden II / DX (Seibu, 1993) The peak of “Heavy Metal” sprite-work. Industrial, grounded, uncompromising. Under Defeat (G.rev, 2005) The final expression of the military shmup. Momentum, recoil, and battlefield physics replace abstraction. Here: space > bullets weight > pattern movement > memorization 🟦 Line 3 — Mechanics → Abstraction → Philosophy (Iuchi Lineage) Hiroshi Iuchi ❤️ Radiant Silvergun → Judgment Silversword → Ikaruga → Kokuga → Ubusuna Treasure → M‑KAI → G.rev → M2 Radiant Silvergun (Treasure, 1998) The maximalist foundation. A shmup with layered systems and narrative ambition rarely seen in arcades. Judgment Silversword (M‑KAI, 2004) The technical bridge. The “Silver” philosophy reduced to pure system and code. Ikaruga (Treasure, 2001) The minimalist apex. Seven weapons collapse into one binary system: Black or White. The “chess” of shmups. Kokuga (G.rev, 2012) The tactical pivot. The ship becomes a tank. Weight replaces speed. Strategy replaces reaction. Ubusuna (M2, 2025/2026) The philosophical return. A synthesis of polarity and modern standards—a reflection on the lineage itself. ✅ Synthesis Shmups do not evolve in a single line. They fragment into three competing philosophies: Toaplan → Cave = density / pattern / abstraction of space Seibu → G.rev = weight / realism / physical presence Treasure → Iuchi = system / reduction / philosophy All of them emerge from: Gradius = designed systems R‑Type = controlled space Darius = structural possibility ✅ Final statement From Gradius’ authored space to Cave’s infinite bullet fields, from Iuchi’s compression of systems to G.rev’s return to physicality— The shmup is not just reflex, but a philosophy of dynamic control.