Interestingly enough, the game would also see a near arcade-perfect port on the Pioneer LaserActive around the same time, where it would be renamed Road Prosecutor (which just sound silly). Much like it's Data East brother & Taito's Ninja Hayate, Road Blaster would eventually be ported to the Sega CD by future Tales Series-developer Wolf Team, where it was known abroad as Road Avenger (because of Atari's game being made by then). Much like how Data East allowed arcade owners to repurpose Bega's Battle machines into Thunder Storm, the same was doable between Thunder Storm & Road Blaster, which explains why a car-based LD game utilizes an aiming reticle to control left & right prompts it's because some Road Blaster cabinets used a flight stick (up went left, down went right).
The end product features a lot of great animation & the constant movement keeps the game feeling exciting & energizing. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if Kitazume & Oomori's work on this game helped get them to be part of the group of directors that helmed the different parts of 1987 anthology movie Robot Carnival Kitazume did Starlight Angel, while Oomori did Deprive. Leading the crew as "Chief Key Animator" was Yoshinobu Inano (an animation director on Mobile Suit Gundam: Char's Counterattack), and alongside him were the likes of Naoyuki Onda (character designer for Gantz, To-Y, & the Berserk movie trilogy), Hiroyuki Kitazume (characters for Bastard!!, Gundam ZZ, & Urotsukidoji), Hidetoshi Oomori (director of Dan Doh!! & Zaizen Jotaro), & even Satoshi Urushihara (of Langrisser & Growlanser fame). Though Hideki Takayama directed once again, the animators behind the second Toei co-production were completely different from the Studio Z5 staff of Thunder Storm.
Indeed, the entire game takes place from the perspective of being behind the wheel of the lead's sweet ride, and while Thunder Storm features some really nice animation, Road Blaster simply looks to be the more memorable game. Road Blaster tells the tale of an ex-police officer who swears revenge on a diabolical gang after getting horrifically run off the road during his honeymoon, which resulted in the death of his newlywed wife. Compared to Thunder Storm before it, this game is a bit simpler as the only prompts given are to turn left or right & to either press the brake or activate the turbo, but to an extent it really doesn't matter. The third LD game from Data East, and the second from its partnership with Toei Animation, Road Blaster came out in arcades in August of 1985 don't confuse it with Atari's RoadBlasters from 1987, though they both involve car-on-car violence.
0 kommentar(er)
