Thanks to Bitwave Games for the review code

Title: Hellfire
System: Steam (PC)
Price: $7.99
Release Date: 08/24/2023

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Story

In this horizontal shooter, you take control of Captain Lancer as you set out to free the galaxy from evil! The Arcade version here is very thin on plot, and there’s not even a cutscene outside of a brief ending shot because of it!

Presentation

Same as the usual drill for Bitwave, and like Zero Wing, this is a horizontal game with a different scale to it, though I still found this led the CRT filter, border, scaling and background options to all work just fine. The game looks absolutely crisp and pops with the glorious Toaplan color that it always had, and is much better than Zero Wing in that regard. The soundtrack is also outstanding, with incredibly catchy tunes in each of the six stages, to the point that I honestly don’t even think there’s a single forgettable song in this entire game. Doesn’t hold a candle to the PCE port’s arrangements, but those godly compositions were based off this great original score.

The only oddity I noticed between the regional variants is that there’s an older 1P version that you can play, and in this ROM the biggest difference I noticed was that all of the max power up shots end up being the same shade of blue, even though that’s supposed to only be for the diagonal shot. Otherwise, everything looks like it should and the more common 1P version is here as well with the proper colors.

Gameplay

Hellfire is Toaplan’s other Horizontal shooter, and in this game you set out across six stages with only your four weapons at the ready, all toggled with the press of a button. You have a red forward shot, a yellow back shot, a green vertical shot, and a blue diagonal shot, and these can quickly be switched between when the need arises. Enemies will drop powerups for your shot, but nothing akin to a smart bomb or other weaponry, so your starting arsenal is pretty much all you have, and I honestly didn’t mind that at all, since the multi directional laser was pretty good at taking out the waves of foes, with the upgraded shots shredding through the tankier enemies and bosses.

As you scroll through each stage, you’ll come across the various enemies and hazards in your way, along with a lot of destructible objects that can hide upgrades and bonuses, or just serve as fodder for easy points, making this a pretty fun game to try and scorechase, especially after you fully power up and the bonus items appear more frequently. There’s even some fun tricks you can pull off, such as how shooting an item container with the back shot can cause them to drop three items at once rather than the usual one, also adding to the scorechasing fun. Like the usual Bitwave releases, online leaderboards are present for both the 1P and 2P variants of the game, which is good as like Twin Cobra, Fire Shark and Zero Wing, the balance is rather different.

For the 1P version, well, Hellfire is pretty tough, with checkpoints that are pretty generously placed, but can still have some nasty recovery segments, especially near bosses. If you manage to save your weapons and avoid dying, this can be a great challenge for scoring points and super fun to push yourself to beat, (even credit feeding won’t get you far, you have to strategize!) but as a result some of the late game stages can be downright agonizing with the swarms of enemies and the weak powered ship you start out with when sent back, but each stage still packs enough variety and fun challenge that I had fun pushing my way ahead little by little in this version.

The 2P game on the other hand, cools things down a bit and makes the game a lot more approachable, even in a general sense, and the instant respawn is handy for spots where you can die and recover without needing to worry about backtracking and being at a disadvantage. However, like a lot of the other 2P Toaplan changes, creditfeeding can be a nasty habit here, and some parts of the game are just flatout horrible to die in (Hello, Stage 5!) since you’ll always respawn at base power, meaning for segments that would normally give you a speed up at the very least in the 1P version, you’ll be slow and weak and will more than likely be stuck brute forcing credits in the later stages of the game if you die. OK in the scoring aspect, but the 1P version I still feel is the most challenging and satisfying one to replay for points, though I did really enjoy the local co-op of the 2P version, and feel if you have a buddy over, it’s definitely worth a playthrough.

Otherwise, Hellfire from Bitwave is a pretty great port, with me not noticing too much inaccuracies this time around. The sound effects are a tiny bit off, especially when comparing them to the fresh M2 release, but like Fire Shark I don’t find them to be too off to the naked ear and the excellent music is still thankfully accurate like it should be. The game speed appears to be rather close to my Switch version when at the original refresh rate, and like always the input feels excellent making this port is a joy to play. The only major bug I noticed at the time of writing this, was the continual shenanigans with the manual/auto coin feature doubling the coin button as the normal shot.

Conclusion

Despite a very annoying and yes, repeat bug that I noted time and time again from these Bitwave ports, I am very happy to say that in the case of Hellfire, a lot of the other problems I noticed were smoothed out and led to a pretty great port! The multiple Arcade versions are different enough to all be worth a try, and the online leaderboards once again come in handy for that scorechasing goodness, along with the usual benefits of the practice and accessibility options to get the hang of Hellfire’s trickier moments, especially if you want to dare and see the end of the 1P version.

Really outside of the manual coin option being borked, I do feel that as a means to introduce yourself to this game and see what Toaplan’s other horizontal shooter was all about, Bitwave did a damn fine job at bringing over Hellfire with all sorts of goodies, and considering this comes right off the heels of M2’s impressive port, Hellfire is just a glimmer of what I feel this team is capable of providing once they manage to smooth out the annoyances and bugs in the other ports.

Whether you like the calculated approach of the 1P version, or the recovery hell of the 2P version, this is one excellent horizontal shooter you’ll be coming back to again and again, and I am super thrilled to have this game out and easily accessible for scorechasing fun. Definitely the best Toaplan port on Steam to date!

I give Hellfire an 8 out of 10.