Metal Hawk

Metal Hawk (メタルホーク, Metaru Hōku) is a multi-directional shooter arcade game that was released by Namco in 1988 only in Japan; it runs on Namco System 2 hardware, and was the third game from the company to allow scores which did not end in "0" (the first two were Hopping Mappy and Bakutotsu Kijūtei, which were released in 1986 and earlier in 1988 respectively). A conversion of the game for the Sega 32X was planned, but later cancelled.

Gameplay

The player must take control of a helicopter (which is the eponymous "Metal Hawk"), and fight various enemies based on the land, in the air, and in the sea, in order to score a certain amount of points for each area within a set time limit; the game employs a perspective similar to that of Namco's own Assault (which also runs upon their System 2 hardware), in which Metal Hawk stays in the centre of the screen, while the playfield rotates around it. At the start of each area, Metal Hawk will fly up to its highest altitude of 400 metres - however, instead of rising up from the ground, the playfield seems to come down away from it, and when an area gets cleared, Metal Hawk will again fly up to its highest altitude and off the top of the screen. These methods of entering and leaving again reinforce the player-centric approach of the game, which also features voice samples (in Japanese).