What SNES shmup is this? Can't remember the name

[NewSchoolBoxer]

Back in the day I would walk across the street to my friend's house and play Super Mario Kart and "this" shmup. Was 2D overhead and at the end of each mission there was a picture of the young lady pilot with a black eye giving a thumps up gesture. Not much to go on, I know. Mario Kart came out in 1992 so has to be 1992 or later.

[komatik]

Would help somewhat if you could add some other basic details. What region SNES was this (ie; US/EU/JP)? Was the game side-scrolling or vertical-scrolling? etc. "After 1992" doesn't really clarify anything since the SNES only came out in the US late summer of 91 and there'd be nothing stopping you from playing an earlier cartridge anyway.

Assuming this was the US, there were only like 15-20 shmups released here so it shouldn't be too hard to pin it down.

[pablumatic]

Thumbs up at the end of a stage sounds like U.N. Squadron (a horizontal shooter) to me, but the "lady" pilot is actually a guy.

[Lord British]

UN Squadron was my guess

[pegboy]

The only other game that matches that on the SNES would be Aerofighters, perhaps playing as Mao Mao. Although I believe it came out a few years after Mario Kart and is also a very rare game.

[Flashman]

Been playing that game 20 odd years and only recently realised Shin was a guy defiantly the best shmup on the SNES, and if you don't do Everdrives still pretty cheap to get the original cart.

[NewSchoolBoxer]

Thanks everyone for the help! I think it has to be U.N. Squadron then. So lady pilot is a guy, ha my mistake.

I thought it was vertical-scrolling but not 100% sure. Definitely not set in outer space. I live in the US and game was in English. Relatively early in the 16-but era, as I hadn't played either game before and Super Mario Kart was easy to find.

I have SD2SNES and bought a working SNES after mine got black screen of death on power up. Guess I'll justify playing all the system's shmups to 100% confirm. Black eye and thumbs up after each mission stand out but 25+ year old memory is foggy. Good to know that Aerofighters is very rare. Would want to buy carts of what I like the best.

[OmegaFlareX]

Be sure to check out the SA-1 patch for Gradius 3. Turns a lackluster port into a real treat.

[komatik]

I thought it was vertical-scrolling but not 100% sure.
Black eye and thumbs up after each mission stand out but 25+ year old memory is foggy.

I feel like maybe this wasn't UN Squadron. Are you 101% sure it was a SNES and not like, a TurboGrafx or an Amiga or something? Maybe even a NeoGeo, they were around starting in 1990. The US SNES had hardly any shooters but there were zillions for other platforms, and I feel like I can think of a few that sound closer.

[Shepardus]

Considering that he also remembers playing Super Mario Kart, it's probably an SNES.

[Tatsuya79]

Plot twist: it was donkey kong country.

[komatik]

Considering that he also remembers playing Super Mario Kart, it's probably an SNES.

Nothing saying his friend didn't have more than one console, or a console + Mac/Amiga or something. It's probably not likely that the friend's family was loaded and bought multiple devices, but it's not impossible either. I'm just saying that if someone's memory is already fuzzy enough to not be sure about something as fundamental as horz or vert then I'm not going to automatically trust their memory of which console. Be careful of falling into the trap of seeing a superficially similar image and going "oh I guess that must have been the one" without further research.