Fighting Hawk Toaplan / Taito question

[Ed Oscuro]

I'm wondering if there is any concrete information on how much of Fighting Hawk (and Ashura Blaster, for that matter) was Toaplan made, and how much was Taito made.

Ashura Blaster, for instance, seems to be a pretty straightforward edit of Twin Cobra.

Fighting Hawk likewise has some similarities to Flying Shark, but it feels more advanced (and possibly more fun to play, in my view). Fighting Hawk has a lot of new graphics over FS that seem to retain the Toaplan style.

The odd thing is that FH - which I consider to be the more successful and more varied edit, if it is one - is from '88, whereas Ashura Blaster is from 1990, three years after the game it's based on! Apparently Taito had some cross-licensing agreement, and given the (imo) work put into Ashura Blaster's TC edit compared with Fighting Hawk, either it's different people or Taito was just extending the life of some code / hardware configurations. Hell I dunno.

Any information or comments?

p.s. thanks for Bloodreign for chatting about this academic topic with me at length :P

[nimitz]

For Fighting Hawk, I am pretty sure the game is 100% Taito made. But, It is indeed heavily inspired by the Toaplan games of the time.


The hardware of fighting hawk is different than all the other Toaplan games of the time, it was made on the Taito L system, the game is in 224x320 (instead of 240x320) and even the FM sound chip is different, so the music doesn't have that distinctive OPL2 sound.

Also, none of the Toaplan games were released part of Taito memories collection, but Fighting hawk was in Taito memories.

Also the gameplay feels different to me, it is just not quite like Toaplan.... and the Game doesn't loop.




And for Ashura Blaster , heres something interesting:
http://www.arcadeflyers.com/?page=thumb ... db&id=1505

[yojo!]

Just like FixEight (sequel to OutZone), Fighting Hawk and Ashura Blaster sucks ass in my opinon. The levels feel bland; it's not very challenging (even on hard) and the soundtrack is generic. Flying Shark and Twin Cobra are quite the opposite.

[Domino]

Just like FixEight (sequel to OutZone), Fighting Hawk and Ashura Blaster sucks ass in my opinon. The levels feel bland; it's not very challenging (even on hard) and the soundtrack is generic. Flying Shark and Twin Cobra are quite the opposite.

Amen.

I swear that Taito is the biggest hit/miss company when it comes to games peroid. It was like this back with their 80s arcade titles, but the 90s most of their stuff were for the most part a hit.

[Ed Oscuro]

For Fighting Hawk, I am pretty sure the game is 100% Taito made.

Thanks for the opinion, but this point, at least, is wrong - at the very least the way planes are shadowed on the ground is taken from Toaplan game code. It's too similar to be Taito's original coding.

The other points you raise are pretty convincing though!

And for Ashura Blaster , heres something interesting:
http://www.arcadeflyers.com/?page=thumb ... db&id=1505

And I see what you're getting at here. Visco distributed? Man that's bizarre.

In terms of GFX it's up in the air if this game has any help from Toaplan - some of the bosses are very Toaplan-ish, the first miniboss which splits into three sections is a concept right out of Flying Shark (I think, maybe that's Twin Cobra). I suppose I'll have a look at the end credits when I get there!

I should also have another look at Tokio, which is pretty old and I thought had a casual similarity to Toaplan stuff. It's about as old as Slap Fight.

[nimitz]

1943 had the same shadow effects, does this mean it's made by Toaplan?

Since, Ashura Blaster loops indefinitely, I don't think we can get much more information there, and Fighting Hawk doesn't have a credit roll...

I don't think there much more information about these games on the net either...


That being said, It's not that hard to see the differences when a game is an actual Toaplan game or a clone, made by a third party. I'm sure some people here could point out many actual gameplay differences between these games and Toaplan's own.

The only sort of evidence on your side is Master of Weapon, a really low quality shmup by Taito released in 1989 which contrasts heavily with Fighting Hawk and Ashura Blaster. But then again Taito did make Gun Frontier in 1990.

[Ed Oscuro]

1943 had the same shadow effects, does this mean it's made by Toaplan?

Actually, it doesn't. According to MAME, Fighting has a different color shadow (a faint gray one) than all the other games I checked, including Tokio and '43 (black shadows all around) So much for that theory (and some others too)!

[nimitz]

And for Ashura Blaster , heres something interesting:
http://www.arcadeflyers.com/?page=thumb ... db&id=1505

And I see what you're getting at here. Visco distributed? Man that's bizarre.

Did you notice the shot from the title screen says Visco (unlike all mame roms), and flyer is from Japan.

I mean, why would Taito have Visco distribute a game they made.... especially in Japan!?!

There's more to it...

[Ed Oscuro]

There's more to it...

Any information or conjecture you have, please share!