Succulla tears Thunder Force IV a new one - Stage 9

FRAME RATE...Y U SO GOOD?

Everything before 1:30 - The first 90 seconds need to be seen to be believed. Sets of cogs you have to push back with the Hunter in order to go any further, things with laser tripwires, things that track you with lasers and shoot at you when you trip them...all with a very good frame rate.

1:30 - We've shot four or five of these things, and the next one we spot decides it wants to be a mini-boss? Okay. Too bad it takes a lot of hits compared to the ones we saw earlier.

1:45 - Now it wants to put on some additional armor and shoot missiles. Now that's something right there. Even worse is the weapons that it has that force you to juke and jive while you're trying to shoot it. This game definitely does not screw around!

2:06 - After taking a zillion hits, it finally goes down.

2:35 - After a rather boring 30 seconds of not shooting, this thing comes from the left side of the screen and tries to bring the ceiling down. If you stayed to the right, though, you wouldn't lose a life to that thing.

2:38 - If you kept an eye on the ceiling like Succulla did, though, you'd find another 1-Up that you shouldn't waste anytime trying to grab! Win!

2:47 - These solo cogs are a little different. They'll send a whole circle of them to entrap you, and the only way out is to shoot the gray one.

3:11 - A short trip to the corner of the screen to grab power-ups for points when the screen slows down, then the screen scrolls up slowly, with more laser-activated traps along the way.

3:45 - It's projectile avoiding time. It gets seemingly difficult near the end, but there's a spot near the missile where you don't have to keep the finger on the trigger at.

3:57 - Mega points.

4:12 - It pays to take the high road here. Gee, 10000 points or another 1-Up? Hmmm...which is better?

4:41 - Boss time! Succulla uses the Free Way to destroy four of the five laser cannons at the rear, then uses the Hunter to finish off the last one.

5:50 - We now see what the front of this thing does...and it does quite a bit. Besides shooting homing missiles and regular projectiles, it can also shoot flames from its sides, which leaves its weak point extremely vulnerable while making it unable to attack way up close.

6:12 - Now it wants to shoot a whole salvo of homing missiles at Succulla. Too bad the Blade and nimble agility both make quick work of them.

6:43 - The left arm gets blown off. That makes things easier...not! Now it can shoot its flamethrower everywhere, but it is still limited to only one direction, rotating throughout the screen. Thankfully, it can now be hit anywhere, which makes the Hunter the weapon of choice for this part of the battle.

7:17 - It still wants to follow you as it's explode. Ten seconds later, you get what is probably the greatest boss explosion in the game.