Master of Weapon (World) - MAME machine

Arcade Video game published 35 years ago:

Master of Weapon © 1989 Taito Corp.

A seven-day nuclear storm brings on a big change on the earth. The earth cracks, the sea boils and the living things change. And human is no exception. After finishing of the cursed 7-day war, the remaining people change their cells and return to the nature in order to endure severe environmental changes. However, a selected part of the people - they had been called scientists - create a computer, which can lead the people in order to leave a seed humankind. This computer is called N.

TECHNICAL
Taito B System hardware
Prom Sticker: B72

Main CPU: Motorola 68000, Zilog Z80
Sound Chips: YM2203

Players: 2
Control: 8-way joystick
Buttons: 2

TRIVIA
Master of Weapon was released in May 1989 in Japan.

Master of Weapon was very unpopular, mostly because it was too difficult for its time. Also, it was released during the 'Tetris era' and most of the Master of Weapon boards (Taito B System) were replaced by Sega's Tetris. Despite unpopularity, some Taito fans still love Master of Weapon because the game displayed excellent graphics and an unique BGM.

After the commercial failure of Master of Weapon, Taito decided to not continue development of vertical shoot'em ups. So, the famous company Toaplan developed their next shoot'em up game for Taito, "Twin Hawk".

A very rare prototype of this game is known as "Yukiwo". According to the advisor, Senba Takatsuna, Taito Game Sales Department requested to change the game's name before the release. 'Yukiwo' is the protagonist's name and was also from the first name of the programmer, Yukiwo Ishikawa (Y.I), later known as 'Yukio Abe' and producer of "Rayforce" which took inspiration from Master of Weapon. Originally, the game was planned to be a 2-Player simultaneous game, but it became a 1-Player game after the name change.

Senba Takatsuna said the game's development took about 6 months. The Mecha design was inspired by the famous anime 'Akira'.

The music composer Hisayoshi Ogura didn't compose the actual BGM. He only did the arrangement. The actual, uncredited composer is V. Osahi. When the game changed its name to Master of Weapon, the deadline was approaching fast. So V. Osahi re-used sounds from "Jigoku Meguri" and "Fighting Hawk".

Buddhism symbols appear in Act 1 and Act 6.

Default highscore table (BEST 5):
NO SCORE PLAY NAME
1 992300 1 Y.I
2 713000 4 KON
3 314000 4 TET
4 224000 2 T.M
5 191230 1 KYO

Gamest (Japanese arcade magazine), December 1989, a Japanese gamer called 'RVS-R. Y' got a high score of 3,922,260 points.

Pony Canyon / Scitron released a limited-edition soundtrack album for this game (Taito DJ Station: G.S.M. Taito 5 - PCCB-00037) on August 21, 1990.

TIPS AND TRICKS

• Levels Select: Boot machine with service switch pressed.

Message appears: SERVICE SWITCH ERROR, press 1p Start(x3), service switch, 1p Start.
Message appears: SELECT BY DOWN SW, select level with joy Down/Up and push Start button.

• Good End: If you continue 5 times, you can have access to the last boss, defeat it to see the good end.
• 'Yukiwo' Charater: When you hit specific building in act 1, you can see 'yukiwo' charater written by Kanakata.
• Random boss: In act 4, after vanishing the first huge spaceship, small house appears in meadow. If you hit this house, a hidden boss will appears (this boss is the final boss in Metal Black and Galatic Storm).

STAFF
Directed & produced by: George Jyuttute
Game & character designed by: Yukiwo Ishikawa (Y.I)
Programmed by: George K-5, Takeshi Murata (T.M), Creamy Tetsu (TET), Maryin Kondoh
Art designed by: Yukiwo Ishikawa (Y.I), Takako Kojima, Dandy Yarita, Makoto Fujita, Akira Saitoh, Hisakazu Katoh, Oolong Yamada, Kenji Hazama, Animation 20, Santa Claus
Hardware designed by: Eikichi Takahashi, Hiroyuki Noguchi
Music composed & arranged by: V. Osahi(Pinch Panchi), Hisayoshi Ogura, Yasuhisa Watanabe
Graphic designed by: Hiroyasu Nagai, Kazuo Nakagawa, Animation 20

Special thanks to: Takeshi Ishizashi, Hidehiro Fujiwara, Keiichi Shibata, Ichirou Fujisue, Kenji Kaidoh, Tomio Takeda, Hiroshi Tsujino, Akira Fujita, Toshio Kohno, Masami Kikuchi, Kazuhiro Numata, Takashi Kitayabashi, Takamasa Hori

PORTS

• CONSOLES:

[JP] Sega Mega Drive (sept.27, 1991) "Master of Weapon [Model T-11063]"
[JP] Sony PS2 (mar.29, 2007) "Taito Memories II Gekan [Model SLPM-66713]"

CONTRIBUTE
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