Two Tigers (dedicated) - MAME machine

Arcade Video game published 40 years ago:

Two Tigers © 1984 Bally Midway.

Two Tigers is a 2-D shooter. The game starts by telling you how may hits you must make on the ship before you can claim credit for sinking it. You then will go to the next screen which has your fighter/bomber in the middle of the screen. A gunsight will also be somewhere in the sky (the gunsight is actually the spot where anti-aircraft fire will be hitting at). Soon the sky is filled with enemy planes and a ship enters the screen from the left side. You mission will be to do whatever it takes to put the required number of holes into the enemy ship to sink it. You have at your disposal a single bomb and the enemy planes themselves for achieving your goal. Along the way, other things may assist (if you shoot them) such as mines and fuel drums. The game will go until you fail to sink 2 ships. If you are in 2-player cooperative mode, then the number of holes to sink a ship will be increased. The same rules apply, though, for sending it to the bottom of the sea.

TECHNICAL
[No. 0A79]

Bally Midway MCR 2 hardware

Main CPU: Zilog Z80 (@ 2.496 Mhz)
Sound CPU: Zilog Z80 (@ 2 Mhz)
Sound Chips: (2x) General Instrument AY8910 (@ 2 Mhz)

Screen orientation: Horizontal
Video resolution: 512 x 480 pixels
Screen refresh: 30.00 Hz
Palette colors: 64

Players: 2
Control: Spinner (on some models, a 'Y' yoke was put in place of the spinner knob)
Buttons: 2 (FIRE, BOMB)

TRIVIA
Two Tigers was released in July 1984.

A conversion Kit for tron was released as "Two Tigers [No. 0C67]". It had has significantly different gameplay and stuff.

Based on the novel 'Gus is my Co-Pilot'. It seems that war games were making their appearance around this time. Bally Midway was no exception in putting a war type game. Two Tigers is a loose conglomeration of several earlier games where the objective was to sink ships. Some games used submarines while others used planes. Although not a major success, it still created a following of dedicated players. Especially for the fact that it also allowed two-player cooperative mode and dogfighting.

SCORING
Scoring in this game is relatively simple but it is fast paced...
BOMB HIT ON SHIP: 150 Points
SHOT DOWN ENEMY PLANE HIT ON SHIP: 150 Points
ENEMY PLANE: 200 Points
DESTROYING A SHOT DOWN ENEMY PLANE: 250 Points
MINES, SWIMMER, SHARKS, FUEL DRUM: 700 Points
SUBMARINE: 1300 Points
HOLE IN SHIP: 1400 Points
DESTROYING THE SHIP: 5000 Points

TIPS AND TRICKS
When you start the game, your fighter will fly in from the left side of the screen. There will be a slight delay then a ship will float in from the left side. Now it's time to put the ship on the bottom of the sea. These strategies are valid for both the one and two-player game. The only difference is that it takes more holes to sink a ship in the two player game and the second player comes in from the right side of the screen.

• It takes three hits in the same place to create a hole. It doesn't matter where else you hit, if you don't hit the same area three times, no hole is created in the ship.
• The best strategy for this game is to use your plane as a dive-bomber. There are a couple of reasons for this:

1) First, your plane goes faster when you are diving. This helps to prevent you from being brought down by anti-aircraft fire and enemy planes. Keep in mind, only the brown planes can collide with your plane.
2) Second, you can drop your bomb more accurately. Since you can only have one bomb on the screen at any given time, you have to make your bomb hits count. If you are climbing and drop your bomb, it will arc up over your plane before coming back down. In turn, this causes the bomb to take a long time to either hit the ship or miss. That bomb could be the difference between a ship sinking or getting away.
3) Third, if your plane gets shot down (either by anti-aircraft fire or by collision with an enemy plane), you have a shorter route to travel before you reappear in a new plane. If you are climbing and get shot down, your character will arc above the plane and then his parachute will open. If your character parachutes from the top of the screen, you will lose a lot of precious time floating back to the water when you could have been pounding the ship into submission.
4) Fourth, if you look when your plane is either at the very top or bottom of the screen, a shield appears around your plane. Basically, your plane is protected when it enters the screen from the top or bottom to prevent it from being shot down. Use this definitely to your advantage.

• Use the enemy planes to your advantage. When you drop a bomb on a ship, it only takes out the piece of ship it hits. When an enemy plane is shot down and hits the ship, it will drill through the superstructure until it reaches the hull, then it will create the hole. This means, basically, you can actually sink the ship without using any of your bombs.
• During the first few ships, you will notice that mines float by the ship. These will make your job easier by taking out the ship from the ''bottom-up'' so to speak. When you destroy a mine under a ship, it blasts a three wide panel out from the bottom of the ship. That makes your job easier since now you only have work at putting two holes vice three to sink the ship.
• The later stages have fuel drums floating by the ship. Like the mines, fuel drums can help you put away a ship faster. When you destroy a fuel drum, it will put a hole in the ship for you. In other words, instead of a lateral blast, it does a vertical blast through the ship.
• During the stages in-between ships, you can do target practice on either the submarine, swimmer and sharks, or mines.
• As the game progresses, the number of holes to sink a ship goes up. In addition, the anti-aircraft fire becomes more accurate and the enemy planes become quicker and more aggressive.
• In the dogfight game, both players try to shoot down all of their opponent's aircraft. The loser has to defend their ship against the winner. So obviously, you want to be the winner since it's easier to sink a ship then shoot down a plane.

STAFF
Designed by: Ron Halliburton
Software: Tim Gilbert
Graphics: R. Berrios
Production: M. Gardaphe

CONTRIBUTE
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