Super Locomotive is a side-scrolling train action video game developed by Sega and released for the arcades in 1982.
Gameplay[]
The player controls the eponymous Super Locomotive, a steam engine as it travels from one station to another. Along the route, it has to avoid incoming obstacles such as other trains with muscular arms, aeroplanes trying to ram and blow it up by dropping bombs, trucks crossing intersections and red signals, having to wait until they turn blue before it can pass.
The game is played on a overhead perspective at the top of the screen, with the player being able to guide the Super Locomotive along multiple routes by changing tracks en route. It is armed with bullets that can be fired from behind or the smokestack to destroy grounded and airborne targets respectively, and a temporary force-field which causes the Super Locomotive to glow brightly and move faster, protecting it from obstacles for a limited period of time. The use of those will rapidly deplete an energy bar which must be maintained between levels by picking up oil towers and coaches.
Upon completing a level, a bonus stage is played which involves the Super Locomotive attempting to shoot as many airborne enemies within a finite time period, with the bonus awarded being dependent upon the number of enemies destroyed. The game then resumes on more challenging levels.
Trivia[]
- The theme music for the game is Rydeen, a synthpop hit and the third track of an album, Solid State Survivor by Yellow Magic Orchestra, a band known for pioneering several electronic music genres.
- The game is considered one of the earliest train video games, making it a precursor to train simulator video games such as Ongakukan's Train Simulator series and Densha de Go!.
- While the game wasn't officially converted for the home consoles, the computer games Trooper Truck (1983) and Loco (1984) are heavily inspired by Super Locomotive.
- A Mega Drive port of the game was included in the Mega Drive Mini 2 as a bonus game, which was developed by M2 alongside a port of Spatter as a hobby during their free time almost 10 years prior to the development of the console, for no particular reason other than the staff liking the games enough to do so. Naoki Horii, the founder of M2, had proposed for both ports to be part of the SEGA 3D Classics project, but were both deemed too niche and were thus shelved.
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