Alien Storm

About Alien Storm

Alien Storm (1990) is Sega's Golden Axe-style beat 'em up shooter in which the Alien Busters, Karen, Garth and the robot Scooter, blast invaders hiding in bins and post boxes.

Alien Storm in Depth

A homicidal alien race is invading Earth, and only a special forces team called the Alien Busters stands in its way: Karen, Garth and the robot Scooter, known under other names in some versions. It closely resembles Golden Axe, with a similar art style, three playable characters, a man, a woman and a novelty character, and special attacks. Up to three can play in the arcade, two on Mega Drive and one on Master System. Missions run from the streets to the mother ship, home of the mother of all aliens, with objectives such as rescuing people or destroying a UFO, and aliens hide inside plants, post boxes, bins, drums and other objects.

Each character has unlimited punches and kicks plus a personal weapon, and flying skulls that appear after certain kills can be shot for life or energy, which powers weapon attacks such as flames or electricity and much stronger specials. Garth calls in a US Air Force starship to bomb the street, Karen summons a nuclear missile that incinerates every enemy on screen, and Scooter explodes, leaving his head behind for his new body to collect. Specials use a lot of energy. Game Machine listed it as Japan's most successful table arcade unit in June 1990.

Making Alien Storm

Sega released it in arcades in 1990 and ported it to the Genesis/Mega Drive and Master System. MegaTech praised the Genesis version as an outstanding arcade conversion with highly enjoyable play, and the Mega Drive version was re-released on the Wii Virtual Console in 2007 and on Nintendo Classics in 2022.