Sega‘s 1985 arcade version of Choplifter is a rare beast indeed. It is a game that went from home computers, to the arcades, when usually the opposite is true. Dan Gorlin‘s helicopter shooter/rescue game was deemed good enough to be completely reprogrammed and put into an arcade cabinet.

The aim of the game is the same as in the original: rescue and return a set number of hostages on each level. You can only carry eight hostages at once, so must make multiple trips out into enemy territory.

The cabinet has two buttons and a joystick for controlling the chopper. Button one fires its gun, and button two switches the direction the helicopter faces. It can face left or right, or out towards the player, and this decides the direction in which it fires.

The original Choplifter was a difficult game, but the arcade version takes it to a whole new level, mostly because of the sheer number of enemy jets, tanks, jeeps and bullets that are swarming around you. And, as if things weren’t difficult enough, you now also have fuel levels to keep an eye on, because they fall constantly and only give you a certain amount of flying time. This makes the game very frustrating to play, and it doesn’t matter how good at it you are, you’re very likely to be shot down, or crash, at any moment.

Unlike most home computer games, the arcade version of Choplifter isn’t really designed to be “fun”, it’s instead designed to make as much money as possible. That said, I think that many arcade developers misunderstood the formula for doing just that. Most people will be reluctant to keep putting money into a game that is so hard that it’s unfair, so a balance has to be found between “fun” and “challenge”, to ensure that players come back to it. I think that Choplifter fails in that respect, which is a pity because it has all the elements to be a fun game.

In today’s MAME society, players can use virtual credits to play as many times as they like, and can also use quick saves to keep attempting the same section of the game over and over, which is likely the only way anyone is going to see any of the later stages. Unless they’ve practised the game so much that they know it inside out. Which is unlikely with a game like Choplifter, which isn’t particularly well known or well liked.

More: Choplifter on Wikipedia