Detana!! TwinBee

TwinBee is one of the Konami series that defined the cute-em-up in Japan: vertically scrolling shooters with round, cheerful artwork and difficulty that never softened to match. Detana!! TwinBee, from 1991, continues that line and landed on the PC Engine at a point when the console was Japan's favourite home for arcade conversions, thanks to a fast processor and strong sprite handling.

The series rests on one unmistakable mechanic. Clouds drift across the stages, and shooting them releases bells. Keep hitting a bell and it stays airborne while cycling through colours, each colour granting a different upgrade: speed, stronger fire, a protective shield. Collecting turns into a small game inside the game, and it cleanly separates players who only shoot from players who arrive at the hard sections properly equipped. The other thing everyone remembers is arm damage, since taking a hit costs your ship its hands and disables part of your offence until you recover them.

The design assumes two players side by side, which has always been the best way to experience this series, because the ships complement each other and a bell can be juggled far longer with two guns working it. The visuals stay readable even when the screen fills up, and the soundtrack has the brisk, melodic character Konami's in-house sound team was known for on this hardware.

You can start it here straight in the browser. If your experience of shooters is limited to the grim, militarised end of the genre, this is a useful counterweight: just as demanding, but with a completely different sense of humour and with progression that depends on your own skill rather than on menus.