P-47 II - The Freedom Star (Mega Drive)

Horizontal
Checkpoints OFF
3 Difficulty levels
6 Stages
Ship speed by icons
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Developed by Jaleco
Published by City Connection in 2025

The Mega Drive is well known for being a powerhouse for shmups. There are so many of them available for the console that a few people think it was too much, when in fact there's always room for more in the heart and soul of every fan of the genre. And seeing brand-new shmups being released for the system in 2025 is nothing short of amazing. One of them is P-47 II - The Freedom Star, a game that was ultimately cancelled prior to release and only saw the light of day after 35 years. Once again the old say is true: better late than never!

The physical edition of the game came out under the banner of different publishers. City Connection took care of the Japanese release, whereas Retro-Bit did the job in other regions partenered with Strictly Limited Games in Europe and Limited Run Games in the US. Developed as a true sequel to P-47 - The Phantom Fighter, an arcade shmup that was ported to several systems at the time including the PC Engine, this game – also referred to as P-47 II MD, as in the box cover – does look better in terms of color and use of parallax, just like a competently designed title should look like in 1990. It does lift some music themes from the original game but that's it, everything else is new.

Just for reference, the arcade sequel P-47 Aces came out in 1995. If we consider P-47 II should've come out in 1990, then we can assume P-47 Aces is actually the third chapter in a fairly obscure series.

P-47 II MD - Announcement Trailer
(courtesy of YouTube user and Western publisher Retro-Bit)

The core gameplay in this 16-bit follow-up is based on collecting power-ups for the main gun and special weapons to enhance the plane's firepower. Helicopters are the carriers of all items, which include speed-up (S), power-up (P), hyper/health (H), extra life (1UP) and an assortment of four special weapons: ground bombs (B), twin vulcan (T), homing missiles (M) and guard option (G). Sticking to the same special weapon upgrades its efficiency, which once maxed out will result in a bonus of 5.000 points if you keep collecting the same item. This bonus also applies for maxing out all other items except for H, which deserves special consideration. 

H stands for Hyper, the special attack that sends forward a powerful exploding bomb that inflicts a ton of damage and clears the screen from bullets. However, hyper stock also works as health, so each hit taken consumes one hyper. This means, of course, that taking a bullet with no hypers in stock makes you lose a life. In the strategic balance between bomb usage and survival it's important to know that hyper stock is always replenished to three when a new stage starts, unless you have three or more in reserve (in this case you preserve the current stock). Even though the maximum visible amount is five, it's possible to stock more hypers than that.

Since hypers in excess aren't worth any extra points, you certainly won't feel guilty for using them as bombs instead of health. It's an interesting detail that serves as evidence of how to actually apply simple yet effective rules to implement the scoring system. On the other hand, the health mechanic associated to hypers turns P-47 II into a very easy game that shouldn't be a great obstacle for the average shmupper. There's no problem at all in that, except for the fact that the game's appeal wears off pretty fast due to the lack of challenge. The soundtrack, a selection of tunes that range from just okay to absolutely boring, doesn't help in the appreciation either.

In the pursuit of Gunfish, the "hugest" armored airship

All things considered, P-47 II at least looks decent with no slowdown at all. Mountains, forests, oceans, caves and fast moving clouds certainly bring up that sweet reminiscence of the good old 16-bit days. It isn't exactly flashy or graced by outstanding graphical moments, lacking the polished smoothness of Steel Empire and the dynamic intensity of Fire Mustang, two titles that can certainly be cited as similar in design and tone. At times it also reminded me of UN Squadron, Air Buster and even some Thunder Force III in the cavern stage, which is nice.

Jaleco and all publishers involved certainly deserve recognition for their job in bringing P-47 II - The Freedom Star to life after so many years. The game isn't stellar by any stretch of the imagination, but the simple fact that it gets the basics right and doesn't offend the player with broken features is to be commended and saluted by all Mega Drive shmup fans.

The high score below was achieved in the Normal difficulty with no lives lost. In this run I believe I missed one power-up item for the 5K bonus. The power-up and the hyper are the only ones that drop to the left pretty fast when released, so take that into consideration if you want to maximize the score when playing.