Uploaded January 2024 | Updated September 2026, 1 hour ago

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Metal Black is a shmup released in arcades by Taito in 1991. This game is known for its unique atmosphere and its beam mechanic. It is also known for being one of the few games designed by Takatsuna Senba during his time at Taito along with Gun Frontier and Dino Rex and was originally intended to be Darius game. Though originally released in arcades, it received a port to the Saturn done by Ving in 1996 in Japan. The arcade version was re-released via the Arcade Archives series on PS4/PS5 and Switch in 2022 and the Saturn version was reissued on PC and Xbox One by City Connection in 2023 as part of their S-Tribute series, giving this game a new audience on modern consoles.

Metal Black honestly has some of the best atmosphere in all of shmups, past or present. While it shared some of the grittiness of some other Taito arcade games from this time such as Gun Frontier and Super Space Invaders 91, it managed to use its excellent art direction and amazing soundtrack to push a narrative of one man trying to save a post-apocalyptic Earth from an alien threat. The intro gives you a decent amount of backstory for an arcade shmup and the actual game builds upon that so well, telling the story after that without words. This game features some incredibly distinct environments and set pieces, accompanied by some of the best music Zuntata ever composed which is saying a lot. There's even a psychedelic vibe going on, like on Stage 4. The imagery of this game from the first stage to the last boss is unforgettable. Even the good ending of this game is quite thought-provoking. You can also get a bad ending if you Game Over on the last stage.

As far as the gameplay goes, it's hard to say that it matches the atmosphere, but the gameplay is still strong. The beam mechanic is actually great, but not necessarily because you get a beam to use. This beam meter also determines your shot power and spread. Also, when you max out that bar, you can even choose to use your beam as a bomb as long as you don't hold down the beam button. Using it as a bomb is more effective most of the time because it's very useful for clearing a lot of smaller enemies on screen quickly.

One odd thing is that your damage per shot is at its highest at level 3 instead of 5, though you do get more protection at the front of your ship from your shot covering it if you do max out the bar. I liked using up my beam right before boss fights in order to grab enough power ups, known as Newalone, in order to get my shot to level 3 in order to kill bosses quicker. Also, you're going to want autofire for this one. I used 25 HZ autofire off of my Brook PCB for this one, with 30 HZ being even better if you have that as an option.

There are a couple of flaws with this game that I have to bring up. One is the scoring being a bit underdeveloped. The RNG in the bonus rounds after Stages 1 and 3 can have a big impact on your final score by the end of a run. Plus, scoring mostly comes down to grabbing Newalone and killing enemies outside of that. The second major flaw is that RNG gets a bit out of hand near the end of the game, especially on the last stage. The red star enemies are pure RNG in terms of where they go and some other enemies have RNG as well in terms of movement. It is down to luck in order to get a no-miss because of that. Even on this run, I got lucky right before the last boss with one of those red stars.

Speaking of lucky, this run got super dramatic toward the end. I almost didn't make it and it even got a bit hairy on the last boss where I almost got killed on my last life, but I managed to no-miss the last boss and finish up the run.

00:00 Intro
00:24 Stage 1 + Bonus Round
04:08 Stage 2
07:58 Stage 3 + Bonus Round
13:23 Stage 4
17:27 Stage 5
20:33 Stage 6
24:53 Ending + Credits

Further reading:

Hardcore Gaming 101 article: hardcoregaming101.net/metal-black

Small guide: shmups.system11.org/viewtopic.php?t=30872

Takatsuna Senba interview: shmuplations.com/takatsunasenba