Uploaded May 2022 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
After Burner is an arcade vehicular combat game developed and released by Sega in 1987. The player assumes control of an American F-14 Tomcat fighter jet, and must clear each of the game's eighteen unique stages by destroying incoming enemies, using both a machine gun and a limited supply of heat-seeking missiles. It uses a third-person perspective, previously utilized by Sega's earlier games Space Harrier (1985) and Out Run (1986), and runs on the Sega X Board arcade system, which is capable of surface and sprite rotation. It is the fourth Sega game to use a hydraulic "taikan" motion simulator arcade cabinet, one that is more elaborate than their earlier "taikan" simulator games. The cabinet simulates an aircraft cockpit, with flight stick controls, a chair with seatbelt, and hydraulic motion technology that moves, tilts, rolls and rotates the cockpit in sync with the on-screen action.
Designed by Sega veteran Yu Suzuki and the Sega AM2 division, After Burner was intended as being Sega's first "true blockbuster" video game. Development began in December 1986, shortly after the completion of Out Run, and was kept as a closely guarded secret within the company. Suzuki was inspired by the 1986 films Top Gun, Laputa and Castle in the Sky; he originally planned for the game to have a steampunk aesthetic similar to Laputa, but instead went with a Top Gun look to make the game approachable for worldwide audiences. It was designed outside the company in a building named "Studio 128", due to Sega adopting a flextime schedule to allow for games to be worked outside company headquarters. An updated version with the addition of throttle controls, After Burner II, was released later the same year.
Now for the music: The arcade soundtrack is the best on offer here no argument from me, it is the original and because it was programmed on a superior board, it allows it to have better instruments with a nice mix of FM synthesis and sample playback (guitars/drums/percussion). The Mega Drive soundtrack was programmed by the Japanese FM heavy metal wizard Noriyuki Iwadare who created this experimental sound driver for the Mega Drive right before going on to create the better sounding Cube driver. The Mega Drive soundtrack was recorded from an original discrete YM2612 sound chip and suffers from a very low audio volume which gives it a very muddy and washed out sound due to the ''ladder effect'' or ''quantization noise'' being far too dominant, it uses the PSG chip for all samples (drums and voice) by muting PSG 3 & 4 and only using the square channels for sample playback combined. The drums are also at a very low volume and the sample quality is quite rough so it sounds very muffly. The Mega Drive ost is also slower in 50Hz giving the tracks a slightly different feel. Noriyuki Iwadare made damn well sure slower music would never appear in his next driver for the system.
Corneria is simply added as a joke as many believe Hajime Hirasawa used after Burner's ost as an influence for Star Fox. Many also believe ''Corneria'' is a blatant rip off of the track ''After Burner'' by Hiroshi Kawaguchi. Whatever you believe, the marvellous McQueen8601 is the one who made this possible through FL studio by emulating Sega's X Board YM2151.
MUSIC COMPOSERS:川口博史Hiroshi Kawaguchi (all tracks except 16) 1987, Hajime Hirasawa - Corneria 1993.
ARRANGERS:川口博史Hiroshi Kawaguchi.
SOUND PROGRAMMERS: MEGA DRIVE PORT: Noriyuki Iwadare 1990.
SOUND DRIVER MEGA DRIVE: Unique (After Burner/Noriyuki Iwadare)
SOUND QUALITY: 384 Kbps.
TRACKS: ♫
Arcade SEGA YM2151 X Board Original
1. Maximum Power (00:17)
2. Final Take Off (01:19)
3. Red Out (08:31)
4. Super Stripe (12:19)
5. After Burner (16:15)
6. City 202 (21:54)
7. Maximum Power - Melody (23:09)
8. Final Take Off - Melody (24:13)
9. After Burner - Melody (32:15)
SEGA Mega Drive PAL 50Hz
10. Maximum Power (37:53)
11. Final Take Off (40:09)
12. Red Out (48:20)
13. Super Stripe (52:45)
14. After Burner (56:58)
15. City 202 (01:03:54)
Not satisfactory in PAL 50HZ? Then click here: youtube.com/watch?v=3XTsB_pKa-s&t=354s
BONUS TRACKS BY Marvellous McQueen8601
16. Corneria (01:06:55) youtube.com/watch?v=BLWB9hxBZDY
17. Black Belt Boss Theme (01:11:29) youtube.com/watch?v=tpBWbyGzhNA
Ripped the Arcade music straight from Youtube and recorded the Mega Drive port from my own PAL High Definition Graphics - Stereo Sound model 1 console through the front headphone jack. The final rip for the whole video was done through my Mega Drive console attached to a model 2 Mega-CD streaming the disc.
After Burner = ''After listening to this, you'll want to burn the whole thing to your own music library, ha ha''.
Enjoy!
After Burner is an arcade vehicular combat game developed and released by Sega in 1987. The player assumes control of an American F-14 Tomcat fighter jet, and must clear each of the game's eighteen unique stages by destroying incoming enemies, using both a machine gun and a limited supply of heat-seeking missiles. It uses a third-person perspective, previously utilized by Sega's earlier games Space Harrier (1985) and Out Run (1986), and runs on the Sega X Board arcade system, which is capable of surface and sprite rotation. It is the fourth Sega game to use a hydraulic "taikan" motion simulator arcade cabinet, one that is more elaborate than their earlier "taikan" simulator games. The cabinet simulates an aircraft cockpit, with flight stick controls, a chair with seatbelt, and hydraulic motion technology that moves, tilts, rolls and rotates the cockpit in sync with the on-screen action.
Designed by Sega veteran Yu Suzuki and the Sega AM2 division, After Burner was intended as being Sega's first "true blockbuster" video game. Development began in December 1986, shortly after the completion of Out Run, and was kept as a closely guarded secret within the company. Suzuki was inspired by the 1986 films Top Gun, Laputa and Castle in the Sky; he originally planned for the game to have a steampunk aesthetic similar to Laputa, but instead went with a Top Gun look to make the game approachable for worldwide audiences. It was designed outside the company in a building named "Studio 128", due to Sega adopting a flextime schedule to allow for games to be worked outside company headquarters. An updated version with the addition of throttle controls, After Burner II, was released later the same year.
Now for the music: The arcade soundtrack is the best on offer here no argument from me, it is the original and because it was programmed on a superior board, it allows it to have better instruments with a nice mix of FM synthesis and sample playback (guitars/drums/percussion). The Mega Drive soundtrack was programmed by the Japanese FM heavy metal wizard Noriyuki Iwadare who created this experimental sound driver for the Mega Drive right before going on to create the better sounding Cube driver. The Mega Drive soundtrack was recorded from an original discrete YM2612 sound chip and suffers from a very low audio volume which gives it a very muddy and washed out sound due to the ''ladder effect'' or ''quantization noise'' being far too dominant, it uses the PSG chip for all samples (drums and voice) by muting PSG 3 & 4 and only using the square channels for sample playback combined. The drums are also at a very low volume and the sample quality is quite rough so it sounds very muffly. The Mega Drive ost is also slower in 50Hz giving the tracks a slightly different feel. Noriyuki Iwadare made damn well sure slower music would never appear in his next driver for the system.
Corneria is simply added as a joke as many believe Hajime Hirasawa used after Burner's ost as an influence for Star Fox. Many also believe ''Corneria'' is a blatant rip off of the track ''After Burner'' by Hiroshi Kawaguchi. Whatever you believe, the marvellous McQueen8601 is the one who made this possible through FL studio by emulating Sega's X Board YM2151.
MUSIC COMPOSERS:川口博史Hiroshi Kawaguchi (all tracks except 16) 1987, Hajime Hirasawa - Corneria 1993.
ARRANGERS:川口博史Hiroshi Kawaguchi.
SOUND PROGRAMMERS: MEGA DRIVE PORT: Noriyuki Iwadare 1990.
SOUND DRIVER MEGA DRIVE: Unique (After Burner/Noriyuki Iwadare)
SOUND QUALITY: 384 Kbps.
TRACKS: ♫
Arcade SEGA YM2151 X Board Original
1. Maximum Power (00:17)
2. Final Take Off (01:19)
3. Red Out (08:31)
4. Super Stripe (12:19)
5. After Burner (16:15)
6. City 202 (21:54)
7. Maximum Power - Melody (23:09)
8. Final Take Off - Melody (24:13)
9. After Burner - Melody (32:15)
SEGA Mega Drive PAL 50Hz
10. Maximum Power (37:53)
11. Final Take Off (40:09)
12. Red Out (48:20)
13. Super Stripe (52:45)
14. After Burner (56:58)
15. City 202 (01:03:54)
Not satisfactory in PAL 50HZ? Then click here: youtube.com/watch?v=3XTsB_pKa-s&t=354s
BONUS TRACKS BY Marvellous McQueen8601
16. Corneria (01:06:55) youtube.com/watch?v=BLWB9hxBZDY
17. Black Belt Boss Theme (01:11:29) youtube.com/watch?v=tpBWbyGzhNA
Ripped the Arcade music straight from Youtube and recorded the Mega Drive port from my own PAL High Definition Graphics - Stereo Sound model 1 console through the front headphone jack. The final rip for the whole video was done through my Mega Drive console attached to a model 2 Mega-CD streaming the disc.
After Burner = ''After listening to this, you'll want to burn the whole thing to your own music library, ha ha''.
Enjoy!
