1941: Counter Attack
1941 カウンターアタック19911941: Counter Attack
1941 カウンターアタックShoot down enemy planes over the Pacific and the North Atlantic.
1941 Counter Attack is a vertical shooter set during the Second World War. It reached the PC Engine in 1991, one year after its arcade debut in 1990. It is the prequel to 1942 in Capcom's 194X series of shooters.
| RELEASED IN JAPAN | 23 August 1991 |
|---|---|
| ORIGINAL ARCADE GAME | Capcom, 1990 |
| PLAYERS | Two |
| FORMAT | SuperGrafx HuCard, SuperGrafx only |
| RELEASED OUTSIDE JAPAN | No |
You shoot down enemy planes and collect weapon power-ups as you fly. Getting hit drains your vitality, and you are destroyed only when vitality reaches zero. A lightning attack on the B button uses up part of your energy bar, so spend it carefully.
Each level allows three loops, and unused loops earn you a bonus at the end of the stage. The charge-up super attack gets stronger as your firepower grows. Player one flies a P-38 Lightning, while player two flies a DH.98 Mosquito. The game moves from the Pacific to the North Atlantic over its course.
The game has no real story to speak of, and that suits a shooter well. The setting moves from the Pacific of the 1942 series to the North Atlantic.
Capcom and Electrocoin released the arcade game in 1990, running on the CP System board. In March 1990, the magazine Game Machine ranked it third in popularity. Western critics were mixed about the arcade version, while Japanese critics liked the SuperGrafx conversion much more.
PC Engine Fan readers gave the SuperGrafx version 19.44 out of 30. The arcade game came back in 2021 in Capcom Arcade Stadium on Nintendo Switch. It also appeared in Capcom Classics Collection on PSP and PlayStation 2.
It is one of the few exclusive games for the SuperGrafx. It shows the add-on's sprite power in a shoot 'em up. A fan on a PC Engine site calls it one of the few great games on the SuperGrafx.
- It is the first shoot 'em up to add 1 point to the score when a continue is used.
- The sequel, 19XX, came out in 1996.
- Capcom's arcade game ran on the CP System board.