Blazing Star

Blazing Star is a horizontally scrolling shooter similar to its predecessor Pulstar (1995) and the classic shooter R-Type (1987). The story revolves around cyborgs that, remembering their humanity, team up to destroy artificial intelligence systems developing the cybernetic armies they were once a part of.

The player can choose from playing as one of these cyborgs, each piloting a ship equipped with different shot types, power, and speed. Tapping the fire button will unleash a standard shot, or it can be tapped rapidly for a different shot type, or held down for a charge attack. Upon releasing the fire button during a charge, it will unleash a powerful focused shot which can also be dispersed to cover a large area with smaller bullets. The effect and range of these attacks varies depending on the player's ship.

Blazing Star was the first game developed by Yumekobo, a company formerly known as Aicom but rebranded to mark their new direction of working closely with SNK. Initial discussions began with the concept for a follow-up to their shooter Pulstar, however they wanted their new game to maintain a degree of independence from the original. With significant changes made to the gameplay style and setting, the team treated their new game as a gaiden and did not want to use Pulstar in the title. Yumekobo's president at the time opposed this, wanting Pulstar in the title for business reasons.

At some point the game was titled Pulstar Blast. The publisher SNK entered the dispute, saying they did not want Yumekobo's new shooter to be associated to Pulstar in the west because it received poor reception there due to its high difficulty. The team settled on the title Blazing Star for its western release, chosen among others including Zero Hour and The Zenith. Not wanting to keep the names different between regions, Yumekobo's president decided to make Blazing Star the title in all regions.

Critics commended Blazing Star as a testament to SNK's devotion to the Neo Geo hardware and keeping classic genres such as shoot 'em ups alive. Edge wrote that side-scrolling shooters were rare to find, but the game should satisfy fans of the genre. They praised the colorful backgrounds and 3D special effects. Video Games agreed that the graphics were nice, but felt some of the backgrounds were pale and it ultimately did not offer "The Ultimate in Neo Geo graphics", as was advertised on the game's packaging.

Next Level argued that the game took better advantage of the Neo Geo hardware than Pulstar with its improved background and lighting effects. Journalists found the game similar to its predecessor, but Video Games in particular thought Pulstar was the better game. They gave Blazing Star a score of 72% and felt it was too short, not challenging enough, and lacking in sophisticated level design. They did however like the bosses, as did Next Level and Edge who both appreciated the game for carrying on the large boss trend from Pulstar.

Retro Gamer and Harcore Gaming 101 wrote that the game is sometimes remembered for its poorly-translated English text. Some articles, including one by linguist Ben Zimmer, have cited the game's game over message, "You fail it", as inspiring the popular interjection "Fail".