Shock Troopers

At the beginning of each session, players choose whether to go through the game in one of two modes, "Lonely Wolf" or "Team Battle". In "Lonely Wolf", one character is controlled throughout the game, while "Team Battle" allows selecting a band of three soldiers through their missions, switching between them on-the-fly. Choosing to go it alone gives a higher starting life total, while proceeding as a team will give a wider variety of special weapons as well as a higher starting total (ten for each of the three characters instead of twenty for one).

At the beginning of the game, there is also a choice to travel through the Mountain, Jungle, or Valley route. Halfway through the game, a different route can optionally be chosen otherwise stay on the current path. Characters and paths chosen determine how much life bonus is received at the beginning of each level. Each stage is interspersed with boss battles (both in the middle and at the end of each stage). Until the very end, battling the enemy commander atop an aircraft.

The Bloody Scorpions terrorist group have kidnapped scientist George Diamond and his granddaughter Cecilia Diamond in order to gain the powerful drug, Alpha-301, which converts normal people into superhuman soldiers. A special team composed of eight soldiers from different countries must fight through their ranks in order to get to their leader and save the scientist's granddaughter and the world. (The sequel, Shock Troopers: 2nd Squad, has a completely unrelated story and different characters.)

In Japan, Game Machine listed Shock Troopers as the thirteenth most successful arcade game of December 1998.

The game was very well received. Classic Game Room described Shock Troopers for the PlayStation 3 as an "amazing" shooter with "fantastic" gameplay, controls, and the best game of 2011, despite being just a re-release. Nintendo Life's Corbie Dillard scored the Virtual Console release a 7/10 and opined it "succeeds in offering up an intense and explosive run-and-gun experience." Digitally Downloaded reviewer awarded it four-and-half stars out of five, stating: "If you’ve never played a run-n’-gun shooter before, Shock Troopers should be one of your top contenders, regardless of your skill level."