Kingdom Grandprix, released in Japan as is a vertically scrolling shooter/racing hybrid arcade game

Arcade game

An arcade game is a coin-operated entertainment machine, usually installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars, and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games, and merchandisers...

 created by Eighting/Raizing, it was later ported to the Sega Saturn

Sega Saturn

The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...

. It is the second in the Mahou Daisakusen series, but the first to include the bizarre but original feature of being a shooter/racing hybrid.

Story

For decades the kingdom has been ravaged by war. Too many innocents have suffered and legions good men have lost their lives in battle. The king had an idea to stop the war; he would hold a big race that would encompass every part of the kingdom. Everyone from each part of the kingdom was invited to participate. The wars ceased and the people began looking forward to this competition every year.

Game play

Consists of a vertically scrolling field where the player races against seven contestants while shooting enemies and avoiding enemy bullets. Tapping the fire button fires the player's weapons; holding it down gives the player a speed boost.

In addition to these speed boosts, overall speed will increase or decrease depending on screen position (the higher up the player craft is onscreen, the faster it travels). Overall speed decreases every time a life is lost or the next stage is reached.

The player is also given a limited amount of bombs which destroy most on-screen enemies and slow down the opponent racers.

Power-ups

There are four power-ups in Kingdom Grandprix

• P: increases the power of your main forward firing gun
• B: gives you an extra bomb
• H: gives you extra homing bullets
• F: gives you extra forward shots

All the power-ups have a cumulative effect on overall power except the bomb which simply increases the amount of times you can use it. One cannot have both H and F weapons, however; picking up one when the other is active will displace the first weapon.

Levels

The game has a total of twelve stages in a branching path configuration. In most cases, there is a choice of two stages for each level. There is only one choice for the first level, and there are three choices for the sixth level. Beating the first loop of the game in one credit and finishing first overall unlocks the second loop, where all the stages not selected in the first loop are played.

Saturn version

It includes a shooting-only mode. In this mode, the racing aspect is removed and the player is left to play the game at their own pace.