Bio-Ship Paladin
Bio-ship Paladin is a 1990 horizontally scrolling shoot 'em up arcade game. It was later ported to the Sega Mega Drive. While the game is essentially a standard horizontally scrolling shoot 'em up, it has an innovation that makes it unique in the genre. The player flies a spaceship (specifically, a bioship) which has the standard forward guns to be found in all horizontal scrollers, but it also possesses a weapon that can be manually targeted with a crosshair, in the same manner as in the game Missile Command. This allows the player to fire in any direction with pinpoint accuracy, and adds an extra level of strategy to the game. The game saw an almost arcade perfect port on the Sega Mega Drive. What few changes there were actually enhanced the look of the game such as added parallax scrolling backgrounds in level 2.
SCREENSHOTS
HISTORY
Bio-ship Paladin, known in Japan as Space Battleship Gomora, is a 1990 horizontally scrolling shooter video game developed and published by UPL for arcades. It was released in Japan in November 1990 and in North America by Sammy Corporation in North America in April 1991. It was later ported to the Sega Mega Drive. Hamster Corporation released the game as part of their Arcade Archives series for the Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 in August 2021.
Gameplay
The player controls the bioship Paladin, traversing various levels while defeating enemies. Unlike most shoot 'em ups, the Paladin had an armor gauge which meant that the ship would not be destroyed with one hit or after brushing up against a foreground object. The ship had a semi-automatic Laser weapon that, when held down, would charge up and unleash a stronger laser blast. Players can use a manual aiming crosshair that could be placed anywhere on the screen for the Beam weapon, allowing the player to shoot any visible enemy fighter.
The player must fight their way through nine levels filled with clever foreground obstacles and waves of enemies. Many of the bosses had to be destroyed by first shooting off their guns, missile launchers and jets before destroying the whole ship. However, there were no Extend bonuses.
Reception
In Japan, Game Machine listed Bio-ship Paladin on their December 15, 1990 issue as being the eleventh most-successful table arcade unit of the month.
1CC RUNS
One-credit clears we point to as the benchmark for this game.
STORES
Prices are cached from each storefront and may be out of date. Last checked 24 Sept 2026.
RELEASES 4 systems
PHYSICAL RELEASES 1 box
