Top Gun Maverick<\/em> is one of the biggest movies to come along in the past few years, and given the action-packed premise, what better film to turn into an arcade game than this? That\u2019s what Raw Thrills has figured as they recently had the machine on test, and with Dave & Busters starting to tease the game already they have now given approval on revealing it, ahead of their upcoming official launch at Amusement Expo. Let\u2019s dive in with what we have so far\u2026<\/p>\n As you can see from this shot of the game on location<\/a>, Top Gun Maverick<\/em> draws upon the two screen\/motion base design of Raw Thrills\u2019 Fast & Furious Arcade deluxe that came out back in 2023. It is not the exact same; the screen portion appears to stack up a little shorter than FnF\u2019s, and of course the player hotseat is now designed after an aircraft.<\/p>\n The cabinet uses a motion base, and features a right-hand joystick and left-hand throttle. If you look real close on the stickers, you can also see where it mentions \u201cDanger Zone\u201d, as a nice little nod to the movie and the music\u2026<\/p>\n As with numerous other Raw Thrills titles, Top Gun Maverick is being co-developed by Play Mechanix. This would effectively be their first \u2018aerial combat\u2019 arcade game. That said, Raw Thrills has no comment on this at the moment other than the acknowledgement that it exists and green light for this story, with real details coming later (in the meantime, they have shown off a new Wizard Of Oz videmption game<\/a> that we\u2019ll have a post about up on here shortly).<\/p>\n Because of the no comment, we don\u2019t know exactly how this plays at this time \u2013 whether that\u2019s on-rails like After Burner Climax or off-rails like Blazing Angels Arcade. Fortunately, we will find out more soon, as this will be at Amusement Expo 2025. Also, the game should be debuting at Dave & Busters in the coming weeks, from the looks of the teasers (e.g. the below image) they have been doing on their social media as of late.<\/a><\/p>\n With that all said and done, this does bring to mind some other jet fighter\/air combat arcade video games that have graced the scene over the years, which some of you may or may not know \u2013 so let\u2019s briefly look back a little on those. One can in fact go as far back as the 1970s to see the first games in the genre, including Atari\u2019s Jet Fighter<\/a><\/em> and Pursuit<\/a><\/em>, or Meadow\u2019s Games\u2019 Cobra Gunship<\/em><\/a>. The 80s saw titles like Red Baron<\/a><\/em> by Atari and Two Tigers<\/a><\/em> by Midway\u2026 but the most significant and perhaps most famous air combat arcade game of all time would be Sega\u2019s After Burner<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n After Burner<\/em> is influential not just due to it\u2019s blistering gameplay and sensational graphics, but also due to the \u2018taikan\u2019 (meaning experience) cabinet and controls. Those latter ones simply could not be surpassed by a game console, even if a perfect port of the software was managed. Sega had already set up simulator style cabinets with Hang-On,<\/em> Space Harrier<\/em>, and OutRun<\/em>, but After Burner took things to a whole new level, particularly with the Deluxe model:<\/p>\n After Burner would dominate this subgenre in arcades for a while (not talking about scrolling shooters like 1944<\/em> or Raiden<\/em>, but more aerial combat simulators). Sega would later release follow-up titles like G-LOC<\/em> and Wing War<\/em> (which took the \u2018taikan\u2019 cabinets to their apex with their ultimate experience, the R360<\/a>), lesser-known attempts such as Sky Target<\/em> and Sega Strike Fighter<\/em>, and then of course there was their original game\u2019s fantastic return, After Burner Climax<\/em>, in 2006.<\/p>\n Namco was one of the select few who came up with an \u2018answer\u2019 to the success of After Burner, with games like Air Combat<\/em> & Air Combat 22<\/em> in the 90s, then Mach Storm in 2013. GlobalVR did also release Blazing Angels Arcade<\/em> in 2008 (which I still have from when I opened up my arcade that year), and as mentioned we\u2019ve seen After Burner Climax and Mach Storm. Aside from those though, there haven\u2019t been many other major releases to speak of in this subgenre\u2026 until now.<\/p>\n \nTop Gun Maverick \u2013 The Cabinet<\/h2>\n
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<\/a><\/p>\nTop Gun Maverick \u2013 The Game<\/h2>\n
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<\/a><\/p>\nA Brief History On Aerial Combat Arcade Games<\/h3>\n
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