Tiger-Heli

Tiger-Heli is a 1985 vertically scrolling shooter video game developed by Toaplan and released for arcades in Japan by Taito and in North America by Romstar. A version for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) was released in 1986. It is the first entry in the Tiger series and the first shoot 'em up from Toaplan. The player controls the Tiger attack helicopter fighting against enemies. The helicopter is equipped with missiles that can hit targets and bombs that destroy any enemy and their bullets within range.

Tiger-Heli was programmed by Masahiro Yuge, Tatsuya Uemura, and Yuichirō Nozawa. Their previous work, Performan, was not as successful as the team had hoped. They revisited Vastar (1983) and decided their next project would be a shooter, drawing inspiration from Gyrodine. The staff wanted to create a game that balanced between being stressful and exciting, and to have players keep wanting to play it after dying. The team chose a helicopter as the player's craft as they deemed it suitable for a slow scrolling shooter on a cocktail cabinet. The soundtrack, composed by Yuge and Uemura, was made to convey a sense of bravery, but was hampered by technical limitations.

Tiger-Heli was a hit that helped establish Toaplan as a leading producer of shooter games during the 1980s and 1990s. The game's introduction of the bomb concept would also become a staple of the shoot 'em up genre. The NES version sold over a million copies in North America, but received mixed reception from critics. It was followed by Twin Cobra (1987). The rights to Tiger-Heli are owned by Tatsujin, a Japanese developer and licensee formed by Yuge. In 2025, an officially licensed version was released for the Atari 7800.