1943: The Battle of Midway is a vertically scrolling shoot'em up made by Capcom and released for the NES, the arcade, the Atari ST, the ZX Spectrum, the Amstrad CPC the Commodore 64, and the Amiga. It is the second game in the 1940s series, following the successful 1942.

1943 is set in the Pacific Theater of Operations in World War II, off the coast of the Midway Atoll. The goal is to reach the Japanese battleship Yamato and destroy it. The player (the American "Super Ace") pilots a P-38, and has to shoot down enemy planes. Besides shooting, the player can also perform a "loop-the-loop" to avoid enemy fire.

Destroying a formation of red enemy planes will result in a power-up, the most powerful of which are the special attacks of lightning, cyclone, and tsunami, which destroy all enemies currently displayed. The other power-ups consist of several different types of shot, a pair of wingmen to fire alongside the plane, and a thousand points (although a thousand points are also received when a power-up is collected).

There are 16 levels, many of which contain hidden point bonuses. At the end of each level, the player is awarded an accuracy rating, which, oddly enough, refers not to how many planes have been shot down, but how many of the guns on the enemy ships have been destroyed. The game was first released for the arcade, in 1987 [1].

In the NES version, there are five different power-ups:

• Offensive Power.
• Defensive Power.
• Energy Level.
• Special Weapon.
• Special Weapon Time Limit.

Unlike the first game, you only have one life, but are given an energy meter. When this meter is empty, your plane is destroyed, and your game is over (if you decide not to continue your game).

Reference

• 1943, Everything².

External links

• GameFAQs entry
• KLOV entry