Cloud Master, or Chukka Taisen (中华大仙, lit. The Chinese Great God) is a 1988 Horizontal Scrolling Shooter made by Taito, but instead of a spaceship and / or a fighter jet, you're... Flying on a Cloud.
Full (if somewhat brief) backstory: you're Mike Chen, a Chinese mage-in-training nearing completion of your apprenticeship, and to graduate, you must hop on a cloud and fly above China, defeating hordes and hordes of enemies lifted from Far Eastern myths in a series of action-packed levels.
Available for arcades everywhere, game was released later for the Nintendo Entertainment System, Sega Master System, Sharp X68000 and TurboGrafx-16.
A 2008 re-release was available for the Nintendo Wii where it was renamed The Monkey King: The Legend Begins with the player character changed to Sun Wukong from Journey to the West.
Flying on a Cloud, Magic Spells to Cast...
- All There in the Manual: Your playable character's name, Mike Chen, isn't in the gameplay, but in supplementary materials.
- Anthropomorphic Food: One of the weirder enemy types; there are gigantic flying dumplings, noodles, and rice-balls trying to attack Mike.
- Animate Inanimate Object: The game gets pretty crazy with these type of enemies. How many arcade games have sentient, human-sized flying mahjong tiles that pursues you throughout and tries crushing you?
- Art Evolution: The Wii version, which turns the original game's pixelated graphics into a beautifully rendered 3D game. It looks nothing like the original
◊. - Boss Rush: The Famicom version somehow requires Mike to re-fight the Kappa, Chinese warlord and Dragon in the final stage, after defeating the dragon the first time, in order to complete the game. The re-release in 2008 omits this level and ends the game after the dragon boss.
- Dolled-Up Installment: The 2008 release changes an otherwise original character, Mike Chen, into Sun Wukong. It helps that his sprite has flowing red hair which could be mistaken for a simian.
- Doppelgänger Spin: One of the power-ups, which allows Mike Chen to split into 7 copies of himself.
- Flaming Sword: One of the bosses, a giant-sized Chinese warlord in Tang Dynasty armor, wields a fiery scimitar. Besides using it to slice up Mike from up close, his weapon can also generate fiery sword beams.
- Flying on a Cloud: Cloud Master forfeits the usual spaceships and jet fighters associated with these sort of games and have the player hero kicking ass on a cloud instead. Some minor enemies have their own flying clouds as well.
- Hand Blast: How Mike Chen blasts his way through hordes and hordes of enemies.
- Kappa: The second boss is a giant kappa armed with a forked rod capable of blasting electricity. In the 2008 release, said kappa is made into Sha Wujing instead.
- Lotus Position: One of the bosses is Buddha, who sits in a cross-legged, lotus pose while levitating up and down as he send attacks at you.
- Non-Human Head: The shopkeeper Mike visits in-between levels has a Chinese dumpling in place for her head. She can even move the edges of her dumpling hair, somehow.
- Our Dragons Are Different: Chinese long are minor enemies appearing throughout the game, with a particularly powerful King Mook version as the F Inal Boss.
- The Phoenix: The first boss is a hostile fenghuang who spams Feather Flechettes on Mike Chen.
- Playing with Fire: There's an upgrade that turns Mike Chen's projectiles into fireballs, which deals far greater damage than the default versions. Also, the giant warlord.
- Spread Shot: An early power-up right in the first stage, turning Mike Chen's attacks into spreads of three.
- Title Drop: After defeating the last stage in the original release:"Thus, the end of the Long Journey of Michael Chen. As his wish has become the strongest superhuman in the world. People praise him and call him the great Chuka Taisen."
