Gunblade NY: Special Air Force Assault is a 1995 Light Gun Game with Rail Shooter elements developed and published by Sega using the Model 2 hardware for its arcade machines. Set in New York City, terrorists called "BEAR EX", disguised as a shipping company, attack Times Square on July 12 2005 with hopes to overthrow the government. Fortunately, the military rolls out the "Special Air Assault Force" (S.A.A.F.) to take care them using a special helicopter with man-controlled turrets. L.A. Machineguns: Rage of the Machines is the 1998 sequel using the SEGA Model 3 Step 2 hardware, but rather than a helicopter, players use hoverbikes in a futuristic 2025 Los Angeles to quell another terrorist organization as part of the "Special Independent Force Against Terrorism" (S.I.F.A.T.).
Gunblade NY features three modes of play: two campaign scenarios ("Easy" and "Hard") of four difficulty-specific levels and a unique "Score Attack Remix", a Time Trial where players must score as many points as possible using one credit within a total of 300 seconds across 4 stages. L.A. Machineguns opted out in favor of a singular campaign with four levels that are selectable by players to tackle in any order; completing all four "successfully" and within time constraints unlocks the fifth and final stage of the game.
In August 2010, both games were compiled and ported onto the Wii as Gunblade NY & L.A. Machineguns Arcade Hits Pack to take advantage of the console's hand-held motion controllers to mimic the original arcade. While Gunblade NY remains largely unchanged for the port, this version of L.A. Machineguns includes unlockable weapons, different shooting styles (shotgun spread instead of rapid-fire) and extending the "Chain Combo" to allow higher scores than the original arcade version. Both games also feature leaderboards that are, unfortunately, defunct due to the service discontinuation of the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection in May 2014.
Tropes for both games include:
- Antagonist Title: The subtitle for L.A. Machineguns is Rage of the Machines, which is the name of the terrorist organization you fight in the game.
- Anti-Air: The second level of the "Easy" route in ''Gunblade N.Y." is to destroy an anti-air emplacement.
- Battleship Raid: The Final Boss battle of L.A. Machineguns has you attacking the aircraft carrier of the Big Bad above the Valley of Fire.
- BFG: What the boss in the Alcatraz level of L.A. Machineguns will use when its Hit Points are about to hit zero.
- Big Applesauce: With surprisingly accurate Real Life locations in the city for Gunblade NY, ranging from Times Square, the United Nations headquarters, Brooklyn Bridge, Battery Park and Grand Army Plaza.
- Big Bad: The Bear EX leader piloting a robot in Gunblade NY and the Mad Scientist in L.A. Machineguns.
- Bottomless Magazines: Justified in Gunblade NY as players are using a turret mounted to an attack helicopter, though the same can't be said about L.A. Machineguns since the Player Characters are using handheld weaponry while piloting a hover bike.
- Call-Back: Possibly. In the Alcatraz mission of LA Machineguns, you fight a giant red robot reminiscent of the final boss in Gunblade NY. In fact, it's possible that the seemingly random prisoner the cyborgs free is the Bear EX leader from the first game as well.
- Death Is a Slap on the Wrist / Meaningless Lives: The Wii version. Lose all your lives in this Wii re-release and you can just press a button to continue with three lives with infinite continues, no worse for the wear apart from score reset.
- Elaborate Underground Base: One selectable level is Yosemite National Park in L.A. Machineguns, which hosts an underground complex
- Gas Mask Mooks: All of the enemies in the game wear gas masks, possibly to obscure the fact that they're actually robots that likely don't have actual human faces.
- Government Agency of Fiction: The S.A.A.F. in Gunblade NY and the S.I.F.A.T. in L.A. Machineguns.
- High-Altitude Battle: The entirety of the final stage in L.A. Machineguns
- Hostage Spirit-Link: Only in L.A. Machineguns yet averted as players won't be penalized by a loss of life, but instead a deduction in points tallied at the end of a level.
- Hover Tank: A set of five of these serve as the boss for the Las Vegas level in L.A. Machineguns
- Human Shield: In the Los Angeles level of L.A. Machineguns, during the sequence of rescuing the President of the United States, if all but one Mook is destroyed, the last one will take the president hostage and use him to shield itself.
- Humongous Mecha: The Big Bad of Gunblade NY pilots one.
- Jet Packs: Some Mooks in L.A. Machineguns are equipped with these
- Killer Robots: All Mooks in Gunblade NY are actually Artificial Humans. The ones in LA Machineguns appear to be cyborgs, as if you blow off their helmets you can see they have human brains underneath.
- Macross Missile Massacre: Expect this to occur at higher difficulties when multiple Mooks are shooting rockets simultaneously at players; by default, most bosses will pull this.
- Mad Scientist: The Big Bad of L.A. Machineguns is this.
- More Dakka: These games are all about turning robots into walking blocks of Swiss cheese and watching them burst into fireballs with a hailstorm of metal-tearing bullets.
- Multiple Endings: The ending in the "Hard" path in Gunblade NY depends on whether you defeat the Stage 2 boss or not. If you succeed, the ending has your commander shake hands with you. If you fail, the ending has your commander punching you.
- Pre Ass Kicking One Liner: The Big Bad of Gunblade NY has two of these when you fight him."On the contrary, it is quite not over yet!""It's about time we put an end to our relationship!"
- Protagonist Title: The subtitle for Gunblade NY is "Special Air Assault Force", referring to the anti-terrorist organization in that game.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni:
- For the protagonists, S.I.F.A.T. is the red and S.A.A.F. is the blue. S.I.F.A.T. focuses on going all out against the terrorists while S.A.A.F. tries to protect the government.
- For the terrorists, the Rage of the Machines is red while Bear EX is blue. While Bear EX did a precise assault by putting NYC into lockdown, the terrorist attacks caused by Rage of the Machines were scattered, consisting of various attacks within California and Nevada.
- Renegade Russian: The BEAR EX is implied to be Russian, with the color motive and MOSCOW - NY shipping source - destination list.
- Rewarding Vandalism: The likes of barrels and vehicles in L.A. Machineguns; not only are they accompanied by a point bonus, it becomes a necessity to target destructible objects in order to keep the scoring combo from decreasing.
- Robotic Reveal: The terrorists on the surface look like humans wearing gas masks, but getting shot reveals their completely metal frames underneath.
- Scoring Points: While Gunblade NY had minimal score prerequisites, L.A. Machineguns expands this with a combo system based on how many enemies are destroyed consecutively without pause using a combo gauge seen around the targeting reticule.
- Shoot the Bullet: The only way to avoid taking damage besides destroying the enemies as fast as you can.
- Time Trial: As a selectable game mode in Gunblade NY
- Timed Mission: Each stage in L.A. Machineguns is timed for roughly five to six minutes. If the timer reaches zero, the stage is considered "unsuccessful", thereby locking out the final stage for play.
- Title Drop: The description for the final stage in L.A. Machineguns calls the organization responsible for the terrorist attacks in the game as "Rage of the Machines".
- Updated Re-release: As a console port for the Wii
- Viva Las Vegas!: One of the selectable levels in L.A. Machineguns takes place in the world-famous Las Vegas Strip.
