_____ _.---. |"-_____ _ _ __.----. .--"" "- /" | | ___\ / "-----" \ | __...:. /__..---. | / .--:: | | "--. .--" | | | | : : / /__| | | |____ | | | |___ | |.-"" / | ___ | | ___/ | | | ; | |'. / | \ | | | | | | | .-"' | | \ \ \ \ | | | | | | | | | | \ \ \ \|__| | | | | | |____ | | \ \ \.-" |.-" |___| |_______/ |__| \ / \/ _________ ___ __ _________ ___ __ ______ _________ / \ / / | | / "-. | "-._| | | \ / \ /______ | / / | | /______ | | | | ____\ /_____ | / / / / / / | | | | ". ' | | | | | | "-. | ; ; / / | | | | | | ." ." | | | "-.___ | | | / | | \ / | | | | | |" / | |\ | | / | | / / | | \ \ | \ / | | |\ \ | | \ | | |"-../ | |.-" / | | / | | "" | | | \ \ | | \ | | | | |\ \ | |_/ / \ | | | \ \ | | \ | | "-._ | | \ \ | _../ \________| |__| \ ./ | | | | |_ ; | | \ \ \_..-" \/ "-.| |_| "-.___/ \| \ ./ \/ COMPLETE WALKTHROUGH BY KAAS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Introduction aaaa~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Welcome to the FAQ of Afterburner, a fun, but very difficult shoot 'em up for the Nintendo Entertainment System. I decided to write this FAQ for a few reasons. The most obvious one is the fact I had nothing to write for, so I had to do something. I remember playing this game a few times, and I remember enjoying it. Also, it was written with the NES completion project in mind (basically it's an idea to have FAQs for every NES game; check the GameFAQs boards for more information). It's a pretty simple game, which is good, because I'm rather busy lately. Anyway, if you have any complaints, suggestions, questions or have something to tell me, e-mail me at the following adress: Kaas(dot)Bink(at)GMail. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Content bbbb~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In here you can find the different areas of the walkthrough. Press ctrl+f to open the search box, then enter the code you see next to the chapter to get there faster. Introduction........................aaaa Content.............................bbbb Version History.....................cccc Controls............................dddd Story...............................eeee Weapons.............................ffff Enemies.............................gggg Scoring Points......................hhhh Gameplay Hints & Tips...............iiii The Stages..........................jjjj Special Thanks......................kkkk Legal Stuff.........................llll ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Version History cccc~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Version 1.0 - 4/July/2005 The FAQ is complete, and submitted. If someone emails me extra information, I'll add it, but I think it's completely done now. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Controls dddd~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The controls of this game are very simple. There are only a few things possible with your plane, so it shouldn't take you long to master them. Directional Pad (+): this moves your airplane. Pressing left makes your plane go to the left, pressing right makes it go right. The controls for moving up and down are reversed however, so press up to go down and down to go up. It's also possible to do a barrel roll, which can come in handy while dodging the incoming fire from enemy planes. To do this, go one direction by pressing left or right, then quickly go to the other direction and keep holding down that direction. Barrel Rolls are an easy way to dodge missiles coming from behind. Select Button: this pauses the game. Press it again to continue. Start Button: press this to start the game. This button is also used to activate the afterburner. This increases your speed for a short period of time. I didn't find it very useful, as you'll (well, I) get shot down faster because you don't have enough time to dodge. A Button: press this button to fire your Vulcan cannon. Yes, you heard me: your Vulcan cannon. B Button: this is used to fire air-to-air missiles. In some levels, you're given the change to load up on fuel and missiles. Don't worry about messing this up, as it goes automatically. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Story eeee~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As you would expect from a shooter like After Burner, there isn't much story. However, the creators did add a little story to make us gamers happy. It isn't special, but it's there. I took it straight out of the manual. Don't expect to see anything about a story in the game, however. When you play After Burner, you're flying high and fast... in the F-14 Thunder Cat - the leanest, meanest fighting machine ever made. And the free world needs you and your set of wings desperately: Naval Intelligence has pin- pointed the two locations where the enemy has hidden its diabolical two-party plan to conquer the world! To get to these sites, you're called upon to use every ounce of your flying and combat skills to survive bogies, missiles and tracers that are dying to blow you out of the sky! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Weapons ffff~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There are only two weapons in the game, but I'll describe them anyway. It's important to know when to use which weapon, and what the weapons do. The Vulcan Cannon (fire with the A button) This is a 20mm rapid fire cannon. You can aim by looking at your visor on- screen (the white little square in front of your plane). When an enemy plane is in the white square, press A to shoot your Vulcan Cannon (move your plane to move your visor too). You can't hit the planes from a long distance with this cannon; you'll need to wait until they're a bit closer to you, making this a bit of a dangerous cannon. It has unlimited ammunition however, so usually I just keep the A button pressed down at all times. The air-to-air missiles (fire with the B button) These are a bit more impressive than your cannon, but they are also a bit harder to aim. These heatseeking missiles use a lock-on. The game locks-on on enemy planes automatically, you can see it has when a plane has a green square around it. It only locks-on when your visor (the little square) is near the enemy plane, so keep moving to get that lock-on. As soon as you see the square, you can fire your missiles, and they usually hit the enemy (they can still miss however). If you fire your missiles without a lock-on, they always miss, so don't do that. Also important to know is the fact that these missiles aren't limitless as the cannon. You start with 70 missiles, but you can reload (and sometimes get more than 70) at given points in the game (usually every two or three stages). When to use which gun? Good question. The best answer is also very simple. You'll notice there are some different approaches from the enemy. Sometimes they'll fly towards you, sometimes they come from behind. When they come from behind, it's usually impossible (and often useless) to get a good lock-on, so you should use your cannon there. But when they come towards you, changes are you get a lot of lock-ons. Try to take them out before they can fire at you. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Enemies gggg~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ There are only four different enemies in the game, not counting objects like buildings, missiles and mountains. Intercepter: this is a supersonic fighter. Dragonfly: this is a Class 1 Fighter. V/Stoll: This is a Harrier Class Jump Jet. Bearmax: The only chopper in the game. It's a High Altitude Helicopter Gunship. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Scoring Points hhhh~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You can earn points in a few different ways. You can shoot enemies, stay alive and earn some bonus points. Shoot enemy planes/choppers: you'll earn 2500 points per enemy. Take out missiles: this will earn you 800 points per missile. Bonus Points: this is calculated by this formula: (Total number of enemy aircraft show down in the previous three stages) x 20,000 points. These points are added to your total at the beginning of every new stage. Staying alive: this will earn you approximately 125 points per second. While scoring points may seem useless at first, except the obvious bragging which some of you might find attractive, points actually serve a purpose in this game. When you earn 5.000.000 points, you earn another jet. The same thing happens at 15.000.000 points; it's another jet for you! While these scores are pretty hard to achieve, it is possible if you're good. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Gameplay Hints & Tips iiii~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In this section, I'll try to give you some hints and tipcs for playing the game. It's a fast game, so the first thing you'll need are some good reflexes and a good hand to eye coordination. If you lack those, try these hints I included to help you with the game! - Practise, practise, practise! This game is hard, so the first time you'll play, you'll probably die a lot. Don't worry to much about it. After a while you'll get better, and dodge those evil enemies and shoot them to bits! - Target enemies before they fire. I've said this before, but it is very important. You can shoot a lot of them down before they are anywhere close to you. This should be your primary strategy. Try to recognize the dots in the distance as enemies, and move your visor over it to lock-on on them. Then blow them to pieces! Even if you manage to only defeat a few of a group of enemies, it will be worth it, because fire from 1 enemy is easier to dodge than fire from 3 or 4 enemies. - Use your Head-up display. In flight, the HUD (Head-up Display) screen shows you where the enemy is coming from so you'll know instantly where to aim. The white radar frame represents the full game screen you see at that time. Red blips indicate enemy aircraft; the horizontal line shows the position of your wings relative to the horizon. If you see red blips outside the white frame, this tells you that enemy aircraft are approaching from the side. If you turn toward them, you can get them in your sights. When the red blips come inside the white frame, the enemy is approaching head-on. - Be alert. Some of the enemy aircraft will start firing before you even see them, so be extra careful. Be ready do dodge quickly at all times, or you'll pay the price. - Shoot the enemies coming at you first. Don't worry too much about the enemies coming from behind, they're actually pretty harmless. They can't shoot you, because they're going the other way. The enemies approaching you however, pose the bigger threath. They'll shoot you down easily, so take them out as fast as you can. If it ain't there, it can't hit you, right? - Learn to dodge enemy fire! Probably the most important hint. Dodging is crucial to your survival! You should practise this a lot. I found going to the left or right side the best way to dodge fire. Pay attention when the enemy fires, then quickly go the right way. When you notice the missile is coming in your direction, you can still dodge it by going to the other side fast. When multiple planes fire at you in succession, it's usually best to move from left to right to left etc. Barrel Rolls usually don't prove to be very good at dodging, because you can't move while rolling. If you're rolling, and an enemy fires at you, he'll usually hit you. - Keep moving. This has multiple purposes. First of all, this comes in handy dodging. Sometimes you can't see the enemy fire very well, for example when you're in front of it, so it's best to keep in motion. If you keep completely still, you're dead for sure. Secondly, when you keep moving, you'll be able to lock-on far away enemies. The lock-on doesn't explore for you, so you'll have to target the enemies before the system locks-on. - Dodge missiles from behind effectively. In the later stages, you'll encounter missiles coming from behind. They are easy to shake off by doing a barrel roll, but if you've read the other hints, you'll know you'll be vulnerable while doing a barrel roll. The solution is easy. Wait a little while before shaking it off. Take care of all the enemies first, then wait a bit longer until new enemies appear. Now do your barrel roll, lock-on on targets while in your roll and fire missiles at them. This will need a bit of practise, but when mastered, it is very useful! - Cheat... If you really can't beat the game (which is no shame), try this code Retro submitted to GameFAQs for infinite continues. When your game is over and you're at the blue After Burner screen, press Left, Left, Left, B, B, B, A, A, A, Start. You will continue on the level you just got a game over on. Look at GameFAQs code section for this game for more cheats (even if they're a bit more useless...). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Stages jjjj~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In this section, I'll take a quick look at the different stages of the game. I'll give some information about them, and tell what to watch out for. I'm not going to tell every single plane and from which direction it comes from, as I think that's rather useless, becuase if you know how to handle your enemies, iy won't matter from which direction they come. I also included a description of the stage, for it is impossble to say in which stage you are ingame. They only mention it at the beginning of each stage, so I thought it would be handy to include, so you can see fast at which stage you are. Stage 1: The enviroment is just the sea and the blue skies. This one's pretty easy. Most of the planes will come from behind, but there are a few that'll come towards you, so take them out with your missiles. Some of the planes which come towards you will be firing in advance, so keep dodging. Stage 2: This stage has a green, boiling sea and a lightgreen sky. This stage is a bit more crowded, and you will be fired at a bit more. Just keep focused and it should be no problem. At the end of this stage your plane will be refueled and you are given an additional 70 missiles! Stage 3: The sky is black here, and the sea is dark blue with waves. At the beginning of this stage, there's a big missile coming from behind. It's easy to get rid of by doing a barrel roll. This stage is pretty tough already, but not too long. A lot of the enemies are coming towards you, so keep firing those missiles! This stage also introduces a new enemy. Stage 4: The sky is blue again, and it seems like you're flying over green land with some trees on it. More enemies coming towards you, so keep moving. Nobody comes from behind, so keep your missiles ready. Make sure you know how to handle your missiles by now, as you'll need them a lot in the later stages. Stage 5: We're flying over the road this time, with brown trees next to us. A car will come from the left, and gives you about 70 new missiles. Yay! You can't steer or shoot in this stage, so consider it a bonus stage. I like bonus stages ^_^ Stage 6: a blue sky, with white clouds underneath you. More enemies coming towards you, but there also a few coming from behind. Something tricky in this stage are the missiles coming from behind. They'll fly near you, and will hit you after a while, so move around to shake them off. If you don't, they'll bring you down. Stage 7: A nice blue sky again, and some trees, like in stage 4. Again, there are missiles coming from behind, so move around again to shake them off. A new enemy comes flying around too here, so look out. Stage 8: A nice brown sky, and some nice brown rocks at the side. Kinda like a brown Death Star... This stage is a bit different than the others you've encountered thus far. You fly through a canyon very fast, and it's your job to dodge buildings. Touching a building makes you crash, but touching the wall makes you crash too. Just keep firing your Vulcan Cannon to destroy some buildings and you should be fine (for some reason it is impossible to fire missiles in this stage). At the end of the stage is a refuel point again, which provides you with an additional 70 missiles. I think this stage is where you pick up one of the plans which the story in the manual mentions, but it is impossible to be sure... Stage 9: A purple sky with white clouds underneath. This stage isn't very hard. Just shake off the big missile in the beginning, then dodge or shoot the oncoming planes out of the air. A little variaton here is the fact the planes (well, some of them) are coming towards you in a straight line, lined up behind each other. At the end (when they're near you), they split up and can easily surprise you, so be aware of that. Luckily, this stage isn't very long. Stage 10: Blue sky, rocky surface. Another big missile in the beginning (you know what to do with it now). There will be a few more of those missiles, and planes from behind and in front. At the end, your weapons will be reloaded again (you guessed it; 70 missiles for you!). Stage 11: Dark blue sky, blue surface. Pretty tough stage, with lots of enemies, from both sides too. Keep dodging and firing those missiles to survive. Stage 12: Nice blue sky, brown with green fields. This stage is very hard, because there are a lot of incoming planes firing at you. There are also a few big missiles from behind to bother you even more. It's important to shoot down the incoming planes as fast as possible. In the beginning, most planes arrive on the left side of the screen, so look out for that area. Stage 13: We're on the road again, with some green trees. You can't control your plane, as you're about to receive another 70 missiles! Stage 14: Yellow sky, green and pink ground. This stage is a bit easier than the previous one, but it's still no picnic! A lot of aggresive jets here, who love to fire at you. There's the occasional big missele from behind again, and even some enemies from behind. Alot of the enemies here seem to appear in the middle of the screen, and are easy targets for your auto lock-on. Stage 15: Blue sky, gray with yellow road. There's a new problem here, as there seem to be planes capable of firing salvos at you. They shoot a burst of about 6 missiles, so in order to survive this stage, I suggest you shoot them down before they have a change of firing! It is possible to dodge those bursts, but it's pretty hard. You'll get some new missiles at the end of this stage. Stage 16: a bit dark blue sky, light blue ground with some houses on it. Nothing special here, just some incoming missiles who fire at you. Been there, done that so just shoot them down before they can fire. Stage 17: Another Death Staresque stage. Grey mountains on the side, and a yellow with white ground, filled with towers, buildings and tanks. Touching a building makes you crash, but touching the wall makes you crash too. Just keep firing your Vulcan Cannon to destroy some buildings and you should be fine (for some reason it is impossible to fire missiles in this stage). Stage 18: blue sky, grey and green ground. Nothing new here, just look out for the big missiles from behind. The enemies seem to fire faster at you here, but if you manage to shoot them out of the air fast and dodge the remaining missiles fired at you, you should manage to complete this level without much trouble. Also, the first few planes don't fire at you for some reason. At the end of the stage you get another refuel. Stage 19: Light blue sky with red and orange ground. This stage can be pretty hard, as it has quite a lot of missiles from behind, and jet firing at you at the same time. Try to shoot them out of the air before dealing with the missile. Look out for missiles heading your way, as some can be hard to spot, because the ground and missiles look a bit alike. There are also a few of the planes that fire bursts at you. Stage 20: nice blue sky, dark and light green grass as ground. This stage is pretty hard. Again, quite a lot of missiles from behind, and a lot of jets coming at you. They seem to be harder to lock-on in this stage, so you must pay close attention. At then end is another refuel. Stage 21: blue sky, blue and green ground. Pretty tough stage again, filled with oncoming jets. A few missiles from behind, but not much. The thing to look out here are the four lined up jets. They split up when they're close to you, and can surprise you. Try to recognize them and take them out. Stage 22: blue sky, brown ground with green palm trees. This stage isn't very hard. There are some missiles from behind again, but you have plenty (well, if you're good enough and you should be by now) to dodge them. Planes seems to fire only when they're a bit closer, so you should be able to shoot a lot of them out of the air before they can fire. Stage 23: classic blue sky and the good ol' blue sea. At least, that's what it looks like at first... You're back at the beginning; you'll land on the aircraft carrier automatically and a screen comes up saying "Mission Complete, congratulations". Press any button to return to the main screen. Yep, that's it. No bosses, no end sequence, no text, nothing. Ah well, at least you completed the very hard NES game After Burner! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Special Thanks kkkk~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ CJayC: for hosting this FAQ and creating GameFAQs. Sega & Tengen: for creating this fun game. Revned: for starting the NES Completion Project. Devin Morgan: for taking over and taking care of said project. Retro: for allowing me to use his cheat. Zharlock: for annoying me, wherever I go... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Legal Stuff llll~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This walkthrough, and all it's content (including the ASCIIs), is Copyrighted, 2005 by Jaap van Zon. This walkthrough is only allowed on www.gamefaqs.com. No part of this walkthrough can be used without proper quoting and/or recognition. Any person(s) found violating this copyright is/are punishable by law and will be to the fullest extent. If you see this walkthrough on another site, please alert me.