The player controls a star ship, the R-9 "Arrowhead", in its efforts to destroy the Bydo, a powerful alien race bent on wiping out all of mankind.

The R-9 can acquire a glowing orbicular device called a "Force", protecting it from enemy fire and providing additional firepower.

Its success inspired several sequel and spinoff games, and home ports and releases for digital distribution services.

The Force has a secondary use as a shield; it is completely indestructible and can block most things fired at it, as well as damage or destroy enemies on contact.

The original version was shelved, and as a result of the settlement between the creators of Katakis and Activision, Manfred Trenz of Rainbow Arts had the right to do a port, which was made in six weeks.

PC Engine) console, although it suffered from a slightly lower resolution, reduced colour palette, sprite flickering and slowdown.

[citation needed] The Japanese release for the Wii is split between two downloads, mirroring the original format of the game.

[24] Collector's Edition variants were also issued which contained a hardcover artbook, dog tags, stickers and cards, once again limited to 1,000 on the PlayStation 4 and 2,000 on the Nintendo Switch.

[25][26] In Japan, Game Machine listed R-Type on their August 1, 1987 issue as being the most-successful table arcade cabinet of the month.

[1] The following month, Commodore User magazine gave it a highly positive review and noted that it drew large crowds queuing up at arcades.

A Mean Machines magazine review praised in particular the graphics and the high quality of the challenge offered by the game, awarding it an overall rating of 92%.

[27] A 1995 article in Next Generation stated that the "PC Engine [TurboGrafx-16] conversion of Irem's arcade smash R-Type is still regarded as the system's definitive contribution to the shoot 'em up genre.

Irem has developed a number of sequels and related games, including R-Type II and Armed Police Unit Gallop.

Other games similar to R-Type are Rezon, released by Allumer in 1991,[54] Aicom's Pulstar and Blazing Star (the latter published under Yumekobo) for the Neo Geo, and Technosoft's 1992 title Thunder Force IV for the Sega Genesis.

Chris Huelsbeck composed new title songs for Amiga and Commodore 64 versions which have remained as popular targets for game music remixers.