Steel Empire/Walkthrough

Rahl
Rahl is the leading mine city of the Silverhead Republic and is under attack. If the Motorhead Empire seizes control of this city, the war is then pretty much in their favor.

The stage takes place above a long railway that tunnels through small mountains. Enemies include small planes with flapping wings, railway cars armed with guns, and windmills that launch themselves into the air firing missiles. A large airship will occasionally fly overhead to paradrop enemy tanks onto the railroad.

The mini boss is a flying sea-ship, which shoots various projectiles at you including bullets and missiles. The end boss is a train with a huge cannon mounted at the front.

Liedengal Caverns
Stage two takes place in a dimly-lit, underground mine, where enemies are easily concealed in the darkness. The mini-boss is a mining vehicle equipped with a large lamp. It fires missiles and bullets from its upper frame. After defeating the mini boss, suddenly an explosion takes place, and a plume of flame erupts behind the player's craft; the electrical arcs have ignited a pocket of volatile gas. The screen scrolls leftward while the player must navigate narrow, winding caverns for about two minutes. There are some health powerups to be found.

Upon emerging from the collapsing cavern, the player faces the boss of the stage, a large mining vehicle equipped with many guns. The vehicle moves along the bottom of the screen.

Sky District Zektor
Stage three begins high in the clouds, with the Empire's Sky Fortress looming far off in the background. The mini-boss of this stage is exactly the same ship as the mini-boss of level one. This time this ship is armed with a new weapon: homing missile. Soon after, the player flies over the Sky Fortress. The fortress is a large brick castle, covered with cannons above, and held in the sky by massive propellers beneath. Each of these elements can be destroyed, often yielding powerups. The last three propellers grant you 1-ups when destroyed.

The end boss is a big air-ship with many (unused) cannons on the side, mini guns which fire at you, aircraft hangars which open up and release enemy air craft that shoot you, three rocket launchers at the bottom and a gun inside which pops out and shoots at you once you destroy the part that houses it.

Gardandi Beach
The beach is the frontline of the Motorhead Empire. This stage is littered with enemies, many of which are cleverly disguised as rocks and other land features. Halfway through the stage, the player must battle a large, green futuristic ship armed with many rotating gun turrets.

The boss of this stage is a large submarine with immense firepower. As the battle begins, missiles shoot upward from the sea. The player must avoid these while attacking the periscope, which is the only visible part of the submarine. Upon destroying the periscope, the submarine reveals itself and attacks from one of three gun turrets on its top. The submarine will periodically retreat to the depths of the sea to launch more missiles. When two of the turrets are destroyed, the submarine attacks in flight.

Dama City
Dama City is the Capital of the Motorhead. This stage starts off with your HQ being destroyed by an air-ship (the same kind that you destroyed at the end of stage 3) using its side cannons, all whilst missiles are flying towards you. The side cannons are not used to attack you when you attack the ship head-on.

After HQ is destroyed, the air-ship does a runner (no worries though, you get your revenge on it), then you are shot at by another unseen airship with its side cannons from below. Then you square off against various ships as usual until flying pods try to hit you. Use bombs to destroy the pods and you get various goodies from all of them such as 1-ups in abundance, extra vitality, more bombs and drones.

After the pods, it's the final boss. First of all the air-ship that attacked you from below (after HQ was destroyed) makes an appearance. It is the same kind of ship as the one from level 3, except a different colour scheme. Just do what you did with the level 3 one. Next, another one appears, this is the one that destroyed your HQ ship. This one is essentially the same as the level 3 one and the first one you face on this level, except it has electricity emitters which will do some damage if you get zapped. These are located on the top (where the mini guns and side cannons are), on the bottom (where the rocket launchers are) and in the gun housing part. When you destroy the housing part the bottom most ends make a sort of electric fence. It should be just as easy as the level 3 air-ship was.

Germburn Fortress
Deep beneath Dama City is the legendary Germburn Fortress, seat of Motorhead's Emperor. This stage is divided into two parts, a mountainous stage and an underground stage.

The first part of the stage takes place on a mountain side with rail tracks. Here, there are various guns firing various projectiles at you. The mini boss (uses the end boss music though) is a train, the same as the one in the first level, except it fires what looks like a spud when you shoot the cannon, and, instead of shooting bullets from the back end gun, it shoots crappy homing missiles.

After destroying the silly choo-choo, you then proceed to fly down a "pipe". Now you are in the heart of Motorhead's empire. all it really consists of is a few gun turrets here and there and the end boss is insanely easy, as it is just a purple version of the mini boss from stage 4. In fact, it is easier to destroy since it doesn't fly as high up.

After destroying the boss, you now discover a big, red bullet being towed into the "pipe", which is now revealed to be a big cannon. You follow suit and you and the bullet are blasted into space.

Lunar Place
You start off in space, with a few of the para-boxes flying around. You then discover that the giant bullet you followed is in fact a starship. First it shoots using a mini turret mounted on the top, then once it's destroyed, it simply floats up. As you fly ahead, it comes down from the top, this time with another mini turret on the bottom. It also has an aircraft hangar that releases little helicopters. Once the hangar and turret are destroyed, it floats down.

The next time you encounter it, it just comes in from the right of the screen. This time, two arm-like guns extend from the rear near the propeller and shoot at you. Once you have destroyed the propellers, it will stop everything and drift backwards towards you, then a jet engine emerges, it fires up its engines and speeds off ahead. It then proceeds to shoot at you again full force. If you did not destroy the arm-like guns before this point, you might struggle a little.

Once destroyed (when it blows up like a boss/mini boss does), you start to fly towards a planet. Then you discover the bullet's wreckage (be careful not to fly into it as it damages your ship). Just when you think that its safe, you find out the true reason why the bullet was launched: it was carrying another aircraft.

The end boss is the aircraft that was in the bullet. It comes up from the lower left corner of the screen, where the bullet wreck is (just off screen at this point). It shoots various projectiles, as well as fireballs and eventually fire walls. Just to further annoy you, there are also meteorites drifting across the screen which can't be destroyed and harm your ship if you fly into them.

There is one good thing about the meteorites though. They provide cover for you when the ship starts shooting firewalls, which you could not dodge otherwise.