Update 7/1 - Aero Fighters/Sonic Wings, Dark Fall, Oniken, Vigilance of Talos V, Paranoiascope, Ether Vapor Remaster

Aero Fighters, also known under the name Sonic Wings, is a series of overhead shooters mostly known for featuring a dolphin named Spanky. Essentially the predecessor to various Psikyo games like Sengoku Ace, they're fairly okay games elevated to extra levels of goofiness due to their cast members. To contrast that, take a look at the Dark Fall games, a series of (mostly) first person horror adventure games from developed Jonathan Boakes. And for just plain flat out craziness, do check out Paranoiascape, designed by a Hollywood special effets artist who calls himself. Screaming Mad George.

Vigilance on Talos V is a game I remember from a PC Gamer demo disc ages ago, mostly because it was a huge ripoff of Super Metroid, blended with a bit of Turrican and some Western design and graphic sensibilities. It's clumsy, but anyone with a thing for exploratory platformers should take a look, at least, because while parts of it seem like heavy infringement, it does have a style of its own. And part 11 of the iOS Shooters article covers Siberian Strike, Sky Thunder, SkySmash 1918 and Shoot It.

On the recent indie side of things, Oniken is a brilliant tribute to NES action games, taking inspiration from Ninja Gaiden, Vice: Project Doom, any number of Natsume games (Shatterhand, Shadow of the Ninja, SCAT), along with a healthy influence from Fist of the North Star and other bits of craziness. It's a ridiculous deal for $5 over at Desura. And Nyu Media, who has been releasing a number of doujin localizations like Satazius and the eXceed shooter trilogy, has published Ether Vapor Remaster, an enhanced version of the classy shoot-em-up we covered here a few years back, also available from their web site for a very reasonable $7.99. And finally, Your Weekly Kusoge is Savage Warriors, one of the many long line of ill-conceived, ill-executed fighting game clones for the PCs in the mid-90s.