Every single game I can find that has a multi-directional shooting mechanic and is of the overhead perspective (though sometimes isometric). Be it Asteroids, Gauntlet, Bosconian, Pocky and Rocky, Robotron, Sinistar, Alien Breed, Ikari Warriors, or Chaos Engine.
I posted it mostly to aid Timewarpgamer just in case he needed a reference sheet of all the games since I heard he was going to do an arena shooter list. Not all will fit into his specific definitions (not even sure what his definitions are), but maybe it'll help. I also posted it in case someone else besides myself is interested in games that share this same overhead shooting mechanic and wanted to find games that are similar.
Some are a lot more borderline than others. The arcade games are pretty much pure shooters, though. Overhead Run-N-Guns, Arena Shooters, or whatever else you want to call them. I'm in the process of sorting out all my sub-sub-genres currently, but I won't bore people with the methodologies of how this list will eventually form.
It really is kind of sad. A lot of these games have been completely forgotten by time. Other genres like side scrolling run-n-guns (like contra) and shmups have been far better categorized and documented.
And, like I said, that list is a bit old now. I'm currently in the process of breaking down the list into three separate lists covering arcade games, computer games, and console games. I'm starting with arcade games since they grandfathered the entire mechanic. You could even say it's probably one of the oldest gameplay mechanics in existence (the mechanic of overhead omni-directional shooting, I mean).
I actually posted this revision of the list back in Dec. 2008 over at Shmups. I'd link to it, but I'm not entirely sure if offsite linking to another board is frowned upon here.
As you can tell by my post count, I'm not the most common visitor of these boards. If anyone is interested in the initial methodologies of how this list started, you may want to go dig up that thread. My username is the same there as it is here, so you could just dig back a bit given that search term.
Hopefully this helps someone. I've spent a long time compiling this information and though I doubt 99% of anyone cares, I'm sure there's a person or two who may be interested in a gander. I know I hadn't heard of many of these games until I started this. I still have a lot of games that will be added to the list.
After I finish updating the entire arcade portion of the list I'm planning on researching every single game on every single platform to see if any of them share some of the same mechanics. That's whats going to take ages. AGES.
Anywho. Enjoy.
Edit: I should also say that the list is sorted by region and by platform. It has a listing for every single SKU of every game, so, for example, there's several Asteroids on the list. One for every platform for every region. The regions are also color-coded, if that aids any.
