Fire Mustang by Taito, released to the Sega Genesis in 1991. Originally released as "US-AAF Mustang" in the Arcade a year earlier.
Here we have a hated game. A hated, hated game. Why does it get so much hate? Alright I am exaggerating. When I was a kid, my friend visited the UK and brought back a local game magazine which absolutely tore this game to shreds. They went on and on about how much Fire Mustang sucked.
Even in doing some research for this writeup, a couple quick looks around the Internet do a good job of tearing Fire Mustang a new one. What gives? Is this game really that bad?
I'd have to disagree. The game is by no means.. wonderful, but it is playable, and dare I say it, kinda fun. You have to remember that the Sega Genesis (and it's rival, the TurboGrafx-16/PC-Engine) was absolutely riddled with side-scrolling shooters back in the day. Thing is, most of them were in outer space, in some fantastic futuristic battle. Therefore, it is refreshing anytime we saw something otherwise!
This game does a good job of placing you in a hectic lone firefight in the middle of the Theater of WWII. It's by no means a simulation, or accurate, or even any kind of realistic - it's just an excuse to have WWII graphics overlayed over the usual side-scroller engine, really; but it does a good job of that, and it is certainly fun to blast through.
Pick this up if you are a fan of Capcom's 1942 series, as it is kind of a nice complement to those earlier games; simple and straightforward (and hey, it's got a sharp title screen as well!) You won't be blown away by the primitive presentation, but this forgotten game is still solid and will keep you coming back for a few more tries.