Vulgus never got a sequel, but one almost manifested on the NES. Titan Warriors (or Neo Vulgus) was nearly complete to the point that two playable prototypes have been found and released, one back in 2007 and the other as recently as Christmas day of 2024 by Frank Cifaldi of the Video Game History Foundation. As for the game itself, it manages to diverge significantly from Vulgus despite its sequel status. Instead of cannon ammo and the various enemy-related items, your ship can now find genre standard speed-ups and power-ups such as a powerful laser and shots that bounce off walls. You can also find two pods that you can send out horizontally to cover more space similar to R-Type, which is immensely helpful since Titan Warriors is a faster-paced game.
Titan Warriors still loops, but it has twelve stages across six planets and a proper ending before doing so. The first level of a planet involves flying above land and dealing with a wider playing field, whereas the second level takes place in space and generally puts you in tight corridors. You also get boss fights at the end of every level and while some of them get reused, they’re welcome challenges that encourage strategic placement of your pods. In certain stages, you’ll find two alien embryos with life support tubes on each side. If you fail to destroy both of them, then you’ll fight them in the next stage fully grown, where they replace the regular boss. Not many shoot-em-ups have this type of branching, even modern ones! Titan Warriors also has much more of a defined and varied aesthetic, starting similarly to Vulgus and descending into fleshy body horror. Some bosses even go as far as launching eyeballs at you! Vulgus does return as the villain in the game’s minimal plot, though it takes on a humanoid form instead.
While Titan Warriors is nothing groundbreaking, it would have fared well amongst other shoot-em-ups on the platform had it come out in 1988 like planned. It has solid enough visuals that feel ahead of the various arcade ports that populated the system and it’s mechanically engaging enough to make a playthrough worthwhile without requiring a ton of dedication to complete. The level design in particular stands out, throwing a good variety of tricks and surprises at the player while leaving plenty of room to experiment with the pods. It also has a full-fledged soundtrack by Harumi Fujita, who was responsible for music on games like Bionic Commando, Final Fight, and Sweet Home. It’s unfortunate that Vulgus’s focus on scoring through particular playstyles and accumulating multipliers was removed and Titan Warriors isn’t as challenging in general, but if you enjoy Capcom’s NES output, it’s certainly worth your time to seek out the prototype and give it a play.
Links
A write up about Titan Warriors by Frank Cifaldi
