Raiden

is a series of arcade games by Seibu Kaihatsu initially available in arcades in Japan and later distributed to other countries by Fabtek and other arcade game manufacturers. The game that began the franchise was Raiden. It was ported for the PlayStation as The Raiden Project. In the 1990s, it was ported to various home computers and game consoles of the time. Later ports were released on mobile phones. Seibu Kaihatsu developed the Raiden games and its related spin-offs from 1990 until 1998. The license of Raiden was later purchased by MOSS in 2005. Raiden III and Raiden IV have been developed on various Taito boards (Taito Type X series), while Raiden V is the first game in the series to be released first on a home console (the Xbox One) and never have an arcade release. Overview In each installment, there is a threat to humanity posed by the invasion of Earth by an alien lifeform known as the Crystals. In the wake of the Crystal proliferation, the world joined to form the VCD, which must launch a counter-attack with their powerful weapon based on Crystal technology, the Fighting Thunder attack craft, for the future of humanity. In most of the Raiden games, the Crystals are represented by a large red crystal that forms the core of the games' bosses and is the final boss. The first two Raiden installments had eight stages. Raiden III consists of seven stages while Raiden IV has five. Raiden V introduces branching stage paths that depend on player performance.