Toaplan

Toaplan (東亜プラン, Tōa Puran^?) was a video game developer from Japan. They were responsible for the creation of a wide array of relatively famous scrolling shooters and arcade games, yet the company declared bankruptcy in 1994.

Popular games from Toaplan include Zero Wing, Snow Bros, Tiger Heli, Flying Shark, Twin Cobra and Out Zone. As it may be difficult to find these games in their original form, a common way to play them now is using an arcade emulator such as Shark Emulator or MAME.

[edit] Games

Batsugun
Demon's World / Horror Story
Dogyuun
Enma Daio (King of Hell)
Fire Shark / Same! Same! Same!
Fix Eight
Flying Shark / Sky Shark / Hishou Zame (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Ghox
Grindstormer / V-5
Guardian / Get Star (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Hellfire
Jong Kyou (Mahjong Mania)
Jong Ou (Mahjong King) (publisher: SNK)
Knuckle Bash
Mahjong Sisters
Musha Aleste: Full Metal Fighter Ellinor (Japanese distribution only; developed by Compile)
Out Zone
Performan (publisher: Data East)
Pipi & Bibi's / Whoopee!
Rally Bike / Dash Yarou (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Slap Fight / Alcon (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Snow Bros
Snow Bros. 2 / Otenki Paradise
Teki Paki
Tiger Heli (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Truxton / Tatsujin (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Truxton 2 / Tatsujin Oh
Twin Cobra / Kyūkyoku Tiger (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Twin Hawk / Daisen Pu (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Vimana
Wardner / Pyros (publisher: Taito Corporation)
Zero Wing

After Toaplan closed its doors in 1994, several former employees formed or were involved with the following companies:

Cave
8ing/Raizing
Gazelle (creators of Air Gallet and the Sailor Moon arcade game; both distributed by Banpresto)
Takumi (creators of Giga Wing and Mars Matrix)