http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvRmngCaR0Q
Tengai is a classic (literally) side scrolling shmup that saw release back in the 90’s, and it’s now available on both iOS and Android devices.
The game was notorious for being very challenging at the time, and for the option to use characters instead of ships – almost pioneering the use of characters when ships were predominantly in most other shmups.
The game also featured a story that was more than just “hero steps up to save the world,” in the sense that each character had his or her own ending, and all six characters play differently as well.
