its commands. The magnetic rays also allow Darc Seed/Eva to control many deadly weapons, including the most powerful weapon of all—the legendary samurai sword Shura. The head of the samurai Namakubi hears of Shura falling into Darc Seed's clutches. He then heads to the United States to destroy Darc Seed, free the American people from the looming zombification and reclaim the samurai sword Shura. Development and release The game was first released in Japan under the name Abarenbou Tengu on December 14, 1990. The US version was released a month later. As both versions only have differences between the sprites, with the Japanese version having a tengu mask belonging to Japanese folklore, the US version has major graphical and story changes, replacing the tengu mask with the decapitated samurai head. Aside from the differences, both games are practically identical, with the Japanese version having only a few major differences: In Abarenbou Tengu, the player must obtain the rapid fire ability. In Zombie Nation, the player starts with it. The main character's sprite is not that of the flying samurai head, Namakubi, but that of a Japanese konoha tengu head. The title screen is different with the tengu's head being incorporated into it. The boss of Round I is an evil Statue of Liberty in both games but with a slightly different sprite; instead of being green with snakes in place of its crown in Zombie Nation, it's red and has a normal crown. Reception The St. Petersburg Times tied the game with Splatterhouse 2 as the tenth best video game of 1992. Mashable, in ranking Zombie Nation the second weirdest video game of all time, claimed it "brings the side-scrolling shooter genre to a weird and gross new height. As challenging as it is confusing, the high point of this game is the chance to take down an animated, evil Statue of Liberty." On the other hand, the Japanese version is criticized due to its difficulty and gameplay, and considered a . However, both versions of the game are considered a cult hit among gamers. Other media Abarenbou Tengu is one of the video games adapted into a manga titled , published in the Gamest Comics collection from April 1999, drawn by Kouta Hirano. In August 2020, City Connection announced a re-release of the game under the name . The game was released on both the Nintendo Switch and Microsoft