I've finally managed to pull this list together, and what a trip it's been! Shmups thrived during the 8- and 16-bit eras. In other words, there's lots of material to work with, which is both daunting and at the same time a great excuse to put tons of play hours into hitting the shoot button again and again and again.

Add to that the fact that I'm in the process of closing on a condo—it has a den, which could make a fine game room—and suddenly this one-man site is really hurting in terms of resources.

I know, excuses, excuses. I'm done. Fo realz. I just want to add a quick shout out for all the regulars and hopefully the soon-to-be regulars. Content may be a little less than regular, but I promise that I'm going to chip away little-by-little at this gigantic project until this is the number one retro game website for fans of consoles that have a number of bits divisible by eight and fewer than 17. Thanks for bearing with me, now enjoy the latest top 10 installment.