Nebula Fighter (1997)

Nebula Fighter is a side-scrolling shoot 'em up with pre-rendered graphics and fast, action-oriented gameplay, developed by Holodream Software and published by One Reality. Set somewhere after the year 2010, Nebula Fighter puts the player into the role of a lone ship pilot who needs to break through the defenses of a space-faring alien race. The twist is that instead of an alien invasion scenario, the humans are actually the aggressors bent on conquering the alien homeworld. Nebula Fighter features a variety of weapons, which can be powered up by picking upgrades during play. Each level ends with a battle against a unique boss. Once a boss is defeated, the player can pick up its weapon to use in the next level.