Is Blue Lightning on Steam?

No. Blue Lightning is not distributed on Steam, so there is no Steam Charts or SteamDB player count for it. Its live popularity is tracked here via Twitch viewership instead.

What platforms is Blue Lightning on?

Blue Lightning is available on Atari Lynx, PC (Microsoft Windows), Atari Jaguar CD.

When did Blue Lightning release?

Blue Lightning was first released on December 1, 1989.

Blue Lightning

Dec 1, 1989ShooterArcadeAtari LynxPC (Microsoft Windows)Atari Jaguar CD

Blue Lightning — frequently asked questions

Is Blue Lightning on Steam?: No. Blue Lightning is not distributed on Steam, so there is no Steam Charts or SteamDB player count for it. Its live popularity is tracked here via Twitch viewership instead.
What platforms is Blue Lightning on?: Blue Lightning is available on Atari Lynx, PC (Microsoft Windows), Atari Jaguar CD.
When did Blue Lightning release?: Blue Lightning was first released on December 1, 1989.

About Blue Lightning

Blue Lightning, a launch title for the Lynx, is an arcade flight game heavily based on After Burner. The player controls the prototype Blue Lightning jet in combat against the enemy. The game consists of nine missions with varied objectives. These range from shooting down enemy planes to taking out tanks and ships or radar installations. In a courier mission, documents must be delivered by landing on a certain airfield. Upon successfully completing a mission, a password is given. The action is seen from behind the Blue Lightning. With the heavy arcade focus, there is no danger of stalling or even crashing into the ground. Crashing into air or ground targets is possible, however. The Blue Lightning is armed with a cannon with unlimited ammunition and 40 missiles. The on-board computer automatically seeks missile lock for enemy targets while the cannon must of course be aimed manually. The Blue Lightning is also equipped with an afterburner: activating it puts the plane to maximum speed for ten seconds, allowing one to catch up to enemy targets that got away. After use it takes another ten seconds to recharge. The plane is also able to pull off a barrel roll, useful to lose the lock of enemy missiles.

Summary via IGDB.

Game details

Platforms: Atari Lynx, PC (Microsoft Windows), Atari Jaguar CD
Developer: Epyx
Publisher: Atari Corporation
Game modes: Single player
Themes: Action, Thriller, Warfare

Details via IGDB.

Reception

IGDB rating

69/100

from 5 ratings

Every version compared

Prices, contemporary reception and the studio credited for each release

Platform	Year	Loose	Complete	Sealed
Atari Lynx	1989	$21	$50	$87

Also released on: PC (Microsoft Windows) · Atari Jaguar CD. We haven’t priced or authenticated those versions yet.

Collector value & authenticity

Atari Lynx · PriceCharting sold data · Verified 2026-08-07

Loose

$21

Complete

$50

Sealed

$87

Region: NA+EU+JP
Released: 1989
Authenticity: Low

On Evercade + PC (The Lynx Collection / Epyx Collection: Handheld) — the cartridge is now a collectibleLow counterfeit risk

Atari Lynx prices, all games & how to spot a fake

The launch title that showed what Suzy could do, and the one Lynx game with a genuine sequel-remake on another Atari console.

Epyx's 1989 after-burner-style flight shooter leans entirely on the Lynx's hardware sprite scaling, and in 1989 the effect was startling on something running off six AA batteries. It is short and it is on rails, but it is the launch title that best justified the price of the machine.

Atari revisited it in 1995 as a Jaguar CD game — a full remake rather than a port, and a different object entirely. If you own both Atari platforms, note that our Jaguar library carries that version separately.

How it was made

Flight controls designed by Landrum, credited by Atari Explorer in January/February 1991: "Landrum has designed the plane's controls so that everything is at your fingertips; he uses the Lynx's joypad, buttons, and option keys to best advantage."

An Epyx title. Epyx designed the Lynx hardware and sold it to Atari, and retained the trademarks on several launch games: a 1991 Atari advert lists Blue Lightning, California Games, Chip's Challenge and Gates of Zendocon as Epyx marks, with only Electrocop and the Lynx name belonging to Atari Corp.

Electronic Gaming Monthly reported in issue 5 that Epyx "appears to have gone out of business, despite the multi-million dollar advances from Atari" — so three of the four launch titles remained the property of a failed company.

What the press said at the time

“Blue Lightning is a showpiece game for this extraordinary system — the smooth scrolling of the backgrounds coupled with the realistic scaling of objects.”
— Electronic Gaming Monthly #9

“Afterburner on a small screen. You get to inflict damage on army installations and fighter planes. The smooth scrolling and pulsating action have got to be seen to be believed.”
— Raze #12, October 1991

Cartridge & preservation record

Cartridge ROM capacity 1 megabit (128 KB), measured from the preserved cartridge image.

Surviving pre-release builds

1989-06-02

Beta

1 Mbit

Catalogue part number PA2020

Cartridge data from the No-Intro preservation database (metadata only — names, sizes and checksums, no game data).

How the Atari Lynx version differs

A launch title, and the game Electronic Gaming Monthly used to demonstrate the hardware: 'Blue Lightning is a showpiece game for this extraordinary system' (EGM #9).

Also on other platforms

Atari Jaguar CD

Atari Jaguar CD. Announced in the period press as a direct upgrade of this game rather than a new title — EGM #57: 'BlueLightning CD — upgraded version of the game from Lynx — will have high-impact graphics and sounds.' It shipped as one of the two Jaguar CD pack-ins in 1995, developed by Attention to Detail, who later said they did not fully understand how the Lynx original's mechanics worked while recreating them.

Worth knowing

A barrel roll breaks a missile lock. Atari Explorer's 1991 review documents two mechanics: a rechargeable afterburner on Option 1 that maxes your speed for ten seconds to catch a fleeing bogie, and barrel-rolls that are "both impressive and useful — a roll can break an enemy's missile lock". The onboard computer will stop you hitting level ground, but as the reviewer noted, "it can't do much to keep you from flying into a hillside... that's your job."
Nine levels, and a Game of the Year award. EGM's April 1990 spec block lists nine levels of play. By issue 21 the magazine was reporting that its "colorful graphics and 3-D effects are so impressive it was voted Best Hand-Held Game of the Year" — an award for a launch title, though EGM does not name the awarding body in that passage.

Before you buy

A 1989 launch title, so it exists in all three cartridge shell styles and in big-box packaging. Flat first-generation carts are the variant collectors want; a curved-lip cart inside a 1989 big box is a later re-release, not the original product. Available today on Evercade and on PC, so buy the cart for the object, not for access.