The "After Burner" arcade cabinet was significantly more expensive than most of Sega's other machines at the time. The first prototype unit constructed, which consisted of the monitor attached to a steel frame, was claimed by Mifune to have "amazing power", but was considered too dangerous to operate and had the power levels lowered. Suzuki also thought of the game using a gyroscopic arcade cabinet that spun the player around, an idea that later became the R-360. A throttle control was briefly considered, but was abandoned as it would have destroyed the game's difficulty balance. It uses the Sega X Board, which was also used for games such as "Thunder Blade" (1987) and "Super Monaco GP" (1989). "After Burner" was officially released in Japan in July 1987, and in October of that year in North America.