Same here. I suck at them now but back in the day, I rocked R-Type, Space Megaforce, Super E.D.F., Firepower 2000, etc. I was a huge fan of the genre, both overhead and side scrolling.

I quickly lost interest when bullet hell became popular thanks to Capcom's Mars Matrix. I know it was around prior but that game is the one that most cite as being what really got them into the genre. It was the only Sega Dreamcast game purchase I regretted (I was very particular about what I purchased after diving into the 3DO years prior, lol).