Running North and Shooting

In researching the various Rambo video games, I came across materials that indicated that some of the games drew inspiration from a specific Capcom title: Commando. Released in Japan as Senjō no Ōkami (literal translation, Wolf of the Battlefield), the game wasn’t based on the Arnold Schwarzenegger movie of the same name, Commando, as that film wouldn’t even be released for another six months and was entirely unrelated. Instead, Capcom tapped into the burgeoning vertical soldier shooter genre. In fact, by most accounts, Capcom’s version of the format was so popular that it came to define the genre for years to come.

When I played through the SMS Rambo: First Blood Part II (aka Ashura) I was legitimately curious what, specifically, Sega had been going for with the title. It didn’t really feel like a full game, being too repetitive, too long, and not really that interesting. What I didn’t realize was that Sega was emulating Commando / Senjō no Ōkami, trying to put their own spin on that game’s format. And while it hit many of the same notes, Sega’s version was overly long and rather slow paced, making for a game that felt bloated and dull. My curiosity piqued by the fact there was a Capcom game that came out before, and apparently was a direct influence, I had to know if their version was better.

Having played through the game, I can wholeheartedly say that, yes, Capcom did it better. The fact of the matter is that Capcom made a tight, fast, interesting shooter that does its job really well. Of course that job is to get you to pump in quarters as fast as possible while the game steals them from you, but the game is solid at that while providing a fun experience. If you’re good at the game you’ll breeze through it in about ten minutes, although with all the enemies, and bullets, and grenades flying around the whole time, you’ll be lucky to get that far.

In the game you play as Super Joe, a soldier sent on a mission to infiltrate enemy territory and take out their main bases. You start at the bottom of the screen and scroll upwards, shooting. At enemy soldiers as well as their vehicles (tanks and jeeps) that come your way. The goal is the move all the way up to the top of the stage where you’ll find an enemy wall blocking you. The doors in the wall will open and enemies will pour out. Kill all the enemies and you’ll be able to go through the doors and move onto the next stage.

There are four stages in a loop, culminating with the final stage of food featuring a base and not just a wall, although all the stage endings function more or less the same. Once you’ve done the first loop you’ll get set on a second mission, and when you finish that you’re done with the game. Log your name on the high score screen, soldier, because you just finished your mission and you can go home to that wife, two-point-five kids, and all the adoring citizens you left behind when you joined up for this suicide mission. Good work, Joe.

What Capcom’s Commando gets right, and what Sega’s Rambo: First Blood Part II got wrong, is the pace. While Capcom’s game is technically longer, coming in at eight stages instead of Sega’s six, The game moves at a much faster, almost blistering, pace. Super Joe moves quickly and lightly, cruising around the stage with serious alacrity. The enemies do as well, and so do their bullets, so there is a certain amount of worry you could have as you’re trucking along because it’s very easy to end up getting yourself killed accidentally.

That’s not the end of the world, though, so long as you have the mind to continue and the quarters to do so. It doesn’t feel so bad to get taken out by a stray bullet or enemy contact when you can so easily and briskly move back up the stage and get going once more. That’s something Commando does so well, dropping you back in the action easily and quickly with minimal fuss. Sure, Sega’s game let you drop right back in as well, but the pace was sluggish and it took forever to get Rambo going. Commando just moves better.

It’s also shorter. The stages of the game aren’t as long as in Rambo: First Blood Part II, and the overall game length is quicker despite this game technically being two stages longer. The game just knows how to get you in, get you moving, and get you to the end (if you’re good enough) so that you’re having a good time. That’s what makes this game fun (and make Sega’s title feel like such a drag): it’s fast and breezy and fun and even when you die you don’t care because you’re blistering along again so quickly. Capcom just did it right.

Command was a hit in arcades and went on to get all kinds of accolades and awards after its release. It not only inspired a lot of copycat games from the likes of Sega and SNK (among many, many others) but also eventually got two more sequels. The first came out in 1988 as Mercs in the U.S., Senjō no Ōkami II in Japan, although it wasn’t nearly as successful as the first game. A third title, Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3, was released digitally twenty years later, in 2008, although it too was far less successful (financially as well as with critics) and was quickly forgotten after its release.

Probably its greater legacy was for indirectly spawning a second, loosely connected series: Bionic Commando. Although that arcade title was actually inspired by another arcade game, Roc'n Rope, in the U.S. the game (well, its sequel, NES manual) directly named the hero as Super Joe, hero of Commando, connecting the two games via story. Eventually it was just accepted that the games were all connected in a big web of storyline, making Bionic Commando’s sequels and Commando’s sequels all part of one franchise.

All from one tiny little arcade game that knew how to move. That’s an impressive legacy, and it makes this a game to check out even if it wasn’t absolutely a blast to play on its own. So if you haven’t before, give this game a whirl. It’s fun, even for just a few minutes.