Gameboy Color - Bionic Commando: Elite Forces Review

Initially created on the original nintendo, this is the gameboy colour a remake of it.

There are other remakes of bionic commando on other platforms released around the same time. The story is about the elite force bionic commandoes in a war going off to stop a traitor Arcturus and the Avar army's Albatross project.

Gameplay: 9.5/10

When you start the game, you'll be able to choose two commandos, a male and a female commando. There isn't much difference between them as far as I can tell. As far as I know, the only difference is in how the weapons and equipment look. Anyway, when you start off, you are looking down at a map with your vehicle. Each level is marked as an area with a number and you have the choice to move or enter

the area. There are also enemies patrolling the routes between each area and you have to be careful or you'll have to fight them. When you attack an area you'll be presented with weapon and equipment choices, early on, this will limited of course but you'll get better armour, equipment and weapons such as the wide gun and the rapid fire item. Of course, you can't access all the levels at once. You'll have to find

items such as the decoders first.

Normal levels are your typical side scrolling platform games. You have a gun and can shoot enemies. However instead of jumping you have a claw which can be used to grapple platforms, ceilings, barrels, items and even stun enemies. When you grappel something away from you, as opposed to just above you, you start swinging and have two choices. The first is to press the grappel button again and retract the

grapple pulling yourself up. The second is to press left or right as you swing. At the end of the swing you'll be swung in the appropriate direction. In the air you can launch your grappel again to catch onto any platforms or grappel points which present themselves. It's hard to master grappling, however once you do it looks awesome when you swing from grappel point to grappel point firing your grappel.

During the mission you'll be able to enter communications rooms where you can contact your headquarters for more information and to advance the story. You can also try tapping into the communications systems to listen to what the enemies are saying. Finally the communications rooms also act as save points as well as places where you can change your weapon and decoder. Some of the time the communications rooms information won't be particularly exciting or relevant to the

actual gameplay but it is important to listen anyway because the game won't allow you to face the boss if you don't.

There is also a sniper mode where you attempt to shoot enemies with from a sniper scope. It's really a mini-game where if you can shoot the enemies before the timer runs out you get rewarded with a medical kit.

If you meet enemies when on the main map, you'll enter a top down view instead where your gun operates as usual but your claw now pushes enemies away instead of stunning. Its not a very exciting part of the game.

There only two bad things about the game play. There is the lack of any jumping abilities and ledge clinging abilities. I know some people it wouldn't be bionic commando if the characters could jump and I know that some would say that the hook is better than ledge clinging but I really really wish they had both. There's also the problem of swinging. For some strange reason, if you are a grappel point and retract your grappel, there's no way to start swinging again except by dropping and

firing diagonally. Since the grappel point is so small this is very dangerous and frankly a number of deaths could be avoided. As you familiarise yourself with the game you soon get over this, but I still occasionally get myself stuck.

Graphics: 5/5

Although the graphics aren't too clear at times there are a wide variety of fairly interesting and varied environments such as temples and waterfalls.

Sound and Music: 3.5/5

The music is pretty good and the sound is alright. The firing sound of your weapons does get monotonous however.

Game design: 4.5/5

The game is designed fairly well. It's really a linear game and its best to travel one level after another rather than jumping ahead of yourself and visiting the more advance areas. You'll probably end up visiting the levels you missed. I do like the various extras in the game such as the sniper mode although the map encounters were a little redundant. There are even two secret areas. There are a few frustrating platform areas but in general it isn't too bad. You'll eventually get the hang of it and swing your way past them.

Longevity: 5/5

The game is quite long with all the different areas to visit. The game isn't too boring and most would want to finish the game.

For: Unique platform game, good level design.

Against: Can't jump, sometimes hard to see where to swing, can't return back to swinging when needed.