Commando
Platform: Commodore 64
Gametype: Undefined
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Description

Several levels await your super-tough Commando in this arcade conversion. Armed with only a standard rifle and a few grenades you must take on hordes of Nazis. Some are wandering around in the open, while others have picked out hiding places, which you must approach from certain angles. Trees, rivers and bridges create a varied combat-like terrain and must be incorporated into your thinking. Extra grenades can be collected, and will definitely be required, as they allow you to kill form distance and thus avoid some enemy shots.

Alternate Titles

"Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando" -- Wii Virtual Console title
"Space Invasion" -- German title
"Senjō no Ōkami" -- Japanese title

Trivia

Bandai has adapted this video game into a board game, part of its Party Joy series.

The german Version was called "Space Invasion" and had all soldiers replaced with white androids. All other graphics are the same. This gives this version of Commando a strange look with all these white androids in contrast to the World War II scenario background graphics.

On June 30, 1988, Commando was put on the infamous German index by the BPjS. 

The energetic C-64 soundtrack for Commando was written by Rob Hubbard overnight at the offices of Elite Software. Rather impressive for one of the most popular and remixed SID tunes in existence.

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Description

Commando was indexed in Germany due to glorification of violence. Therefore a new version with the title "Space Invasion" was released in which the hostile soldiers are replaced by white robots that remind of the Stormtroopers from Star Wars.

You are Super Joe, the two-fisted elite soldier of the 80s, in the fight against the advancing forces. Equipped only with an M60 machine gun and six hand grenades, you expand into the hostile area. Mines, grenades and dynamite explode all around you. (translation of orig. cover text of the version sold by "Encore")

You see the soldier that you steer from the birds view. The soldier runs from bottom to top whereby again and again a huge amount of enemies attack from the front and side. Many of them are also barricaded behind walls and stones and can only be driven from their hideout with grenades. However, they also leave the hideout as soon as you pass them. If you are hit by a hostile soldier, a grenade or a shot you will lose a life and start again shortly before the position where you have been hit.

Controls

With joystick + keyboard:
In all directions = steers Super Joe into the corresponding direction
In all directions and press fire button = Super Joe fires his M60-machine gun
Space  = Super Joe throws a grenade

The enemies

The forces are equipped very well. Next to the many men, they also have huge amounts of heavy weapons and vehicles at hand. In all three areas the security measures get constantly higher so that you proceed only with difficulty, therefore you should collect all the flashing boxes for more hand grenades.

Bug

If you manage to make more than 1.000.000 points there will be a digit overflow and the game starts to recount from "000.000". This is also valid for the entry into the highscore list!!

Solution

As you get an extra life every 10.000 points and there are some locations in the first level where you (if you are standing right) can get points and with this extra lives almost without limit, it is no problem to play through the rest of the levels. The game then restarts after the third level with difficulty grade changing in turns (shooting frequency of the enemies normal, shooting frequency of the enemies a bit faster) and can with some practice become an endless game...

The number of lives that can be reached is limited to 256 (more than enough). The counting is done in hexadecimals, but the display is decimal, that is why the lives display is sometimes weird (graphic characters).

Cheats

The version by "Remember" contains next to the manual and a resetable highscore list that is saved on disk also the following cheats: unlimited lives, unlimited grenades, no dropping into holes and water, collision query off, jump levels.

The game was awarded with the British Golden Joystick Award in the category Arcade-Style Game of the Year in 1985.

Trivia

Commando is the realisation of a Capcom arcade machine. In contrast to the 8 levels of the original, the C64 version has only 3. Elite used the license for Commando to publish a Gauntlet-clone named "Commando 86" a year later, with which Capcom has nothing to do. The official follower is the game "Mercs", which was released on the arcade machine at the end of the 80s.
The C64 version was programmed by Chris Butler who at that time programmed several games by order of Elite. The fact that only 3 out of 8 levels were left in the final version could be connected to the alleged insisting of Elite that as with Ghosts'n Goblins the game should be completely in the memory.

The music is by Rob Hubbard, who wrote a remix of the music on the arcade machine. In 2007, Rob Hubbard himself in person has created a cover version of the title tune with Propellerhead's software sequencer "Reason 4" after their request. The cover is second to none (see Commando#Links).

The character "Super Joe" is also the protagonist in the Capcom game Bionic Commando, which, however, is not counted into the Commando series.

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Description from the packaging:

Experience the ultimate in combat action... Commando.

As the crack shot Commando, battle overwhelming odds to defeat advancing rebel forces! Carry out your lone crusade through hostile territory with only a machine gun and hand-grenades. Enemy fire flies past you from all directions; rebel forces appear from caves, trenches and strongholds to bar your progress! Break through the enemy lines to reach the fortress, collecting supplies from defeated outposts. There can be no retreat - the fate of the free world is in your hands!


http://www.c64-wiki.com/index.php/Commando
