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When you boot Commando, you are loading a piece of history. Back in ’84 it became an instant hit with all arcadesters. Then Elite made it one of the first-ever home computer licences. The idea behind the game was as simple as it was revolutionary. Guide your GI through six vertically scrolling levels, kill everyone you meet, rescue a few prisoners and cause as much mayhem as possible.

The 64 version included some fantastic pieces of music and excellent graphics. The only trouble was that it was outrageously hard. Unfortunately the Amiga version has lost a lot in translation.
The difficulty has gone. It is now too easy to complete a level. Graphically the game has been toned down: you are no longer the rough edged blood and mud characters of the 64, instead you get nice clean sprites. Unfortunately, the music has lost all its strength, now it has wimpish spot effects and seems wasteful of a sound chip. Worst of all your grenades can only be thrown forward, so you tend to be better off with just your trusty machine gun.

I was generally disappointed with this version. It lacks the feel that made the action frantic in the original. Add its age to this and even this classic begins to look more than slightly dated. Still, a definite for kill-crazy Commandos, it is jam-packed with ketchup, but if you are after a healthy shoot ‘em up you might choose something else.
Mark Patterson

Title Commando
Game Type Shoot'em up
Players 1
Compatibility All Amigas (With WHDLoad Patch)
Company Elite Systems
HD Installable Yes (With patch)
Submission Seppo Typpö (groucho@pp.inet.fi) Profiled Reviewer

Review
Commando was (and still in some ways is) one of my favourite arcade games.
Despite its very simple gameplay there is something special about it -
something that other similar arcade games tried to copy, but in my
opinion, never managed to fully reproduce. Elite Systems (who also did the
excellent 8-bit conversion) took the challenge and decided to convert the
arcade to our favourite 16-bit machine. The result is - in my humble
opinion - Amiga gaming history.

The game's objective is very simple - the player has to guide a single
super soldier (a sort of Rambo of its time) through the vertically
scrolling levels, fighting against all kinds of enemies (and vehicles)
while liberating POWs which appear from time to time on his route. The
main character is armed with a basic machine gun and set of grenades.
There's nothing philosophical in the plot of the game - it's kill or be
killed all the way to the (bitter) end. There are no power-ups, no huge
end-of-level bosses, no secret levels - just hordes of bullet-spitting
enemies with a deathwish hurtling towards the main character and his
trusty M60 machine gun. At the end of each level things get even more
hectic as a sort of 'mega killing mode' is activated - suddenly the number
of enemies on screen is tripled, and the player has to swiftly deal death
around him before he is overrun by sheer numbers.

When compared to the original arcade Amiga Commando looks quite excellent.
Elite developed the conversion with aid of Capcom and claimed that most of
the graphics and sound were lifted straight from the arcade ROM - which is
believable since the graphics look pretty much identical when compared to
the real thing running under the MAME emulator. The playability is pretty
spot on too, but with some minor niggles - switching between the two
weapons is not as fluent as in the arcade version thanks to the one button
joystick - which means the grenades are not so useful in picking off
enemies as they should be. One can always play the game purely on
keyboard (clever design decision from Elite) which makes things much
better.

All in all Amiga Commando is a highly competent conversion of the classic
arcade game. For Elite, Commando marks one of their better Amiga games -
and especially arcade conversions - only in Ghost'n'Goblins did they
achieve a similar level of excellence. While the game itself will probably
not impress the Doom generation, it offers a few hours of innocent and
addictive fun to those who enjoy pure arcade action and want to reminisce
about the good old days.