Bionic Commando

Never thought much about the game except the brilliance of tim follin's soundtrack.

I must admit I do wish I could hear a few sound effects too.

Still, the star of this game is Tim Follin's soundtrack! Wow!
Tim devised a "playback" machine?!
Music sounds digital! Beautiful!

Challenging but highly recommended.

Quite an ugly game for 1988 but thats the only big negative for this conversion. Sound is stellar and it plays really well with snappy controls and lovely scrolling. Quite a high difficulty level but its playable enough to not be that frustrating. A quality Coin Op conversion.

Not bad, even if the sprites are a bit crude.
The music is quite brilliant, a very good tune from Mr Follin that would have been better kept for the title screen and transitions between levels in my view. I would have preferred to hear what he could have done for sound effects instead.

Now this was loads of fun and waaay better than the risible US version.
My friends and I played this one a lot back then. It really was like having a mini arcade game at home.
There's nothing not to like about this. Everything, especially the great gameplay, makes it one of my favourite action platformers on the C64.
Special mention has to go to the music though as it really is fantastic.

Great game, great fun, great music. Had some good times playing this. Was fun just to swing about between branches.

I would play this and deal with the flickering and on screen garbage on an NTSC machine rather than the US version! I had both versions growing up cuz my dad knew about the BBSs - in fact we had a lot of PAL games. Wish this one had a fix, but it's still playable lmao

@Roger: Of course we could do that. It's just that your plea comes more than four years after Monk's "review". Maybe he will read your comment in another four years time and then stop using the comments function for his reviews. Which are, just as yours, always a good read. Cheers.

Can somebody explain to Monk that the comment section is meant for short remarks, not for long reviews? There's a separate section for that.

@Monk. So Manic Miner is a waste of time too as that was a platformer? Also, chill out about the drop or addidtion of the bloody letter "s"! I'm sure it was just a last minute decision just to make it singular or plural!!! SHEESH!

Great game and love it.
Gameplay, sound and graphics are awesome.
The only minus on this game is that Monk has written his usual list of comments on it here
Please stop doing that.

Fantastic platform shooter. 1 of the all time C64 greats. Great gameplay, nice graphics and a catchy soundtrack make this a classic. U. S. Version does suck tho!

My three comments below are in reverse order again - the reason being the stupid 1500 chars limitation (who comes up with these LIMITATIONS? Let information and text be FREE, damn it!) forcing me to split the message in three parts, and the automatically arranged order of the texts making it reverse (I didn't bother to reverse copypaste it).

The least this system could have is a char counter of some kind, so you would always know when you are about to breach the limit, but no. People are such narrow-minded, small-consciousness half-animals that they never write much, and thus limitations like that do not bother the masses. It's only us individuals who have to suffer. Sigh.

Anyways, I wrote this message just to point out, that even the Zzap! 64 review scan has the plural version in it's title! Talk about confusion..

So, is it "Bionic Commando", or "Bionic Commandos"? The arcade version seems to be "Bionic Commando", though.. And I haven't yet found one game screen (loading screens only) that would actually have the plural version shown. Quite a mystery, really!

These things that bother me about this world - the masses don't really care, just like they never care about pretty much anything, as long as they have their ugly emoticons, handbags and sport channels.

But games like Moonstone, Fist II, Spy Hunter or Bionic Commando were never cloned much. I wish they had, because it might mean we would have some really excellent games instead of wasting the productive energy on all those platformers (no creative energy needed to produce one of those monstrosities).

Well, technically, this is a platformer too, but the bionic arm makes it different - and you don't have to be collecting stars or coins or rings all the time.

All in all - good fun, a game that deserves it's place in computing and gameplaying history - recommended.

This is one of those arcade conversions that do not make you miss the original. I mean, this one, just like Green Beret, Commando, Bomb Jack, Yie Ar Kung-Fu and some others, is one of the conversions that deserve to exist, and are in at least some ways better than the original. There are other conversions that are good, but which do not have anything that would make you choose them over the original ones.

Fortunately, many of the arcade conversions on the C64 actually have a unique 'personality' of sorts, that makes it completely worthwhile to play even if you have just completed the arcade version, and Bionic Commando(s) is a good example of this.

Good, timeless fun, that wasn't even cloned all that much - I wonder why many of the best games and 'game styles' were never cloned, whereas the most awful ones were done in zillions of different versions? Platforming, for example. Who on Earth (or anywhere else for that matter) would ever need all the platform games that have been made? I could tolerate perhaps a few - Sonic, Superfrog, Kid Chaos. Beyond that, platforming becomes just repetitive and boring, making the player sick (unless he's already sick in the head).

Is this game "Bionic Commando", or "Bionic Commandos"? Where did the plural come from, that we see in some adverts, flyers and even in the Amstrad-version's loading screen? Even in some computer magazines they previewed this tightly as the plural version, and there was later some explanation that since the home versions feature only one commando, and the arcade version features many of them (as in two simultaneous players or something - I haven't even tested whether this is true or not), that they changed the name from plural to single.

But there seems to still be a little bit confusion about this - I'd like to know the truth - does anyone here know? Why the plural, and why was it changed? Which was first?

In any case, this is one of the better conversions. The Arcade version is good, and relatively easy to complete - and the C64 version follow it quite faithfully, though if I remember correctly, this one is a little bit shorter. The title music is a bit weird, with too much emphasis on empty drumming (I guess Follin got excited when he got ring-modulation to sound like 'steel drums') but the second level music is easily the best version I have ever heard - just compare it to the NES-version, for example.

Spent a who, e summer p, acting this as a kid, it was tough, but I could get to the end without cheating. Of course the music was off the scale. 8/10

Good game. Fast but a bit hectic in the same time. The difficulty level is quite high so at first you may feel a little annoyed.

Love this game, and a massive fan of Follin's music on the 64 (his Speccy work it has to be said is great too. ) This, along with LED Storm & Ghouls 'n' Ghosts, in my opinion has some of the best music on the system, although it seems I'm at odds with most people here - my favourite being the 'trippy' tune from level 3. Brilliant conversion, a world away from the dire US version.

I loved this game way back in the day, however nowdays it doesnt really appeal, but its a really good conversion!

Very good game with nice graphics/sprites and really funky music. Bought a copy a few weeks back and played it a few times since.

I think C64 version has slightly better playability than Amiga version. I played the latter version a lot as a kid. It's a bit stupid that often soldiers or other enemies just jump on you from heaven and then you die... But it's still quite good game ... At least for a while.

Music is arranged from coin-op. The original is by Harumi Fujita (sounds quite poor compared to C64/Amiga version). 4th stage music is the craziest and it's mostly Follin's own.

Best 64 music - easy for me. On Level 4 ( song 8 ) it even has a 7/8 time signature part, ain't heard that in any other games... Go Folin !

Really enjoyed playing this, and still pop back to it from time to time. The sound is stunning.

The first and Second level are amazing. Truly great level design. I never made it past level 3 back then but today I can say that it was just as good as the game gets quite mediocre after that. The later levels confine the players movements and looses the feeling of freedom to choose your way.

Monster game! One of the best C64 games ever, great music, playability at the best, great variety locations. No prisoners.

@Roger: I'm with you: it's OK, but by no means a classic.

Quite why this ugly, unresponsive, and downright unfair game gets so much credit is anybody's guess.

Excellent game.

I'll always remember the stonking music on this although found it very difficult as a game. My bro really liked it though so I'll give it a smiley face.

I've played this a lot (recently too)...
It can be frustrating to time rope climbing and enemy travel, apart from that it plays great...
Music is above madly great, I love it, have it on my cellphone even

Watch out for the US SID version, it sux (compared to this) and misses several trax..

Try it tonight !

Nothing extraordinary in the graphics... But the music! Dear Mr. Follin, This is a masterpiece! Just like Deev. Said:Outstanding! The game is one of my favourite stuffs. Great idea, good game. BIONIC COMMANDO:Hooked on a feeling... 8/10

Wow! I remember spending a whole weekend playing this game non-stop with my friend back in 88. Loved that robot arm. Cool concept! Addictively fun...

Decent conversion. Graphics are very poor, but the music is outstanding!

I remember Commodore Force magazine giving this game away on one of its cover tapes once. It's action packed, fun and thrilling. Cool music.

Basic graphics but it's gameplay that counts. It's kept faithful to the arcade and the bionic arm works well, even better than in Amiga conversion! Also this is faster than the Amiga version and has a proper scrolling routine instead of annoying push-scroll. Good renditions of Amiga tunes as well.

Great music. Tim Follin is obviously one of the best there is. Lousy conversion though of a great arcade machine.

Great playability, fantastic music and hot action. Its wonderful

Us version is crap is rocks... Suit u sir

Still love this game!!! Capcom rocks the C64! Important: listen to that great music!!

10/10

Brilliant music. Go Tim!

The arcade was great and this conversion is superb too. Brilliant game play combined with nice graphics and sound. The SCG crack'n'trainer made this game eaven more playable. Super.

An OK'ish conversion. The music is really GOOD! ... The graphics are just above average (i could have drawn better ... Not a bad game. I'm told it is well coded and not an easy thing to do (... All that long arm action stuff).

I don't know why I never finished this game. I loved it. Maybe it's because of all the joysticks I smashed due to my hook coming loose. Anyway, it had good graphics and music to suit.
One that gets remebered.

I have this game at home on my computer, which I like to say that this is a good game, a bit like Batman when the man swinging the rope to get on the steps. I only have 2 levels on that game which I don't know if there is more levels on this game. Perhaps this game I have at home is possibly demo game or something, but anyways it's a cool game and I love it.

Tim Follin rulez 4ever. I caan fly when listening to the musics.

This game was cool, swinging from tree to tree killing the bad guys.
kicks splinter cell ass
oh and the music I am humming it now ... Duo doo daoo doo doo da da... It mint...

This was a great game, very original at the time. A joy to complete.

Superb music and fantastic gameplay.

This was a kick ass game!!!

A brilliant game that I spent MANY hours playing as a kid. Level 3's music still stands as some of my fave on the C64!

Superlative arcade conversion with great music. Still one of my all time faves.