NES Review: Gun.Smoke

There's a good reason why this review says NES as opposed to ROM. Earthbound Zero is more or less only available as a ROM, while all the other games I'll review are available as legal carts. Thanks to my local old-school NES buddies who've kept their systems and carts in immaculate condition, I'm able to review these classics for all 3 of you.

Gun.Smoke was one of my favorite rentals when the 8bit system was the hot box of the day. I used to know a cheat code or two that would afford me all the weapons up front, which was fun, and the turbo controler (the NES Advantage, if I remember correctly) made my standard gun more deadly than the machine gun the cheat gave me.

Sounds like it could be Houtzdale, doesn't it. Heh. That's the first thing I thought of when I looked at that screen for the first time in well over 15 years. Anywho, you're out to capture bad guys, and in Houtz... I mean Hicksville, it doesn't get any badder than this guy:

Bandit Bill. That's right. Mean looking hombre, ain't he. Well, you've got to take this bad seed down, and the local authorities will give you $10K if you succeed. All you have are your sidearms, an unlimited supply of ammo for said sidearms, and the occasional helpful townsfolk who will sell you goods, but don't expect them to jump in the line of fire so they can off stuff cheap. You'll need the cash you find along the way, that's for srue.

The streets are mean, that's for sure. Roaming banditos working for the big burrito on campus attack you from all angles in all sorts of ways. Beware death from above, as snipers have positionend themselves as well. Wandering miscreants like that dude over yonder will lob dynamite sticks (which, curiously, are blue), but you can actually pick these things up before they asplode.

With only a standard NES controler to play these games with these days, all the rabid fun was taken out of it, but at least I got to spend about 20 minutes reliving my childhood. It's a fun shooter varient with some pretty decent challange to it (unless, of course, you have a good controller).

Gun.Smoke - NES - Arcade Port/Shooter