RE-GEN: The Strike series – 16-bit smart shooter, next-gen firepower (PS3/Xbox 360)
We’ve played that game before, right?
Re-imagining the classics for the new generation. This is RE-GEN.
With power comes evolution: shooters have gone from scrolling to full 3-D environments, from turkey galleries to smart, reactive enemies. Yet even the classics, with their scrolling and their shooting galleries, have virtues all to their own.
The Strike series from Electronic Arts is one of the most notable examples of the genre. A multi-directional, military-themed shooter, it became a hallmark franchise, particularly on the Sega Genesis. Even in that age of solid-state cartridges, Strike was known for its surprisingly challenging gameplay, and became known as the 16-bit “smart shooter.”
After three successful 16-bit titles, and two CD follow-ons in the PSOne (as well as the Saturn and PC), Strike vanished; no more was heard. Perhaps it was a victim of its own success, having stuck too close to its core formula. Or perhaps EA lost interest (happened before, happened since). Pity: the series had quite the potential, even after five games. And especially today.
RE-GEN is all about second chances for the classic titles we loved. Can the power and capabilities offered by today’s platforms, from the high-end PS3 and Xbox 360, to the innovative Wii, to the handheld wonders of the PSP and NDS, offer something new to resurrect the Strike series? This is the question we set out to answer today. Some things, after all, don’t deserve to gather dust in the back of a shelf, when it has more to offer.
Time to go back in time, before going back to the future. Learn about the Strike series, and speculating its next-gen future, after the jump! Or discover what the Wii, the PSP, or the DS has to offer a Strike title.
We’ve played that game before, right?
Re-imagining the classics for the new generation. This is RE-GEN.With power comes evolution: shooters have gone from scrolling to full 3-D environments, from turkey galleries to smart, reactive enemies. Yet even the classics, with their scrolling and their shooting galleries, have virtues all to their own.
The Strike series from Electronic Arts is one of the most notable examples of the genre. A multi-directional, military-themed shooter, it became a hallmark franchise, particularly on the Sega Genesis. Even in that age of solid-state cartridges, Strike was known for its surprisingly challenging gameplay, and became known as the 16-bit “smart shooter.”
After three successful 16-bit titles, and two CD follow-ons in the PSOne (as well as the Saturn and PC), Strike vanished; no more was heard. Perhaps it was a victim of its own success, having stuck too close to its core formula. Or perhaps EA lost interest (happened before, happened since). Pity: the series had quite the potential, even after five games. And especially today.
RE-GEN is all about second chances for the classic titles we loved. Can the power and capabilities offered by today’s platforms, from the high-end PS3 and Xbox 360, to the innovative Wii, to the handheld wonders of the PSP and NDS, offer something new to resurrect the Strike series? This is the question we set out to answer today. Some things, after all, don’t deserve to gather dust in the back of a shelf, when it has more to offer.
Strike: when smart shooters existed within 16 bits
Popular especially with the military and Tom Clancy-types, Strike had a distinctive flavor that helped marked it as the “thinking man’s shooter” of its day. These elements helped create that Strike legacy:
- You controlled a special forces attack chopper (and other vehicles) in a multi-directional shooter (MDS) perspective, against the whole army of a madman dictator or a rogue high-tech terrorist with an appetite for nukes;
- The game involved “smart resource management” because of limited ammo loads, requiring you to resupply on the field through fuel and ammo dumps (and armor repairs); and
- The game was always accompanied by a tactical database showing you mission objectives, friendly and enemy assets, their threat level to you, and even tips on how to dispatch enemy units. All these combined to give Strike its gameplay depth and “smart shooter” label.
From 1992’s Desert Strike, each game progressed the series both plot-wise and with few changes per installment. The Jungle Strike sequel (1993) introduced the option to change your mount in-game. The series moved to the PSOne with Soviet Strike in 1996, and introduced better graphics, improved controls, and stylistic live-action cutscenes, as well as allies who would help you (little) in the field. (Interestingly, the 1994 Urban Strike featured a terrorist attack on the New York World Trade Center… in 2001. Eerie.)
Jungle Strike, Urban Strike gameplay (uploaded by ShiryuGL)
There was supposed to be a Future Strike – Nuclear‘s ending strongly hinted at a sequel – but it never came to pass. However, EA would later release Future Cop LAPD, which would feature Strike gameplay elements. EA never got around to confirming if Future Cop was supposed to be Future Strike or not, so that mystery remains for fans of the series.
EGM’s Quartermann hints that EA might be planning a next-gen revival. Rumors being rumors, we’ve so far heard nothing on this since. Still doesn’t stop us from speculating how an update would kick the game to next-level.
Trading horses from old-school Cobra to high-tech Comanche
Probably the biggest weakness to a Strike update on the PS3 and/or Xbox 360 is Mercenaries 2. Pandemic’s open-world shooter may have different gameplay approaches, but Mercs could easily be seen as a “spiritual successor” to Strike, due to the vehicular (particularly chopper) combat and the one-man army approach to world peace. Comparisons between the two have in fact been made in a few Mercs reviews. This is one potential path for a Strike remake – but runs the risk of “just being a repackaged Mercs.”
A possible alternative is the Ace Combat approach: transform the game into something more like a chopper sim, like the admittedly lackluster Thunderstrike: Operation Phoenix (PS2). It also opens up new gameplay possibilities, such as chopper dogfighting, but dilutes the core Strike formula. Whatever the case, tapping the full power of both next-generation consoles opens a new path of evolution for the genre – but evolving further away from its foundations has its risks.
STRIKE-net boots up on broadband
Retaining the classic isometric MDS perspective of the game might mean under-utilizing the full capabilities offered by either console (when other games in the genre have gone towards rendering fully 3D worlds), but it might not be too much of an issue in digital distribution. In fact, if games like Assault Heroes are any proof, the classic shooter might find a good home in Xbox Live Arcade and PlayStation Network.
Not that Strike itself has to be straitjacketed to its old-school formula in order to retain its identity. Even in the somewhat restricted environment of the multi-directional shooter, there can be room for innovation, ranging from different weapons to deal with even more innovative enemies, to rendering “useful” terrain to hide behind (for example, dipping behind a ridgeline or tall structure to shake off incoming missiles), and adapting actual military helicopter tactics to create gameplay challenges.
Smart soldiers – human or silicon
Robust battlefield AI is the next item in the checklist. Military combat games are evolving towards depicting the battlefield as a fluid and dynamic environment, with ever-smarter (and changing) enemies and allies. The enemies in the 16/32-bit classics were tough, but they were set-piece: they had patterns, they were predictable. It would be disappointing to rely on weak AI and Zerging in this generation.
A Strike evolving towards next-gen has to up the ante. Enemies that learn how to swarm and push you away from mission-critical objectives, and call in reinforcements to finish you off; allies you can direct in battle to help clear your path: these will be big improvements in the series’ gameplay, creating even tougher challenges to smart one’s way out of.
Multiplayer would be the coup de grace of a next-gen Strike. The old games never included the feature. Now, if Strike were to retain its MDS flavor, simply chasing each other like dogs in a yard might sound a little like last-gen, right? Doesn’t have to be that way: a potential answer is found in that maybe-spinoff, Future Cop LAPD.
Future Cop‘s two-player and skirmish mode is base assault, Herzog Zwei-style. Victory is measured not by the frags you rack, but by shepherding one of your lemming units (in this case, a hovertank) into the enemy’s base, and keeping his lemmings from breaching yours. The battle is won by control of the battlefield and lines of attack, by attacking enemy hovertanks yourself, capturing outpost bases and neutral turrets to boost your forces, and sniping at the enemy player on occasion.
This kind of gameplay offered quite the enjoyable challenge (if you didn’t mind the split-screen), and could be adapted for a similar online multiplayer for a next-gen Strike. Taken online, with additional innovations in the game design, and the smart AI described above, it can expand such a game’s replay value, offering to online friends and adversaries good times with attack helicopters.
Get ready to STRIKE
I’m not saying this just as a fan of the series. Because it had a surprisingly wide appeal in the past, and because it has so much room to grow (particularly in multiplayer), Strike stands a good chance of succeeding as a remake/update to current standards.
Retaining its classic MDS formula, but with new innovations like those discussed to sweeten the pot, such a future Strike can make a fine addition to the XBLA or PSN library. Taking a brave step by revamping the formula and going in either the sim-chopper or open-world directions, a boxed release can break new ground for the series, though it risks competing with similar titles already established on the next-gen platforms. Multiplayer will be a fine new addition to the series, and could potentially provide a good amount of replayability to the game.
Resurrecting Strike may be just a long-shot dream, even given the rumors. But hey, that’s why those who loved Strike, loved Strike. Because it was fun to dream we were saving the world, one madman at a time, dispatched with extreme prejudice and an extra load of Hellfires.