| Bloody Wolf | |
| Developer: | Data East |
| Publisher: | Data East, NEC Home Electronics |
| Designer: | Yoshiaki Honda (Arcade & PCE) Tomotaka Osada (hardware) |
| Programmer: | Takaaki Inoue Sōichi Akiyama (Arcade & PCE) Minoru Sano (PCE) |
| Artist: | Shinji Noda Masanori Tokoro Takahide Koizumi Mix Man Dot Man (Arcade) Eiko Kurihara, Masahiko Ujita, Yutaka Kadode, Shinichi Kanamori, Takahide Koizumi (PCE) |
| Composer: | Azusa Hara Hiroaki Yoshida Shuji Segawa Tatsuya Kiuchi Hitomi Komatsu (Arcade) Shogo Sakai, Takafumi Miura, Yuji Suzuki, Yusuke Takahama (PCE) |
| Released: | 1988 (Arcade), 1989 (PC Engine), 1990 (TurboGrafx) 2007 (Wii) |
| Platforms: | Arcade Game, TurboGrafx/PC Engine, Virtual Console |
| Genre: | Run and gun |
| Modes: | Single-player, multiplayer |
, released in Europe as Battle Rangers, is a run and gun arcade game released by Data East[1] in 1988. Two commandos take on an entire army with many weapons, and defeat bosses to advance levels.
Snake and Eagle, two commandos of the Bloody Wolf special forces, receive instructions from their commander to destroy the enemy's weapon base and rescue any allies who have been reported missing in action, as well as the President. In the Battle Rangers version, their commander is a Secretary of State and the instructions are simply "save the top urgent crisis of our nation."
In the end, the Colonel tells Snake and Eagle that their next mission is to rescue the President once again; however, after having decided to "party it up tonight", the men decline to take the mission and abandon the Colonel.
The game uses a side-view[1] and employs a multi-directional attack method similar to many other arcade games of the run and gun genre, including Guerilla War, Ikari Warriors, Mercs and Data East's own Heavy Barrel.
Allowing up to two players to play simultaneously, once players create their own codename using up to three initials, they receive a quick mission briefing before the mission ensues. Players automatically begin the game with a machine gun containing unlimited ammo and a knife used exclusively for close quarters combat. The mission's levels are separated into "scenes" and usually consist of one or more players running through various terrain, attacking hordes of enemy soldiers, and reaching the end of the stage to battle a boss. Players have the option to rescue various hostages scattered throughout the levels to obtain new weapons or items.
The game was ported to the PC Engine (known as the TurboGrafx-16 in North America) by Data East in 1989, and published a year later in the US by NEC. The PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16 version retains much of the same gameplay elements, level designs, enemies, and items as the arcade version.
Differences between the Arcade and PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16 versions
The game was reviewed in 1990 in Dragon #164 by Hartley, Patricia, and Kirk Lesser in "The Role of Computers" column. They gave it 3½ out of 5 stars.[3]