Ikari Warriors on the NES, Not as Good as Commando

Ikari Warriors is one of the games that I remember playing when I was in high school. A friend of mine kept describing this game as something completely different from what it was. It was very cheap when I picked it up back in the late 1990s, which is something you could say about most retro games.

SNK released this game in 1986 as an arcade game. It was one of the many games that took inspiration from Cacom’s game, Commando. Ikari Warriors had a unique control scheme and was a two-player game. This control scheme didn’t translate too well to the NES, which is also something you could say about other arcade ports on home console.

There are a few SNK games from this era that I like. A few of them are on my list of favorite NES games. This isn’t one of them, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t anything good about this game. Let’s take a closer look at it to see what it has to offer.

TLDR: A fun distraction from better games on the NES

Narrative

There is one strange thing about the story in this game. The NES manual gives two different names from what Wikipedia has. I can only assume that the names were changed for the NES port, but I’m not sure since I don’t have a source.

The story in the NES game is very short. The manual (Link) says that you play as Paul and Vince, who are warriors with secret orders. These two are supposed to “invade an enemy nation.” That’s it. Whoever sent them on this mission must’ve really hated them.

For a game like this, the story is perfectly fine. I wasn’t expecting anything elaborate. The manual tells you who the characters are and what they’re trying to do. That is really all you need from a game like this.

Gameplay

Yeah, I’m not a fan of the gameplay in Ikari Warriors. There are some good things, but this isn’t the game that I would want to come back to. If anything, it makes me wish I were playing Iron Tank or Commando.

The first thing I want to point out is the slowdown. This is something that is separate from the movement speed of your characters. Ikari Warriors has a lot of slowdown. It is tied to how the sprites flicker a lot, and both cause a lot of problems for the gameplay.

You move painfully slow on land and even slower in the water. The screen scrolls as you move through the game, and it feels like an endless journey to nowhere. If you make it through all of the levels, then you’re greeted by a “congratulations” screen.

One of the things that I really like is the continue code. Pressing “A, B, B, A” after you lose all your lives will result in you getting three more lives. I’m glad this is in the game because it is way too easy to die, to the point where I wonder how the developers expected you to get through the game without it.

Ikari Warriors has quite a few power ups and bonus point pick-ups. The major ones are the vehicles, which don’t last long enough in my opinion. You can pick up more ammo for your gun and grenades. That’s really about it.

I don’t like the gameplay in Ikari Warriors. It is a rough arcade port that needed to have a different controller or a better control scheme. There are some nice things in this game, but they don’t stick around long enough to make up for the game’s shortcomings.

Visuals

I don’t mind the graphics in this game. Ikari Warriors has decent graphics, but they do get a little repetitive as you just keep walking. In some areas, the graphics get in the way of gameplay, which is never something that you want to see.

It is easy to see everything. That part of the graphics is done well as you can easily see projectiles and enemies, for the most part. The landmines are a different story altogether. They are one of the many annoyances that crop up as you get further into the game.

There is quite a bit of sprite flickering in this game. This is a common problem for most NES games, and even some of the classics have this issue. It is a bigger problem than other games I’ve played. The sprite flickering is more annoying in this game than in a regular NES game.

The graphics didn’t bother me. While the sprite flickering was pretty annoying, it wasn’t the biggest problem with this game. Everything in this game looks okay for an NES game from the 1980s.

Reviews at the Time

Finding reviews for this game has been a challenge. The review scores are all over the place. I found one review for the NES game when it was released in late 1986. The other reviews for it came much later, and they took a nosedive in the early 1990s.

Computer Entertainer gave the game a 4/4, which says more about the number of NES games on the market at the time. The reviewer called the game a “real winner” and seemed to like everything about it. They did point out that it is more fun with a friend.

The reviews on MobyGames show a different story. From 1989 to the present, the scores have fallen to around a 5/10 or lower. The user scores this game at 6.5/10. This does include all the versions of the game, so things are a little skewed because of the better versions of Ikari Warriors.

The review scores tell a familiar story for most retro games. The scores are normally higher on release, and then plummet in the 2000s. In the 2010s, the scores tend to stabilize around reality.

6/10. This is a playable NES game. I don’t like it as much as the other retro games that copied what Commando was doing, but Ikari Warriors does have a few things going for it. Even though I find the gameplay to be annoyingly repetitive, I can’t say it is bad or terrible.

Pros

• Easy continue code
• Decent Graphics
• Fun two-player game

Cons

• Frustrating glitches
• Cheap one-hit deaths
• Way too repetitive

Conclusion

Despite its frustrations, I do like this game. It isn’t going to make it on a best of list or a list of my favorite games, but there is something fun about it. This is one of those games that would be more fun with a second player. Just having someone else with you would make this much better.

I can see how someone would like this game. Ikari Warriors isn’t some broken mess or anything like that. It is simply a long and repetitive game that is way more fun to play with a friend than by yourself. I might have a different opinion of this game if I had played the arcade game before this one.

Whenever I go back and play games like this, I try to keep an open mind. Something like this is best experienced with a friend or two. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, it would’ve been a fun distraction before going outside to play. In the late 1990s, it would’ve been fun to laugh at as each of us struggled to get anywhere in the game.

If you liked this post, please check out my other posts about retro games. Here are some suggestions: Simon’s Quest and Iron Tank.