314 · Cabal
Originating in the arcades, Cabal is a shooter where the protagonist runs back and forth along the bottom of the screen, ducking and dodging bullets and grenades from the enemy. The player returns fire by moving a target around the screen which also moves the player character and may expose him to enemy fire.
Cabal is a 1988 arcade game from TAD Corporation, a company of ex-Data East developers, and Mike, Sean and Joe all played the NES port. It's a shooting gallery where you control a soldier on screen, hide behind walls, and aim a crosshair at everything the Dreaded Republic of Allied Terrorists (DRAT) throws at you. The manual is a letter from Major I Am Havoc promising a week of "recon and ruination" on a tropical island. We liked it better than the game.
What works
- The tone. When you clear a level, your soldier waves his gun over his head and dances off into the distance like he won the lottery, to happy music. Joe laughed out loud the first time. Sean called it the game's defining feature, and it clashes with everything else. The manual's last page congratulates you on finishing, so you could skip the playing.
- A destruction meter. You don't hunt a set number of enemies. You wreck vehicles, boats and buildings until a white bar turns black.
- Dodge rolls and scuba soldiers. Enemies popping out of the water, and white-armored soldiers who dodge-roll like you, are the most interesting foes. The submarine parked in a pond in front of a house was the one boss that felt like a real fight.
- A good power-up. One beefier gun, in red and blue, falls briefly and is easy to miss, so grabbing it feels earned. Grenades follow your crosshair for range.
What doesn't
- The controls. The D-pad moves the crosshair up and down and the soldier left and right, holding A reverses roles, and dodge rolls need button combinations. Joe called it a lot for one brain, and Mike felt the NES hardware lets the game down. We wished the soldier could shift a step into the screen to dodge.
- Fragile walls. The cover walls were gone in seconds for Joe and Mike. A let's play we watched suggested they last if you play in the open and save them for crowded moments.
- Bosses that don't build. One has a safe spot where you can stand and shoot for five minutes. After the tough submarine, the train boss was easier than the stages.
- Hard-to-see bullets. They flash between two colors every frame, and Joe kept getting hit by shots he never saw.
- It wants to be a Zapper game, but controlling the soldier rules that out. Two-player has red and blue crosshairs, and may make it friendlier.
Beyond the game
The arcade original used a trackball, which Mike wondered might fit better. TAD's follow-up, Blood Bros, is the same idea in the Wild West and is the one people tend to remember.
The bottom line
Skip it. We voted three no's. Mike left the NES version off because the controls hold it back. Sean enjoyed it and wants to try the arcade version and Blood Bros, but not as essential. Joe found it frustrating and, even past that, nothing to write home about.
Written from our conversation in this episode.
- Show no mercy!
- NES Longplay
- Manual
- 1988 arcade shooter
- Developed by TAD Corporation which was a group of ex Data East Devs trying their own company
- Arcade had the trackball (which I never really liked, it made sense for marble madness but very little. People use those as computer mice)
- PLOT
- YOUR ORDERS, SOLDIER
- At ease! Major I.M. Havoc here--Combat Consultant to the International World Affairs Council. We've just received notice of a world-wide assault being planned by D.R.A.T.-the Dreaded Republic of Allied Terrorists. The Council has instructed me to select a volunteer to defuse the situation.. and guess what? You just volunteered!
- Get ready for a week's R & R (Recon and Ruina-tion) at the terrorist camp, on a secluded island paradise. You'll stroll the warm, tropical beaches as bullets shred the sand at your feet. Gaze at enchanting sunsets as you dodge the raking fire of deadly combat choppers. And admire the beauty of ancient ruins. And then ruin 'em some more!
- This is strictly a covert operation. The Council cannot claim responsibility for you if you fail.
- You're on your own and if ya' mess up, it's your hide. The entire terrorist camp must be wiped out or the vermin will begin their reign of terror.
- Leave no buildings standing. No ships floating. No choppers flying. And most importantly. .clear the entire zone of enemy personnel!
- Keep your eyes open and your finger on the trig-ger. Complete your mission and the world can breathe a sigh of relief. And good luck, soldier.
- You're gonna need it!
- Major I.M. Havoc Combat Consultant, I.W.A.C.
- YOUR ORDERS, SOLDIER
- At the end of the manual, the last page congratulates you on completing the game…so do you even need to see the end screen? You got the congratulations.
- Wild Guns = Cabal
- Cabal is like Virtua Cop, House of the Dead, Time Crisis light gun style game if there was never any advancement from the player as enemies were defeated and if there wasn’t a lightgun
- This should’ve been a light gun game right?
- Gameplay
- Generic gun with limitless ammunition and a fixed number of grenades to fend off enemy troops and attack the base.
- Some power-ups give special weapons such as an extremely fast-firing machine gun or an automatic shotgun with a lower firing rate and larger area of effect. Others grant extra grenades or additional points.
- Starts behind a wall which can be damaged and shattered by enemy fire.
- An enemy gauge at the bottom of the screen depletes as foes are destroyed and certain structures (which collapse rather than shatter) are brought down.
- When the enemy gauge is emptied, the level is successfully completed, all of the remaining buildings onscreen collapse, and the player progresses to the next stage.
- Some ports didn’t have the roll
- Generic gun with limitless ammunition and a fixed number of grenades to fend off enemy troops and attack the base.
- The awkward run when you finish a level
- 2 player requirement?
- D.R.A.T
- They’re such a DRAT
- DREADED REPUBLIC OF ALLIED TERRORIST
- Would terrorists of different allegiances form an alliance? Is there a common goal or niche for that?
- Sequels and Spinoffs
- TAD corp games
- JuJu Densetsu (Japan) / Toki (U.S.) (1989)
- Blood Bros. (1990)
- Legionnaire (1992)
- Heated Barrel (1992)
- TAD corp games
- EGL
- NEXT WEEK - Captain Skyhawk
- Superhero, SHMUP, SUPER SHUMP?!
Auto-generated transcript. Each paragraph starts with its timestamp. Speakers are not identified.
Cabal, show no mercy.
And welcome to NEStalgia, a chronological exploration of every NES game released in North America. I'm Mike. I'm Sean. And I'm Joe. Cabal, the 1988, which is more recent than the 1984 game we played last week. You ever think we're getting like cheated here when you're not getting games that actually came out in 1990?
Yeah, I feel like we're doing this like weird like slingshot around like slingshot thing where we go back to 1990 to then like be propelled back further to 19, whatever, 84. Wait, what year is this? Well, it's 2024. Oh. 1990 is the year we're playing games from right now. But really, they're all like actually older than that for the most part. Like it's always like, oh, this actually came out to arcades in 88 or this came out to computers in 84. It's like, well, that's annoying. So it's like switch releases. The kids didn't know. Right, right. Exactly. Yeah. Nintendo was never releasing up to date stuff unless they were releasing it themselves.
And Cabal was developed by TAD Corporation, T-A-D, all capitals corporation, which was a group of ex Data East devs trying their hand at their own company. So they were like, you know what? Screw Data East. That's really funny. Yeah, it's like 1988. It's not even like, hasn't been that much time. So these are Data East rejects.
Or the best that said, screw this and we can do better. But like still, like, you know what I mean? Like there just hasn't been enough time. Like nowadays you see that where it's like, this guy used to work at BioWare, right? And now he, you know, started his own company or whatever. But this is like, you know, video games have been around for four years since the crash. And it's like, we're going to make our own company. Screw the big guys.
And Cabal was an arcade game. So the arcade version had a trackball. And I, you know, I understand that there's a time for trackballs. Marble Madness probably being the most appropriate time for a trackball. But I don't really like using a trackball for controlling anything really. Even, you know, people who use them as computer mice. I think those people are really strange. Those people are strange.
But I would say that this game, I would dig a trackball. I see exactly how it was used. And maybe this would be much better that way. But yeah, as long as the trackball only controls the crosshair, it doesn't also control you. Two trackballs. One trackball for you. Yeah, you have to actually roll the ball too. You're not actually using your hand. Yeah, and you actually can push in the trackball for the buttons. There's no other buttons. Yeah. It's just you push in the trackball. Right. I like that. And depending on how hard you push it in is the action it performs. So whether you do the roll or whether you shoot the gun depends on how hard you press.
You're getting too far ahead of ourselves though because Cabal has a plot. And in the manual, it comes as a letter from Major I Am Havoc, who is a combat consultant for the IWAC.
I think it's the International World Affairs Council, which isn't funny compared to DRAT, the dreaded Republic of Allied terrorists that you're going up against. Like you think that Major I Am Havoc, your enemy being DRAT. Didn't we just play a game where the terrorist drug dealers were DRAT? Wasn't that like the Black Manta or something? I thought they were something different in Wrath of the Black Manta. It wasn't DRAT, but it was, I think we talked about DARE a lot. Maybe that's what... No, whatever. Well, we were talking about DARE, but I don't think that they had DARE in the game. No. They did have a lot of, yeah. A lot of educational goodies though.
True, true. And now that I've lost my train of thought, I might as well tell you that, you know, I'm not going to necessarily read you this letter from Major I Am Havoc, but this is like, this does set the tone for the game, right? You even see it from like when you complete a level that like, it gets a little cartoony and he does like a little dance and he's like, I'm, you know, like I did it. I somehow survived the level. Like they're clearly pitting you up to be this like low level soldier who just has to take on an entire army by yourself. And that's kind of funny. Okay. Yeah. Hold on. I didn't think we'd reference this yet.
If, if in the manual, it's giving you a funny vibe that really is not anywhere in this game, except for that ridiculous, you've just laid waste to homes. Yeah. And then you just run off into the distance like a fucking idiot that just like won the lottery or something. And it, it, it's really strange. It's very, it's very strange. So I'm glad you got it out of the way now. Yeah. And I don't think you guys are being clear enough with this. It's not just like, oh, he's running and he's happy. It's like a ministry of silly walks, high need, like outward need dance. That's like waving his gun around like above his head. He might as well be shooting the gun in the air, you know?
But okay. So Sean, you mentioned the houses and everything, but they're, they're trying to make sure that you know that you shouldn't feel bad because anybody who lives here is part of the dreaded Republic of allied terrorists. I think the Geneva convention does say something along those lines. Yeah. And you know, uh, first off, would terrorists of different allegiances form an alliance? And like, is there even a common goal or niche for that amongst terrorists? Have we ever thought about that before? Like whether two different groups of terrorists would join up and become like super terrorists?
I feel like we're getting into like comic book-y levels of like villains. We're like, yeah, like the sinister six of terrorists. I think it does kind of happen in the real world. So I don't, I don't know how silly it is, but never to the degree of like all terrorists of all. Like, it's not like, uh, it's not like an all-star thing. Like the IRA isn't getting together with Al Qaeda. Uh, uh, and what? Okay. Sorry. That might've been, uh, I don't think that exists, but in some forms, maybe.
Yeah, no, they're, they could be funding each other, supporting each other with information. But this is a, this is a country now that has just been like the country, you know, some countries run on democracy, some run on communism. This one runs on terrorism. Well, yeah. Yeah. The idea that like, yeah, that every single, you know, terrorist organization has like been decided to band together. It's kind of like the, again, like, um, black Manta, where it was like all drug organizations became one drug organization. It's like, what is the incentive? Well, profit in the terms of like a drug, a drug organization. But I think like the question is because you can be a terrorist for a lot of reasons.
Uh, they, they, they're probably not going to have a hundred percent aligned goals, you know? So it was probably doing from the start. They should go back to the drawing board, uh, figure out a new way to run a country, but you're here. So just to give some flavor text lines from, uh, major, I am havoc that kind of helped set up the silliness of furthermore, other than just the dance and, uh, the enemy being known as drat.
Uh, he says, get ready for a week's R and R, which is in parentheses recon and ruination at the terrorist camp on a secluded island paradise. You'll stroll the warm tropical beaches as bullets shred at the sand of your feet, gaze at enchanting sunsets as you dodge the raking fire of deadly combat choppers, and admire the beauty of ancient ruins, and then ruin them some more.
That's a well-written manual. I think so. I think, you know, you gotta give it up for that. Yeah. Uh, a little more flavor for you. You're on your own, and if you mess it up, it's your hide. The council cannot claim responsibility for you. If you fail, the entire camp must be wiped out, or the vermin will begin their reign of terror. Well, if that was so true, why would they send just one person? Like, if this is really, like, do or die, and this is an entire country, right? I think the United States might have another way to solve this problem.
I think that's like, that's the make or break in pretty much all of these games, you know, that they always just send the one dude. But I think, like, in at least one of our previous episodes, we may have come to a headcanon of like, oh, you'll go first, and then the rest of us will go. Uh, because we either really trust in you, or we don't think that the element of surprise is useful in any way. Um, so we're going to waste it on you. I like to think that every member of, this is the US, every member of the US military is, is also doing this. And that's how outnumbered we are, is that every individual has to take on these hundreds of people.
Like, all at the same time, or we're going in sequence? Yeah, all at the same time. If you were to like pan the camera over, there's another guy doing exactly what you're doing, there's another 50 guys coming at him. Oh, I like that. And he's shooting a bunch of them, you know.
I promise I'll get away from the manual so we can talk about the game, but I think this is funny. At the end of the manual, the last page of the manual congratulates you on completing the game. So, do you even need to see the end screen? I mean, do you even need to play the game? You got the congratulations. You got basically the same thing that you're going to get if you beat the game. Yeah, if you just read, it's like, it's like a lesson in reading the manual. It's like, do you ever have a teacher give you that test that, like, the directions say, like, fill out question number one and two and then sit quietly. And there's like a thousand other questions that you don't have to do if you just read the directions.
I like that. I do remember that happening and failing, because who has time for that? But I also like the idea that whoever wrote this manual wasn't fully aware of the concept and that maybe they wouldn't be reading along page for page, like, as they're playing the game. And like, oh, no, you're not supposed to read that part yet.
Yeah. Spoilers. Yeah. I'm actually surprised that in the game, when it gets to the end, it doesn't say like, you know, page 13. Exactly. Instead of the end or anything, it just goes page 13. And you're supposed to know like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's actually page 12, Sean.
So good guess, though. I really appreciate you throwing in some of your skin into that. I know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna have to know you're gonna
All right, back to the actual game now. The game is, you know, how do I put this? Like, Cabal is a third-person shooter where you hide behind walls and have your crosshairs targeting at enemies, and those walls are only good for so long, and your firepower is good forever. So lay waste to all of the enemies, vehicles, buildings, boats, whatever there is on screen. Shoot it all down to deplete the enemy meter at the bottom of the screen.
Unlike other games where it might be like a set number of enemies or a time limit, this is actually just like a destruction meter. And so you have to cause a certain amount of destruction to fill the bar up completely or deplete it, depending on which way you're looking at it. You're turning a white bar black. And once that bar is completely black, the level is over. You don't have to defeat every single enemy on the screen. And you move on to the next stage. There are like four stages in a stage, if that makes sense, all leading up to a boss at the end of each one of these main stages.
This is the kind of game that like later games like Wild Guns would play a lot like. However, there's something I can't shake about Cabal, and that's just the way it's set up. It's set up so that you see the entire screen and including your character, including every other character, and you can see your crosshairs and everything. But Cabal is kind of like a really early version of the kind of Virtua Cop, House of the Dead, Time Crisis, light gun style games. If there was never any advancement from the player as enemies were defeated, and more importantly, if there wasn't a light gun, this should have been an NES Zapper game, right?
Yeah. 100%. The way that I describe this and what is so jarring about it to me is you are playing as a guy in the first person perspective, and that guy is playing a light gun game. So you have to control the guy playing a light gun game, and it's very weird because you've got to move him around, but it's the same controls to move him as it is to move his gun. So it's very jarring. Yeah, I'd describe this as like a shooting gallery game.
Because yeah, I definitely got the same vibe of like, oh, this is sort of Time Crisis demake. Um, but I don't know, I still think that it, I don't think this is a badly designed game. I think it's weird compared to what we're used to. Um, but I also think that like a light gun game, there's a lot more going on here than what I think a light gun game is capable of. I mean, I agree in the sense that you, there's a lot more going on because you have this character on screen and you can dodge fire that's coming at you and you, you move. But I, I do think that, uh, the, it wasn't there with the, with the way that you control the character and the way that you control the crosshairs.
It, it's very like counterintuitive to me. Maybe I just needed more time with it to, to familiarize myself more with it. But, uh, I, I've got a couple of, a couple of complaints about it. One is that you are controlling this guy moving back and forth, but you can't, because you can't move anywhere up and down, it sometimes makes dodging some fire very, almost impossible.
I mean, probably not actually, but for me, almost impossible because like sometimes I do see something coming at me, but the only way I can go is left or right. And it's still going to hit me because my sprite is so tall, um, that it, it hits me either way. And like, I wish I could move up and down a little bit. And then also just up and down on the D pad moves your cursor up and down, left and right moves your guy up and down. And then holding a and left and right moves your guy left and right. That's a lot for my brain to do all at once.
Okay. I mean, I think though that the fact that while, if you're not holding a down and you're, and you're pressing left and light, left and right, yes, your character's moving, but I think your, your, uh, crosshair is also moving with you. So there's still some of that going on. And then you only really lock into place if you're holding down shoot and then the, the cursor moves in relation to you. So I, yeah, it's, it's a bit more complex. It's sort of like holding down, like aim down sites or something in a way. But, uh, I didn't think it was completely ruining my experience.
Sean is correct that this game is doing something though, that a light gun game couldn't. And I think the reason why I was just throwing out that like, it should be a lightning, like a game is because it feels like it would be better on the NES knowing the whole like NES zapper and, and how good that usually feels in games, but it can't be that because you are also controlling a character.
And so, uh, a lot of what this game's skill or, um, rather difficulty comes from is trying to shoot at enemies while successfully dodging their attacks. And so, uh, you know, I agree with Sean that it's not, um, it's not a flawed game from the get-go because of that. It's not like it's just always bad to shoot. Like it's impossible to hit enemies and move at the same time. That is not true. It probably does become hard when like Joe said, it becomes nearly impossible to avoid
bullets when there's enough characters on screen that they are shooting in all directions because you don't really have a way out from that except for the dodge roll and, uh, the, uh, jump roll, which are, uh, basically maneuvers built into the game that require some precision. You can't just be invincible while you're dodging, but they do make it a little easier than say any shmup ever does where theoretically you can cross through. Yeah. You get high frames, right? Right. With, yeah, with correct timing.
And so, yes, um, yes, it's a challenging game in the sense that like, I certainly thought that the walls that I had were going to last a lot longer than they did. I don't know about you guys. Yeah. Um, and yes, the crosshair is hard to control, but it's not like the character and gameplay design that they gave you is inherently bad. Yeah. For some reason, the vibe I was getting, again, a modern comparison slash example is the original release of Resident Evil four. Like that game changed the way that we control third person games.
Um, but if you go back to it and you ignore all of the sort of, uh, the, the polish and streamlining that every game after it sort of perfected, it is a really tough game to control and it's really hard to handle. And that's sort of what I was getting from this. It's like all the utility is there. Like it makes sense how you sort of lock down and only aim. It makes sense how to dodge. It makes sense how to rearrange yourself on the screen. But to, to put that, all that, all that into your brain, like Joe was saying, you definitely have to rewire a few things to make it work. Yeah. It definitely has all of the, everything that I would want to be able to do with how you do it. You know, even that those dodge rolls and stuff was like.
It was like a weird combination of like, you hold like down over and a or B or whatever it is. It was like, it was just a lot of button combinations and like, you know, like up and down doing something different than left and right. Unless I'm holding a, now it does the same thing. It's just, yeah, a lot to get my brain around.
I wonder how it would have went down if the game just focused more on the player's ability to dodge attacks and had a little more, uh, not, not like auto aiming in the sense that it just automatically locks onto a target because obviously you'd either have to solve the ammunition problem or make it harder to shoot or something.
Cause otherwise you'd always be locked on. But if it wasn't so much on the directional pad to move a crosshair cursor around and was a little more streamlined of just like, here's where the enemies are and your crosshairs kind of move in tandem with them. So you just need to line up the shot while dodging the other shots. I think some of the, uh, some of the biggest problems I had was wasting so much time adjusting crosshairs while kind of focusing on that.
So I'm not moving and therefore realizing like, oh, well now I'm trapped because these bullets are coming to me in a way that I can't escape them. Uh, you know, that's, that's more of an observation on probably my skill level and something I could have overcome with time. But I just feel like the way the crosshairs control in the game as is are just a little too rigid, um, for my liking.
Yeah. I think something else that I could have used personally, like, cause like, yeah, I'm trying to get my head around what exactly I would want them to do differently because I can't think of like a great solution. But one thing, uh, that I would have liked was to be, if you could, if you could walk three steps forward and three steps back, like into the screen and then just make holding A, B to, you know, whichever you want it to be, holding A is to stay still and not holding A is to move no matter which left right up down you're using, then you get the, that is more clear and you get the ability to dodge things a little bit into Z space.
Um, would, I mean, I, that's just me making it a little easier, I guess. I mean that you don't necessarily have to take away that challenge of it, but I think that would make it more, um, digestible for me. I think I agree. I think I'd like that if it, I mean, it doesn't have to be, I don't think it should be too much of a buffer down there, but if it was like the equivalent of like, if you moved up from the bottom to the top, like you've shifted the crosshair one full crosshairs length, I think that that would be enough. Um, but yeah, I think that that would still be a completely playable game that is still like
capitalizing on what it's going for. And so you have the generic unlimited ammunition gun at all times. You also have a fixed number of grenades, uh, that you can throw. And I believe that those are also based on where your crosshairs are. So you can get some nice range on those, especially if like tanks or helicopters are in the distance. Uh, there is a trade-off for that of course, but it can become a skill thing.
And then there's also some like power up items, uh, that can fall from enemies that also enhance the gameplay. Uh, you know, we ask this question every time that there's power ups in a game, just do they add enough? What do you guys think? I think the fact that there's only really the one power up, which is you get a beefier gun for a short amount of time. And the fact that that it's a, it's a demonstrably useful, uh, useful thing to grab. And it's hard enough to get because it doesn't really stay on the screen too long. And they're, they're well spaced out and how often they're dropped.
I think like, this isn't the kind of game where, oh, the power ups need to be like super creative and inventive. I think that it's like, it's good use of something simple.
Yeah. You're not, it's almost, it's almost less of a power up and more of just an item, you know? I mean, it's not like you're, it's not a shmup where you're trying to like, you become Superman by the end of collecting enough power ups. It's like, it's a nice reprieve where it's like, okay, this is, this is more helpful. And is it true that there's just the one? Cause that's the only one that I saw was that like that stronger gun. Yeah. There are different colors. I don't know if the colors have anything to do with it, but I remember like the, the
your reticle changes and you, you get a different sound effect and everybody dies faster. So maybe there are different like levels of power increase, but I only saw it as like, okay, good. I've got big gun now.
Yeah. Same here. Yeah. It is interesting cause they do have red and blue, but, uh, neither I or the manual, uh, could list any change, uh, between them. So it must, if it is something, it, it must not be a time or the amount of shots fired. I don't know. Right.
And I mentioned that wall, uh, that you start each level with, and that's kind of, um, you know, space invaders ask. Yeah. They always had those, you know, those, yeah, they had those walls, but even though, you know, those decay much slower than this. And I mentioned that when I was talking about, uh, some critiques I had on the game, what did you guys think of that? Is it like surprising that it's there at all? Is, is there a way to keep them around longer that I didn't pick up on? Um, you know, would love to hear your thoughts.
I mean, I, I, I felt the same way. I mean, I played a couple of levels and I was like, these might as well just not be here. Like they, they don't, they help for like a second, but then like the levels take a while. It's a, it's a, it's a long level. And I feel like, I feel like, well, I guess you could probably, if you're better at this game, you could kill things fast enough that they don't destroy the walls. For me, the walls were destroyed in seconds. Like immediately the walls are destroyed. I'm watching a let's player right now who is doing a lot better than I was. And the walls actually do seem like, yeah, like, like useful one-time shields.
So I guess in that sense, they are useful, but. I guess like if you were to play the game a bit more risky and stay out in the open and just dodge for a while and only use the walls when you think it's warranted, when there's like a bunch more enemies on screen and you're not just like leading every shot to that wall. Like maybe you can increase the length that way if you use them more strategically.
But I'm, I was using them the same as you guys. Whereas like, oh, if I don't have to dodge for a little bit, I guess I'll do that. And obviously in these, uh, shooter gallery style games, uh, thank you for the term there, Sean, you know, a lot of it relies on how interesting or dynamic what you're shooting is. And so, yes, like the landscapes will change and the locations will change where you are. But, uh, in a game where seemingly the object is to just destroy everything on screen, including the buildings, how, uh, dynamic do these levels feel?
Is there like, oh, this is a little trickier because there's these obstacle in the way of the enemies or like, oh, this obstacle actually acts as a, um, you know, a shield for them as well or something. Like, uh, I, I can't think of too many examples like that from this game off the top of my head. Uh, you know, that to say that each stage is refreshing, that it is completely different from the stage before it, not just like a palette swap or, um, you know, the same location, but mirrored. It is, uh, you know, you are advancing through the enemy lines. Yeah. They do have, uh, they do play around with that sort of environmental thing. Um, there's one in the first world, I guess, where in the background is a gate that, um,
sort of very, very quickly, periodically every, I don't know, maybe 10 seconds or so, a pair of grenadiers will come out from behind and throw grenades to where you're standing. Um, and if it's out of their hands, then it's guaranteed to land where you were standing. So you kind of want to keep an eye on that, uh, on that gate.
Um, there's a level later on in the game where there's like a weird, like bog or like, I guess just like a flooded area where instead of all enemies coming from the sides, they can just come up from under the water. And there are levels that have like cover that only they can use until you destroy it. And then once you destroy it, it's a little bit easier because they don't just pop out randomly. So it's, I don't, I think they could have been a lot more creative with how they used all this environmental stuff, but it is still there.
Yeah. It was more in the, in like the offensive, well, I guess the enemy's offensive environmental stuff. I felt like there was a lot of that. There was, in addition, there was also like plane bombings that would come in and like there were, you know, in some things and there were like, yeah, like you said, like the, the grenades that would come in, like totally changed the way you think about the level.
Yeah. There wasn't much as far as environmentally, like things for you to interact with that change it. Not that there needs to be, but if that was your question, Mike, like I, I didn't think there was, but it was, there was a lot in like the end. And I want to say enemy variety, but some of it, like those people coming out of the water is not even enemy variety. It's like enemy placement or like the, the way it's enemy behavior. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
Yeah. But the people coming out of the water, those scuba soldiers, um, which is an awesome name for a soldier division. The scuba soldiers, uh, are, I definitely like the most interesting of the types of enemies, uh, at least soldier classes that you can find. There are also those white, uh, armored soldiers who are able to do the dodge roll that you can do. Oh yeah. It's like, wait, that's cheating.
Like, yeah, you know, like give me one kind of advantage over the enemy, but, um, no, that's fun that like, you have to, you have to really like follow them across the screen and shoot at them this way. Just like how you might die from not dodger rolling at the exact second, you get them as well for like, yeah, you dodged this bullet, but did you dodge the next bullet?
Like, no, cause you can't, you can't move that fast. Uh, also with the scuba soldiers comes probably, um, the, the most interesting of the boss fights to, uh, the, uh, submarine battle. Um, I, I was surprised to see that so early in the game and that, uh, I didn't beat the game, but the rest of the boss fights in the game are just kind of, you know, like, oh, this is a, here's a, like a super weapon or something.
And here's a bunch of trucks. Right. And it covers, you know, like even the super weapon thing, it's like, yep. And it covers sometimes so you can't shoot at it, but once it's exposed, just shoot at it and you'll take it down. Like the sub is like the actual, I don't know, like threatening dynamic kind of boss fight that I expected the game to continue on from there out. But you guys weren't feeling the boss fights in general?
Calling them boss fights maybe is silly in itself. I mean, I guess there's that, but I, I, what I noticed about this was that there's the, the first, I think it's the very first boss fight. There was basically a safe zone, you know, like there's a spot that you can stand that is like completely, you can't get hit.
I did find that there was one time where like after me almost destroying the boss, you know, like however, five minutes of me just standing in one spot, shooting the boss, he couldn't hit me. Then he shoots like one thing over in my direction and I got to move and then I go back and that safe spot again. So it was a little underwhelming because it was easy. I also felt that the, the next boss, I think was the submarine, the second boss you said?
Yes. I think it was the second boss. The submarine was pretty tough. And then I only got to the, to the boss after that, which I think is like a train looking thing. And that one was like much easier. So I felt like, like I felt like the train thing was easier than the levels themselves. So like, while like there's cool boss variety, it didn't, it didn't feel like progression. It just felt like really, really easy, kind of hard. And then like really pretty easy again.
And who knows how it goes on from there, but I would have liked, um, I mean, I say I would have liked more, um, you know, better design to make it more difficult, but I love the fact that I can just cheat that first boss because I'm a baby. But if I, if I were a serious contender in playing this game, uh, I would be kind of disappointed knowing that I could just completely cheese it. I like that the submarine is like just in a pond in front of somebody's house.
Yeah. They just have the, that's like, you know, some, uh, corporal's, um, submarine that he keeps in his, uh, cause you know, the corporals all live there. Yeah. And that's where they park it. And then like, you know, you know, when you see like a car on the, on the highway and it's got a trailer hitch and there's a submarine hitch to it, that's where usually where they're going, they're taking it to the ocean. They're going subbing.
Yeah. There is the ability for two player in this game. And while usually that is just something we gloss over or ask Joe, uh, you know, what was it like? Uh, I feel like this game more than even some of the other games that offer it, like this time two player feels like it might be like a requirement, uh, to fully experience the game and to be able to enjoy the game without as many frustrations. Uh, certainly being able to take down, um, the enemies twice as fast might give you a standing chance against all their bullets, right?
Yeah. I also, how does it work? This is like you each have, I'm assuming it's not like this modern way where it's like you, you only die if you both die. I feel like that's a more recent thing, but like when you die, you didn't play it, Joe, I didn't play it. I actually didn't even know there was a two player until you just said that I somehow missed it. Damn. Missed opportunity. That is surprising. It feels like a missed opportunity, but yes, uh, cabal, I could try and find the, uh, NES specific rules, but yeah, it is like you can, you can join in and then, uh, the game ends when both players die.
Yeah. I mean, yeah, I guess in that sense, I, I, I, what I'm curious about is like if, if player one dies and player two finishes the round, does player one come back or no, you just wait until player two dies. Well, no player one immediately comes back just like how you would in the stage. So, you know, once you lose all of your lives, it's game over for that character, but you spawn right back in until you lose all your lives. And obviously like it's, it's in real time. Like you're both on there. You both have cross hairs. Uh, the second player is all red. Whereas the first player was blue. Classic. Yep. Red, red and blue. That's the way baby. Especially if you're going to go take down drat.
Man, there's such a drat. Drag. Uh, that it'd be such a drag. Yeah. Sorry. There's such a drat. Drat would be like what they would say when you defeat them. They'd be like, oh, drat. On the sequels and spinoff side, um, Tad Corporation, the people that made this game saying screw Data East, um, they made a bunch of other games. And by that I mean four. So, um, good job, um, at having a company.
Uh, they did make a game called Blood Bros, which, uh, is kind of like a cabal influenced game. Uh, what I mean by that is it plays exactly like cabal with the, you know, same viewpoint and everything, but, um, it's much flashier. It's on newer hardware. It's, um, I think it's like in the 16 bit kind of days. Uh, I don't know if that translates to arcade games. Like if, if the Super Nintendo and the Genesis had 16 bit, did arcades also have 16 bit and just were capable of doing better stuff or did they not care about bits? It's a good question. You'd think that at this point in the podcast, we'd be pretty good to answer that question, but we don't know.
Yeah, we don't know. Uh, what makes Blood Bros interesting is, uh, you play, it also has two player. You can either play as the cowboy or the Native American and you're in the wild west and, uh, there's just shenanigans everywhere, you know, uh, big explosions all the time when you shoot stuff, which feels good. Uh, lots of different types of enemies, which is fun. This game definitely seems to be the one that people remember, uh, over Cabal. But, uh, that's not to say Cabal doesn't have its fans.
And we will see if any of those fans are on this episode of Nostalgia when we do the essential games list. I think I would like to try Cabal with the trackball, even though I hate the trackball, um, and prefer it only when I'm also playing as a ball, a la Marble Madness. But I don't think it was done right here on the NES. Um, specifically with that D-pad and with two buttons, like I would just like to see,
uh, a better way to, I don't know, I don't even know how the trackball works. So I guess I'm just intrigued. Like, did that also control both the crosshair and your movement? Or like, was there a different, like a joystick for the crosshair, but your trackball was for your movement or vice versa? Like, I just think that the controls on the NES are what holds back Cabal here. Um, it, it certainly plays well and can be played. Um, but I can't help feel like the hardware, uh, let it down here. So I'm not going to put the NES version on our essential games list. Sean? Um, yeah, I feel like I had a more positive experience with this game than you guys. I wasn't as turned off by the controls. Uh, I really did like the destructible environments.
The, uh, the, the animation's pretty good. Like, uh, uh, especially like on your character. Uh, like if, as you sort of are pivoting around following your crosshair, it's like a very smooth animation. I just like that. I like blowing stuff up and, uh, I, I don't, I really don't know how to feel about the idiotic way that he runs off into the distance, but it's really kind of like the defining feature of this game, I think. So I think I like that because it just really does not play with the rest of the tone.
But so, I mean, yeah, I, I had a positive experience with this game. I would like to play the, uh, the wild west version. And I'd also like to play the arcade version of this. Um, but that said, I don't think that this is an essential game. It's just, uh, it's very, at least it's unique. So I liked it, but not essential. Joe. I would say that I definitively love the way he runs off at the end of the, uh, at the end of the level. I think I actually laughed out loud the first time I saw that because it was so unexpected. The music is so happy.
Um, but yeah, obviously, uh, I found this a pretty frustrating experience, um, with the controls and like other things about it too, that like we didn't even really mention. I think that something about it, something about the way that the bullets, um, kind of flash between two different colors every frame.
So they look, they're like, they're like hard for me to see. I feel like I would just get hit a lot because like I just could, I didn't see the projectile coming at me. I don't know. Maybe that's just, maybe I'm gonna get my eyes checked. But also, um, yeah, those, those frustrations that, uh, that I had kind of combined with like the fact that like, if I got past all of those, I still think I would look at this and be like, it's, it's nothing to write home about anyways.
So that's definitely the, those two things combined are definitely keeping it off the essential games list for me. All right. Three no's. Um, but I was surprised, I will say not, um, having not even played the game yet. When I first started just doing my doc for the episode, I was surprised to see maybe not the NES version, but just Cabal in general being fondly remembered, uh, all over the internet. So, um, it certainly, uh, was a good game at the time of its release and maybe just hasn't
aged well enough, uh, for it to be considered compared to what we usually put on the essential games list. Who can say? Every day is just like, what side of the bed did I wake up on? Yeah. Zelda 2 is still not an essential game. Um, so I just have to wake up on the right side of bed. I always wake up on the left side. Yeah. We gotta, we gotta fix that. We gotta fix your bed. Yeah. Can someone fluff up my bed, please? Um, next week, Captain Skyhawk, uh, question. Do we think that's a superhero, a shmup or the, um, never before seen superhero shmup?
I'm gonna say it's a, just a shmup. Hmm. Um, I don't know. I think maybe it's a, maybe it's like a, one of those pilot simulator things. There are so many like Captain blanks. Are we doing the episode now? Are we in the Captain Skyhawk episode? Yeah, let's just do it. No, no, no. I'll save my, I'll save my thought for next week. Uh, we'll see you guys then every Friday. Bye. All right, all right, all right, all right. Bye.
