Bionic Commando!

Hot damn they're remaking Bionic Commando. Bionic mother fucking Commando.

If you aren't aware, Bionic Commando was an arcade and NES staple back in the day. You control some dude with a weird name like Ladd Spencer to save Super Joe, the main character from Commando (another ridiculously awesome Capcom classic). At first glance it looks like standard side-scrolling platformer fare, but the big twist is that your character can't jump... instead he shoots out his telescoping bionic arm to swing and climb around the environment. It was very innovative at the time and a hell of a lot of fun.

Bionic Commando on the NES was very different from the arcade version. The Japanese version was called Top Secret: Hitler's Revival. It's in the future and you have to stop the Nazis who are trying to revive Hitler. 8-bit games didn't exactly have the market cornered on original plot lines. When they localized it for the States they decided to take out all of the Nazi stuff and replace it with... other stuff. The Nazis became Badds and Hitler became the mysterious "Master D." (man... Japan is AWESOME) At the end of the game you shoot a rocket through the cockpit of Hitler's chopper and his face explodes (sorry if I ruined it for you, but I think the statue of spoiler limitations on Bionic Commando has passed). It was very badass to kill a reborn Hitler as a 12 year old. And holy crap was that a lot of rambling explanation just so I could post an 8-bit image of Hitler's face exploding.

I am a little bit cautious about getting too excited about the remake because of the development team. It's being developed in Sweden by a team that's most recently done PC ports of GRAW. It's being overseen by some creative directors at Capcom Japan. And it's being produced by American producers at Capcom USA. It's not necessarily a recipe for disaster... but... I'll be crossing my fingers. I want some hot next-gen bionic grappling arm action!

-Brad!