As featured in Retrogaming Times Monthly issue #72, May 2010.

Tiger-Heli drops the player into the pilot's seat of an attack helicopter on a mission to penetrate a dangerous terrorist nation and prevent a world takeover.  Armed with a barrage of missiles and a pair of bombs, any target is fair game.  Houses, civilian cars, railroad crossing gates - everything is ripe for destruction and scores points.  In fact ground targets are the only adversaries you'll face.  Even the planes that you fight against are on the ground, either sitting out in the open or taxiing down runways.  Unconventional to say the least but something that gives the game a little uniqueness.  Powerups exist in the form of support helicopters, known as Little Heli, which can be called by shooting special power up cross symbols on the ground.  Another unconventional aspect for a vertically scrolling shooter is that the game has no ending.  Upon reaching the end of the final area, the game loops back to the second stage and continues in this fashion.  Each stage ends with your helicopter touching down on a landing pad where bonus points are awarded for attached bombs and/or Little Heli.  After totaling up any bonus it's back up into the air for the next stage.

The arcade version of Tiger-Heli was developed by Toaplan, who would develop many popular arcade shooting games in their short ten year business duration.  Tiger-Heli is was of their earliest games but it set the groundwork for the company's legacy of entertainment.  The NES version was developed by Micronics, infamous for their NES games such as Athena, 1942 and Super Pitfall.  Taito published the arcade version while Pony Canyon published the Famicom version and Acclaim the NES version.  While it may seem that the involvement of some of those companies would set the game up to be a rotting pile, amazingly enough the game turned out to be an excellent shooter - depending on how much you like the arcade title.

Before even getting into the specifics of Tiger-Heli on the NES I have to start off by saying this is one of my favorite NES conversions.  As an arcade to NES conversion goes, you really couldn't ask for a better attempt.  For the most part, 99% of the arcade game makes the transfer onto the home hardware.  Controls are exactly as one would expect them to be with the directional pad replacing the joystick, one button for firing missiles and the other for dropping bombs.  Graphics are outstandingly recreated and look excellent save for the lower graphical horsepower and a few minor changes.  Granted the original arcade version's graphics weren't spectacular but side by side one can clearly see that a real attempt was made to get this game into the home looking like it did in the arcade.  If there is one drawback to the graphics and control, it goes back to one of the key problems of most Micronics developed games - low frame rate.  The game chugs along consistently for the most part but at first it feels like it is barely running properly.  However it only takes a couple moments to adjust to the slower pace of the game and since it does remain consistent, it doesn't detract from the fun.  Something that also has to be mentioned is how much on screen objects flicker, especially moving enemies such as the hundreds of tanks you'll destroy.  The flickering doesn't cause any problems with gameplay but there is an awful lot of it, on pretty much everything that isn't a background object, including the burned out craters that are left in your wake of destruction.  It's no secret that many Micronics NES games were poorly programmed so these problems don't come as a surprise but are far from crippling.

Game mechanics are identical with missiles traveling about half a vertical screen from where they are fired, even with the horizontal orientation change on the NES.  Bombs take out a circular area around the helicopter and the explosion effect is pretty close to how it originally was.  As in the arcade version, an enemy shot impacting the helicopter on the same side as a stored bomb will cause the bomb to detach and protect the helicopter.  I found this to be a nice touch and helps to maintain arcade authenticity.  The power up cross symbols work in exactly the same way: shooting a red cross dispatches a side firing Little Heli, shooting a grey cross (white in the arcade) dispatches a forward firing Little Heli, and shooting a green cross (blue in the arcade) dispatches an additional bomb.  Little Heli's must be collected for them to settle into formation and as in the arcade, there is a limit of two at a time although they can be mixed and matched.  Also as with the arcade version, only two bombs may be carried at the same time.  Attached bombs show up on the side of the helicopter and drop off when fired, again authentic to the arcade.  Power up items picked up when already maxed out will instead yield bonus points.  Bonus diamond blocks work as they did in the arcade, shooting ten of them awards an extra life.  Sound effects and music are dead on exact to the original, including the slightly different tune that plays when escorted by a Little Heli.  Yes, the same repetitive song plays throughout the entire game, but it's great.

Tiger-Heli always brings to mind fond memories of the NES era, those days when so many were playing the games and the world was in love with Nintendo.  Tiger-Heli was a game of constant rental, commonly owned game among friends and would become an unsung classic of the platform in my opinion.  It wasn't until many years later that I was able to finally play the arcade original and I was able to drop right in and know exactly what to do.  This is a testament to the accuracy of the NES version.  Yes the NES version is a little easier than the arcade original but I think that's mainly due to the slightly slower pace of the home version.  The effort at recreating the level design is what really shines.  This is something that another Micronics NES conversion, Ghosts 'n Goblins (RTM issue #34), also did very well.  While it's not for everyone, if you're in the mood for a simple NES shooter and high scores are your primary objective, then take a look at Tiger-Heli.
 

"InsaneDavid" also covers all types of video gaming at http://www.classicplastic.net/dvgi

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