Caliber .50 is an obscure arcade shooter from SETA Corporation, first released in 1989.

It can be played single or simultaneous two-player and is arguably better than the legendary Ikari Warriors. Caliber .50 is like Commando on steroids…

Like Ikari Warriors the player characters (in this game: USAF pilots escaping Vietnamese captivity) can run in one direction and shoot in another by using a rotary controller. You pick up different weapons as you go and can throw grenades to cause explosions.

Where I think Caliber .50 beats Ikari Warriors is in its surprises – at the start of the game you can optionally board a plane, take off, and strafe ground targets to make things easier for yourself later. That surprised me. As did the enemy troop formations, the weird boss fights, and the helicopters flying underground… It’s all mad stuff.

The levels are varied and interesting and the baddies come at you thick and fast. Caliber .50 is quite exciting stuff for an arcade shooter very few people have ever heard about.

SETA chose a highly vertical screen configuration for this game, which I think hampers it a little. Might have been better square, or horizontal, to give a wider view of the battlefield (like, for example, in Total Carnage).

Still, Caliber .50 is a fine game. Definitely one to play now. Especially if you’ve got a friend on hand to help with two-player.

More: Caliber .50 on Wikipedia