The 1986 NES version of Commando is a flickery mess to be honest, although that didn’t stop the game becoming a smash hit – selling over one million cartridges worldwide.

The sprite flickering is obvious from the outset, when the helicopter sets you down, but more disconcerting are the times when the entire screen flickers and you wonder if the game is going crash… And the flickering also affects the on-screen score and number of grenades (meaning that they disappear from time to time, depending on what is happening on-screen). I tried Commando in various emulators and the effect was the same, and must be part of the game… So get used to CONSTANT FLICKERING, because this game has some of the worst I’ve ever seen.

The controls are fine, and apart from the flickering the graphics are too. The NES rendition of the Commando theme is recognisable but basic. As is traditional in most early NES games: there’s no high score table or name entry (usually because the publishers didn’t want to spend money on battery back-up saves).

Overall, though, there’s no getting away from the fact that this port is hamstrung by the NES‘s lack of graphical prowess (or poor programming – or both). I’d rather play a better version of Commando than put up with the constant flickering, to be honest.

More: Commando on Wikipedia