"The Only Game That Uses The Light Gun Well"

Ah, too be young, drunk, have a light gun, and a copy of Operation Wolf again (Well I got 1/2 of that). This is the best usage of the light gun, as it's an actual game gun that uses it! What a novel idea.

Your mission is to free eight areas from enemy troops. You do this with two main weapons, a machine gun and grenades. The machine gun is what the zapper uses (you need a controller to use grenades because of the lack of buttons on a Zapper). The machinegun bullets are fast but not very powerful, useful for firing down enemy troops. Grenades are mainly for taking down tanks and choppers.

Along the way though, be careful not to fire down friendlies. Doing so will drain you health meter. You'll also want to watch out for ammo packs, because if you run out of bullets, you can't fight hand-to-hand combat.

The actual gameplay is first-person perspective. Imagine DOOM on rails. Shoot anything that walks by (excluding hospital personal and refugees, etc. etc. etc.). Enemies range from foot soldiers with guns to boats to copters to tanks to close range assassains.

In my opinion, using the controller makes the game no challenge at all. You're given a crosshairs on the screen, and all you have to do is ''steer'' it to your target and press the button. If you have a slow motion controller, just turn on the slow-mo and the game is laughably easy.

However, beating the game with the Zapper (a.k.a. Light Gun, Halloween Gun) requires the skill of an LA gang member. It's one of the most taxing and fun tasks to do of any Nintendo game. Take some turns with friends and you'll see the appeal.

The graphics for this game are right on. You get a real sense of guerilla warfare when you see foot soldiers in green camo gear crawling in the jungle. Things can slow-down a little when too many people get on the screen, but that's just a sign that you need to shoot faster.

There is no sound for this game. At all. Well, okay, some sub-par sound effects of bullets on metal. But the errieness of the game can make you really paranoid and start wasting ammo. Better pop in a CD in the stereo or get some headphones.

The replay value could use some work. Once you beat the game, you get a little screen with a grading of your performance, then you're booted back to level 1 to start your journey over again. But then again, this was originally an arcade game, so I expected as much.

Operation Wolf is the best usage of the Zapper that I've ever seen. Unlike Duck Hunt, Operation Wolf is faster paced and doesn't limit you to three measly shoots. It's also much more challenging. I think it uses the gun better, but maybe it's just because I'm still P/Oed at that dog from Duck Hunt....

Overall, Operation Wolf is an excellent game. For as little as $2.50 you can walk home from a yard sale with a classic light gun game (If you need a Zapper, any Funcoland will gladly give you one for a quarter). The errie sound is the only detracting factor, and doesn't hamper the rest of the fun.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 01/31/00, Updated 01/31/00