Jungle Strike is a shooter released by Electronic Arts in 1993 for the Sega Genesis. It was ultimately ported to a number of other systems including the Super Nintendo, DOS, Amiga, CD32, Game Gear, Game Boy and PlayStation Portable. This game was the sequel to Desert Strike and was the second in a series of similar games.
Jungle Strike, like its predecessor was a shooter played from an isometric overhead perspective. Like the rest of the games in the series, it was a bit slower and more strategic than other shooters. It has been described as being inspired by Choplifter and Matchbox toys though it reminds me a bit of Raid on Bungeling Bay. Game Play is very much like that of Desert Strike with the obvious difference of being set in the jungle (at least in part) instead of the desert.
The antagonists consist of the son of the antagonist of the first game and a South American drug lord. Missions alternate between stopping terrorist attacks on various targets in Washington D.C. and attacking the drug lord’s forces, including his jungle fortress. Ultimately, you must stop nuclear bombs from blowing up the White House.
The game was very good on just about every system it was released on and was especially good on the Genesis, Super Nintendo, Amiga and DOS (similar to the original). The DOS and Amiga versions were somewhat enhanced as compared to the Genesis original with the DOS CD-ROM version including an extra level as well as full motion video cut scenes. However, this game probably fits best on a console such as the Genesis and SNES. Essentially, if you liked Desert Strike then there is no reason you wouldn’t like this game or the subsequent sequels.
There’s not much in the way of re-releases for this game. It showed up on a “retro” compilation called EA Replay for the PlayStation Portable in 2006. Other than that, there really aren’t any re-releases to speak of, however there were three more sequels including Urban Strike, Soviet Strike and Nuclear Strike. Future Strike was also planned but it evolved into Future Cop: LAPD. If you like shooters at all or have fond memories of games like Choplifter and Raid on Bungeling Bay then you should definitely give Jungle Strike and the other games in the series a try. Like I said above, it really feels best on one of the 16-bit consoles but it is good on any platform. You’ll have to track down an original or use emulation to try it though.
Screen shots above are from the Sega Genesis version of the game.
