Part 13: Snake's Revenge Part One: Run Through the Jungle

Snake's Revenge Part One: Run Through the Jungle

Before we get started, some music:


This is called "Introduction", so I'm linking it with the introduction. Carrying on:


This is the first screen on boot-up, and it already raises an issue: at the end of Metal Gear, Grey Fox was rescued, Metal Gear was destroyed, and Big Boss was dead. So what exactly is Snake taking revenge on?


Hitting a button always gets me this, a description of the Metal Gear from the first game that sounds a lot more threatening than it turned out to be. Instead of TX-55, it's called Metal Gear 1 here. I don't know why.


Let's start, then, shall we?


Unlike Metal Gear, Snake's Revenge has an intro. Apparently "the enemy" has a weapon, which may or may not be Metal Gear. The wording here makes it sound like the intelligence guys just call up Snake whenever they see somebody with a gun and say that it might be Metal Gear.

It's not much of a story, but it's more than Metal Gear gave us.


John Turner is our first ally. And the manual has something on him, too:


Here's your first lesson about Snake's Revenge: the manual doesn't really give a shit about being consistent with the game. I assume the game knows what's going on, so I take it as gospel here.


Our other support troop is Nick Myer. The manual says this:


Whatever group this is supposed to be (is it FOX-HOUND?) has an entire division dedicated solely to Nitroglycerin, says the manual. Seems a little inefficient, but I'm not going to argue with anybody who has entire divisions focussing on one explosive.

That's the support staff. Our leader is:



What else do we know about Lt. Solid Snake?


Okay, so we are working for FOX HOUND. In other news, he's Lt. Solid Snake in this game, which means that they decided "Solid Snake" was his actual name, apparently.


Lt. Snake puts his knife in that sheath and turns red to show the enemy that he means business. Let's roll.


The game starts in the jungle, with John and Nick running off into the trees. We also find out that since Outer Heaven, Snake has really taken to looking like a gorilla. That's all I can see when I look at Snake's sprite in this game.



On the next screen, it's dark and then some fireworks go off and light the place up. We also get a call.


You must collect information from your co-workers.

Snake's Revenge is a sneaking game, just like Metal Gear. Let's check out the inventory.


This game starts you with a knife and a handgun. Guess FOX-HOUND got a real big kickback from the government after Snake blew up Metal Gear. Or maybe he just kept the gun from Outer Heaven, who knows?

There are two types of attack in this game, a melee and a ranged. Melee is done with your fists or the knife. Knife does more damage, but fists can make enemies drop items. This is the manual entry for the knife:

Super helpful, huh?

And for the gun:


The handgun works the same way as in Metal Gear. Hit the button, bullets go about ten feet in a straight line and kill guards they run into. Simple.


Snake has no items, though. Not even his cigarettes.

The music for the jungle area:


In true Metal Gear style, we have a bunch of shit to sneak through before we get anywhere. Also, another call.


We can't help you anymore. See you at the meeting point after the military operation is over. Good luck!!

Our sidekicks fucked off into the bushes and now our pilot has to bug out, so Lt. Snake has to go it alone. Surprise.


The next screen is dark, save for areas lit up by searchlights. Walking into a searchlight lights up the screen, but also triggers an alert. So don't walk into searchlights.


More searchlights! You can also see a truck here. These screens still have a bunch of obstacles to get around, so sometimes you end up stuck on something you can't see, which doesn't help you to sneak at all.


A couple more screens in, I find a ration. In the item menu, the game calls rations "food".

I think this is meant to be "life bar", but I'm not sure. This game doesn't exactly feature a flawless translation.


You can still make items respawn by coming back to where you found them. There hasn't been much innovation at this point.


While we're in the jungle, we also rescue this POW. Just like Metal Gear, you can rescue POWs to raise your rank, which gives you more health and carrying capacity. This guy was just sitting in the jungle, tied up.


There's a second POW in the jungle, who doesn't have anything new to tell Snake. Why are these guys just being left outside?


The jungle isn't entirely linear, and it's pretty easy to get lost. That's what I did here.


This is the screen I wanted. Running toward the building, Snake's radio...rings, or whatever it does when he gets a call.


Good luck infiltrating the enemy's base.

Maybe if Snake could've followed John through the bushes, I would have gotten here sooner.



Once he's off the radio, John runs onto the scene and gets the guards to chase after him. They do not see Snake, who is being sneaky and hiding behind/next to a tree.




Unfortunately for them, they've fallen into Snake's cunning trap and he dashes into their base while they take John inside.


This is inside the base. Now, Metal Gear wasn't exactly a visual marvel, but this game is just ugly. Whatever, I guess we have sneaking to do.


In a side-room, Snake finds card 1.


Key cards open doors, just like Metal Gear. I can't complain about the mechanics being directly lifted from Metal Gear, though. At least they work.





Yay sneaking! Yeah, this is pretty much Metal Gear all over again, except the enemies have a wider field of vision and you can't run through them anymore. I'd say this is because it's a newer game, but the NES is the less powerful machine, so I'm not sure. Sneaking is slower because you can't get away with as much, though, so there's that.


Here's a picture of me not sneaking very well. The same two-level alert system as in Metal Gear applies here, except fewer enemies show up. It's still not to your advantage to get alerts.


In one of the other little rooms, we find...an enemy officer, just standing around with his hands in his pockets. Let's see what he has to say.


Oh, it's nothing. Welp.


Further into the base is another POW. John has been moved, but he doesn't say where to. Oh well, I'm sure we'll find him later.


If you find some, you can get classified information from the enemy.

This guy gets us a promotion, and tells Snake about truth gas. This is a new thing added to Snake's Revenge. Collect truth gas, then use it on enemy officers and they'll tell you things, kind of like POWs.

Snake's Revenge has some pretty neat text windows.


Running outside, Snake finds a flute. No, I'm kidding. It's a silencer.


Silencers: now deadly! I don't know what's going on with this manual.


Back inside, Snake finds truth gas just laying around in the open. These guys learned about security from Big Boss, I see.


Well, there was an officer just standing around and staring at the walls earlier, so let's see how this stuff works.


It works great!

Enemy officers are kind of useless. They tend to give you information like this (useless) or that reads like word salad.


Elevator time! We're going down to the basement.


Guards and shit. Still Snake's Revenge, nothing has changed.


It's difficult to get near the port.

This is more information from an enemy officer. I guess it means that Snake is supposed to go towards the port. I'm glad that videogame translations have gotten better since this.


A few rooms later is an SMG.


I think they might've lifted too many elements from the first game and put them into the smaller Snake's Revenge, because we're just finding items left, right, and centre.



Like plastic explosives and grenades!

These work the same was as in Metal Gear (what a shock, right?) but have no explanation in the manual, for some reason.

Grenades replace the grenade launcher from Metal Gear. Again, no explanation in the manual. It is not a very good manual, really.


Other shit I find in the basement: oxygen tanks! I guess Snake is gonna have some swimming to do, eh?

Apparently, he will. Oxygen tanks are limited in this game, unlike in Metal Gear. I'll explain what it means by horizontal screen when we get there.

The room the oxygen tanks are in is also full of poison gas. There is no gas mask in Snake's Revenge, so you just have to hope you don't die and then eat a ration once you've stocked up.



Oh boy, more elevators! Snake's Revenge is not a great game.


Past the elevator, I kill the guards in this room and get ready to head south. Behind that door is one of Snake's Revenge's additions to the gameplay.


A sidescrolling section.

Sidescroller video!


These portions aren't terrible at this point, but they do maintain the stealth game idea. Stealth games do not make good sidescrollers. Snake's Revenge is not a very good game.


Past that, you find these guys, whose attack you can't avoid. They are our first boss fight, which a guide I looked at called the "Ultra-Sheik Assault Team". I call them the cyborg football team, because that's what they look like to me. The manual doesn't call them anything because it sucks.

Boss fight against the cyborg football team.


As you can see, the strategy to beat these guys is just to hit them with grenades and then the SMG, eating rations whenever your health gets low. Compared to the bosses from the first game, and as far as first bosses go, these guys are really hard.

It's not very good game design, but Snake's Revenge is not a very good game.


The team is guarding another ugly room full of guards. I kill the guards and leave the room.



Another fucking elevator, right here. Hooray.



When you get off the elevator, a pair of orange blocks slide in front of the door to block it.


The way around this is to stab the blocks with your knife until they go away. This takes 20-30 stabs each. The blocks do nothing to harm you. Gameplay!


Past the blocks, we're outside now!


Outside, Nick calls us. Looks like we're going to the ship, I guess.



Guards, murder, &c. Our destination is to the north.

Come back next time to find out where Snake is going and what he'll find there!