Developed and published by Taito in 1987

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Video Notes: tool-assisted (save-state, input recording)

If you walk into an arcade today and are lucky enough to find genuine video games amongst the coin pushers and fruit machines, it stands a pretty good chance that, if not some hideously oversized version of Flappy Bird or other mobile conversion, it will be a light gun shooter. From Duck Hunt to House of the Dead, there has always been a lasting appeal for games that require the player to wave a brightly coloured, plastic gun at a TV screen whilst pulling the trigger to make various things die.

Operation Wolf is one the classic games synonymous with arcades of the late 1980's. With it's controller modelled on the equally-classic UZI 9mm sub-machine gun, lush graphics and booming sounds, this was the most fun you could have for 20 pence! Sadly, I was never tall enough to reach the controller back then, so all I could do was watch from afar as others played the game. I am, of course, in no way bitter about this.

Operation Wolf (or Op Wolf as it was known) is an on-rails shooting gallery where the objective is to shoot all the bad guys before they can shoot you. The game is set across six levels designed to simulate a military operation where you, a lone soldier, is dropped behind enemy lines and tasked with rescuing hostages from a POW camp. Each level contains a specific number of enemy troops and vehicles that must be destroyed in order to progress to the next mission.

Once a level begins, bad guys will start running across the screen and popping out from behind cover to take shots at you. The game is a true test of reactions and accuracy as you get precious little time to take an enemy down before he starts firing at you. Certain enemies that are about to fire will flash white a number of times, highlighting themselves to the player as a priority target and should be taken out. Being an arcade game, the player takes damage extremely quickly and it can be game over before it's even had a chance to begin.

Bad guys aren't the only thing to appear on the battlefield. Nurses, civilians and other non-combatants will run into the line of fire and it takes concentration and restraint to make sure you don't accidentally put a bullet between their eyes as well. Killing innocents is frowned upon and will inflict additional damage to the player's health as punishment.

The player is armed with a sub-machine gun and a limited supply of ammunition with which to dispatch foes. The amount of ammunition left in the current magazine is displayed to the right of the screen, as is the the total number of magazines remaining. When a magazine runs dry, there is a brief pause
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5Di8wh2f08