True Lies (Super NES, 1995)

Somehow, I did a post for this game twice. Once in February 2012, then again in April 2024, not realizing it had been covered already and wanting to do something for it. To my knowledge, that's the only time this has ever happened. My OCD is going a bit nuts having two posts for the same game, and the 2012 post is too good to just outright replace, so I'm going to merge the two. The 2012 post was written by crazy, off his rocker me, while the 2024 one was written by more straitlaced, professional me. So to keep it simple, the 2012 sections will be in italics and the 2024 sections will be in bold.

Also, the 2012 parts may be wildly offensive. I don't know. I'm not going to be one of those "it was a different time" people. It's there, like it if you like it, don't if you don't. Might end up being an interesting post for the "contrasting styles" reason. A good cop bad cop situation, or more accurately an insane man and his therapist.

True Lies: Now with 360 degrees of Firing Power!

2024: This is the one game I bought in the 1990's that I didn't actually finish back then, as far as I know. Well, more specifically my mom bought it. We went to the store to get something new and she got me this and Stargate. We liked both movies, and didn't know how bad movie-licensed games were yet. The good news is that both of said games are actually pretty decent. Yeah, even this one. Note: This was probably the one time pre-1999 or so that I ever got to get two games at once. And it was two movie-licensed games. Yeep.

Anyway, LJN finally made something good? Yeah, I'm surprised too. These two games are probably the closest I ever got to actually buying a bad game, but I lucked out. I'll cover Stargate some time, but in the meantime I think this is the superior game of the two. Surprised that I never finished it until 2010. I did skip to the last level in 1995 and "beat" the game with an invincibility code, but it wasn't until 2010 that I actually painstakingly beat every level normally (with emulator checkpoints, as some of these levels are way too long).

(Don't get too excited, the poster is just a giant picture of Arnold's face)

2012: True Lies, for the Super Nintendo, is one of the lamer movie-based games of the 1990's. However, it has a special place in my heart. You see, this is the only SNES game I ever owned as a kid that I never actually finished back then. It was just too difficult, and too...bad. Luckily, emulators exist, so I was able to revisit this as an adult.

It's worth noting that this game is based on a James Cameron movie. I'm a big fan of JC, even if he's kind of a dick. Since Titanic held the record for highest-grossing movie of all time until Avatar broke it, does that mean Cameron is both the #1 and #2 director of all time?

This gives me an idea for Former WWF Superstar Val Venis' next movie.

THIS SUMMER...

VAL VENIS IS...

Titanic.

IN...

Rated X.

Val Venis: "Heh heh. Know what the difference between The Big Valbowski and The Titanic is? ONLY 400 ladies went down on the Titanic."

SIR! STAND DOWN! I REPEAT, STAND DOWN!

Whew... I apologize, folks. Now, about True Lies...

James Cameron: "Don't tell me I can't make a Titanic 2! I'll make Titanic 2 if I want! This is MY Oscar! Suck it, Oscar Committee! Suck it long and good!"

Dammit! Get these guys out of here! We need better security. I apologize, folks. Alright, here we go, True Lies:

2024: Get used to seeing this screen a lot, because this is one of those "run out of lives and you go back to the beginning" games. However it also has level passwords, plus a ton of codes you can enter to skip levels, be invulnerable, etc. So you can always go back to the level you were on.

2012: True Lies was made by LJN... brewer of countless bad NES and SNES games. At the end of some rainbows you can find a pot of gold... at the end of this one, you find a pot of shit!

2012: Here we see The Governator, Arnold. He's a super spy, and he's trying to stop terrorism with the help of TV's Tom Arnold.

2024: The game has these surprisingly well-done shots from the movie between levels, and actually does a pretty good job following the movie location-wise.

2024: It also contains TOM ARNOLD, and subjects you to looking at his face for a large portion of the game!

2012: HAVE YOU NO SHAME, TOM ARNOLD?

2024: He says to keep a low profile...

...so then I JUST STARTED BLASTIN!

Man, Tom Arnold is peering right into the player's soul here. Is this really necessary, LJN?

2012: Our hero negotiates the first of the nine levels in the game... and the most fun/interesting one by a huge margin. After this, the game designers ran out of ideas for the remaining eight stages.

2024: The gameplay here is a bit like Smash TV except transpiring over actual levels. It's top-down, you shoot guns at terrorists, and you have a dive roll that makes you invulnerable to attacks for a moment. Wait a minute... was Fromsoft inspired by True Lies for the Super NES? Is this the game we can thank for Dark Souls pioneering invincible dive rolls that are now in like every game?

2012: Also, when playing this game, get used to seeing Arnold staring you down because his picture is onscreen for THE WHOLE GAME. It doesn't even serve a purpose. Nope, it's just frozen, staring at you inappropriately.

AHHHH! MAKE THE UNBLINKING STARE GO AWAY!

Unfortunately, this is the mid-90's, so our heroes are downloading over a 56k modem. The screeching and howling of the modem immediately alerts the terrorists to Arnold's location. The electronic bellowing of "You've Got Mail!" didn't help either.

2024: Don't worry, that guy was definitely a terrorist! We only shoot bad guys!

Alright that one wasn't. Jesus, all of these RULES.

2012: This game contains civilians who you can accidentally shoot, and hitting three means game over. The first two levels are crawling with them, but after that they pretty much disappear from the game entirely. This was actually an interesting game mechanic, too bad they scrapped it so quickly.

2024: Plant the keycard in the computer and get outta the chateau. This all happens in the movie, IIRC. It's been a while.

The next section has Arnold running for his life down a mountain. I basically just dive-roll through this entire level. Big question on my mind is, how far did I get with this game in 1995? I want to say maybe halfway at the most.

The bad guys chase Arnold with a helicopter, but nothing can hit him with my DIVE-ROLL SPAM.

I mentioned how this game has a lot of codes. Well here they are. They make the game a lot more fun:

"Kill as many civilians as you want" would have gone over real well in the 90's. I probably would have gotten sent to the principal's office for talking about it, kinda like when I said I liked Maximum Carnage and literally got sent to the principal's office for saying it. Meanwhile a girl in my class got a "five minute timeout" for stabbing my friend in the head with a pencil.

With a fucking pencil!

Not even kidding. She was from Boise, Idaho, so I've never liked Boise, Idaho. If I did what she did I would have been expelled to the gulag of the local alternative school.

2012: Oh shit! They're gonna kill Tom Arnold! Meanwhile, our hero battles terrorists on the ski slopes of the Swiss Alps.

Here's the leader of the badass-named Crimson Jihad, played by Jeff Goldblum's evil brother. It's too bad this game is so poorly constructed, because it could have been like playing an episode of 24.

2024: Also "Crimson Jihad" might be the coolest terrorist cell name I've ever heard.

2012: Arnold traverses the mall, home of famed fast food joint Llama City.

2024: Uncle Furry, huh?

Too bad you can't go into some of these shops. I'd like to see what's going on in the Llama City.

2012: Speaking of malls, back in 1995 my mom paid something like $30 to get this game for me at a mall. I really wanted it. Nintendo Power made it look cool, and it... it had Arnold! Little did I know that we were buying the first not-great game I'd ever bought. It's a good thing we never bought any of the Terminator games for the Game Boy or the SNES. Those games were outright unplayable. At least this one is good on a surface level, but good luck ever beating it without codes.

Shut the hell up, TV's Tom Arnold! I do what I want!

Arnold takes a moment to wash the blood off his hands...

...before getting more on them! BLAM BLAM BLAM! He used to be a terminator, bitches!

First boss is this shotgun-wielding menace. He has way too much health, but our hero reigns supreme by Rock Bottoming the guy through a toilet.

np bro

2024: The bathroom stalls emit endless waves of terries unless you destroy the doors, which causes the stalls to stop spawning them in. Are they climbing out of the toilets? And meanwhile the big ponytailed guy with the shotgun is the actual boss, and you want to destroy the stall doors before he shows up. Dealing with him plus endless-spawning goons is a no-go.

Get outta here, Tom Arnold! I can't imagine having this guy in my earpiece all day.

2012: Our hero chases Goldblum through the park on horseback. Unfortunately, I don't get to do this in the game. Know what else doesn't happen in the game?

THIS...Oh God...THIS.

Level 3 is a hedge maze with the final civilians of the game, a karate class in session. If you succumb to the urge to throw a grenade into the middle of this group, you will be game overed one and a third times.

2024: This level is a massive, ridiculous maze that's about twice as big as any level should be (which is pretty much the trend from here on out) where you have to gather keys to progress.

Most noteworthy thing here is the group of martial artists. I think this is the last time you see any civilians in the game. Weird how they just totally drop that concept after the first couple levels.

2012: Another difficult boss follows, as our hero takes on a guy with a flamethrower. None of these bosses were in the movie.

Evil? Aren't we all just shades of grey, really? In any case, the bad guys now have a nuke. Wait, they have three nukes!

By Christ, those two are even bigger than the other one!

Level 4 is a subway, and the official point where the game stops having any redeeming qualities. At least the first three levels were somewhat interesting, fun, and...well...beatable without becoming a frustrated wreck.

Look at this. It's like trying to dodge your way through a hailstorm! They just went waaaay overboard at this point, like they were trying to see how many bullets the SNES could process onscreen at once.

2024: I'm about 90% sure the park level was the last one I beat in 1995 when I first played this. I barely remember the next level at all. It's a subway tunnel. Chances are this is about when I gave up and level-skipped to the end.

The main hazard here is that occasionally trains barrel through, murdering everyone. Also the terries are becoming much better-equipped now.

At the end you have to blow up a computer room while an endless horde of bad guys converges on you.

2012: These between-level shots are the one cool thing remaining about the game. That said, the AK-47 he's got here isn't even a weapon you can get. So much for authenticity. I expected better from you, LJN! ...wait, no I didn't.

2024: Wonder if Arnold Schwarzenegger himself ever played this game. Probably not. Tom Arnold probably did, though.

Next level is the docks. Things are getting pretty bland and repetitive at this point, I see why I jumped ahead. The core gameplay is still good though. The trick to playing this game is to use the Y button to lock your facing in one direction so you can strafe and lay down shots. Until you learn to do that, you aren't going to get very far.

Would be hilarious if he fired this the wrong way, like Rae Dawn Chong in Commando.

2012: Next is a huge, confusing, Chinese monastery type level. Things are increasingly dire for our heroes, as the nukes have gone from suck to blow.

Know what does blow? This game. The presence of Tom Arnold is the only thing keeping it out of zero territory.

2024: Next level is China. Where in China? I don't know. It's just called "China".

After that we've got the Refinery. Not sure if the game is still following the movie at all or just tacking generic areas on to extend the game time.

Flamethrower wielding mobs become the predominant enemy type as the game goes on. Luckily they don't move around and don't have a lot of range.

2012: Here is the ultimate weapon of the game: the flamethrower. And you'll need it, because at the end of this area you get attacked by an almost endless stream of enemies. No matter how good you are, they will slowly whittle you down.

This is cool. You get to fly a jet for the next level. Normally I'm against changing control schemes up on a player for one level mid-game (case in point... those infernal Mega Man rail levels), but I'll seize the opportunity to take a break from the rest of this atrocious mess.

This level is pretty fun. Unfortunately, it's only about two minutes long. What's more, the ridiculous difficulty continues here. It seems like enemy shots actually take off MORE of the fighter plane's health than they took off of Arnold on foot in the rest of the game. What?

2024: The second-to-last level is easily the best thing in this game. You commandeer a fighter jet and take out a bunch of terrorists on a highway. It basically becomes a vertical shooter for one level.

Then the last level is an office building where Aziz is holding Arnold's daughter captive. I think technically the nuke got disarmed back in the subway level, so after that it's probably just him trying to rescue his daughter.

2012: That son of a bitch! Let Dana go!

2024: Disappointingly, you never actually fight Aziz. He just retreats and leaves you to fight goons. "The streets will run with your blood" is an insanely good threat.

2012: And here's the final boss, an uberhenchman with two uzi's. His gunfire barrage is nearly unavoidable, until you find the one spot where you can hit him without getting hit back. Otherwise, he kills you in seconds. So much for dodging, or, you know, trying to play this like a real game. Just hang out in that spot and blast away. Yeah.

2024: The final boss is this dude who dual-wields uzis and has a massive amount of HP. The trick is to get him stuck on this corner here and shoot him where he can't hit you back very often. However it's more likely the player will just have to trade shots with him because his hail of fire is almost impossible to dodge.

2012: Finally, I win, and Arnold saves his daughter by catching her with a plane.

2024: This leads to Arnold launching Aziz into the sky with a missile from his fighter jet. Hilarious!

2012: Aformentioned daughter? Yeah, that's Eliza Dushku, five years before her star-making turn on the Buffy series.

Arnold takes a moment to dance with his leg-tastic wife.

With that, True Lies is over.

2024: So that's it for True Lies. A decent movie-licensed game, and a decent LJN game. It's like hell has frozen over.

I think this is a solid run-and-gun game that probably shouldn't be forgotten. Would have been really good if it had a two-player mode, and it's perfectly suited for one. There are so many foes charging at you fast that you really NEED a second player as backup. However, no such luck. I think a two-player mode would have elevated this game into the realm of cult classic, because all the tools are there already.

That concludes the one game I bought in the 1990's and didn't finish. Took me 15 years to get back to it and beat the game, then another 15 years to finish writing about it. Which makes this post the culmination of a 30 year journey. ...well, not really. Still, not too bad for something my mom got for me in a Caldor.