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Here he comes, here comes Speed Rumbler, he’s a demon on wheels... and sometimes out of
them, runnin’ around with a cannon of some sort... until he gets run over, which is kinda
inevitable, because there’s freakin’ cars rumbling around everywhere and they’re all
shooting at you. At speed. Hence the name, The Speed Rumbler. Combining the very best
of Commando, R.C. Pro Am, and every other Capcom arcade game that existed only to bilk
the youngsters of the late eighties out of their quarters, The Speed Rumbler seems like
a refreshing take on the shooter genre. And then you touch the slightest drop of water,
and immediately die. It’s that kind of game.
After a terrorist sect invades your small town (because, as stated outright, they only
target small towns,) it’s up to you, Speed Rumbler Guy In A Tank Car Thing, to hunt them
down and try to save your family. You do this by slaloming through six courses, encountering
a series of traps, foes, and other crap designed specifically to stop a Speed Rumbler Guy In
A Tank Car Thing. There are barrels in your path, huge trailers trying to run you off
the road, and unbelievable quantities of ordnance flying all about. Fortunately, your Tank Car
Thing is fairly durable, and is able to take a couple bounces off walls, frontal and/or
side impacts from jerks in their own Tank Car Things, and a number of bullets while
still being operable. And if you happen to take too much damage, you’ll conveniently
catch fire, allowing Speed Rumbler Guy to bail the heck out and go on foot. Presumably,
you’re able to jump into evacuated vehicles and continue your bloody rampage, since every
foe in a compatible vehicle seems to take the opportunity to come to a stop and take
you down like Hank Schrader ending Tuco, but rather unfortunately for you, they’re all
really good at it. And you’re very squishy outside your Tank Car Thing.
But while the shooting action is pretty decent, the controls are your primary stumbling block.
As I mentioned earlier, despite your vehicle being capable of sustaining several rounds
of fire and a couple full-speed head-on wrecks, should so much as pixel one venture onto a
surface that can, in any circumstance, be construed as “water,” you die. Just stall
out and BOOM. It’s not a problem in the first couple stages, but once you get to the
third map - the quarry - you’ll be cutting serpentines over all manner of broken bridges
and perilous cliffs, leaving you pretty much screwed. As if to add insult to injury, the
game sometimes decides it’s going to auto-scroll, damaging your maneuverability and causing
even more damage to your hair. That’s what you get for being the Speed Rumbler. A dystopian
world of pain, a mission to fulfill, a number of comrades-in-arms with weapon upgrades or
points or score bonuses or what have you, and patches of torn-out hair.