The NES version changes things up by having a completely different level structure. Every five sections or so you fight a boss, and after that the game scrolls in a different direction for the next set of sections. You find upgrades to increase both your speed and the strength of your gun up to three times each. Play progresses linearly from Section A alphabetically to Section Z. You also drop bombs anytime you fire your gun. Therefore, you can face one way while moving in another direction. You use the joystick to move around and you have two action buttons, one to fire your gun and the other to turn around and face the other way. He can move in all directions but can only fire directly left or right. Your character looks like an astronaut with a gun. In the arcade game, you automatically enter the base and begin at Section A. It’s a shell of a story and premise, but it’s all you really need. Defeat L-Brain and escape Balangool to beat the game. The mission is to destroy L-Brain, who is located in Section Z of the enemy base. You play the role of Captain Commando and you are tasked with entering the enemy base of Balangool. Section Z is a side scrolling shoot-em-up. Many years later, the arcade version was re-released in a few different Capcom arcade game compilations, so you can play it on PS2, PS3, PSP, Xbox, or Xbox 360. Europe had to wait until September 1989 before Section Z on NES was released there. The NES port was released shortly thereafter in July 1987 in North America. This version of Section Z is also developed and published by Capcom. The game was first ported to the Famicom Disk System in Japan in May 1987. It was both developed and published by Capcom. Section Z began as an arcade title released in December 1985. Let’s take a closer look to see if these changes make Section Z on NES fun to play.

Reading impressions from other players around the web gives me the consensus that the NES version is the better game. The changes in the NES game make Section Z more suitable for home play as opposed to a quarter-munching arcade experience. This conversion differentiates itself from many other ports by significantly altering the style of the game from the arcade to the NES. I never realized just how many NES games are arcade conversions until I started this deep dive into the library.

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