Choplifter was originally released by Broderbund in 1982 as an Apple II game but it was so successful that it was ported to other systems and even had an arcade release by Sega in 1985. That version was a remake and some home ports were based on Sega’s coin op. The Atari 7800 version, however, was based on the original Broderbund title, though with improvements.
The story of the game finds 64 US delegates trapped by the Bungeling forces and it is up to you to save them. Thanks to a secret military based, which has been disguised as a post office, you have access to a helicopter equipped with a machine gun and bombs. Using this chopper, you can enter Bungeling air space to rescue the delegates from the various barracks they’re trapped in. Once rescued, you can fly them back to the base for safety. The Bungelings are not letting you just fly in and retake the hostages, though, as they have tanks, jet fighters, and drone air mines ready to take you down. You must destroy them and avoid their fire to complete your mission. Be careful when picking up hostages because landing on them will kill them and your own weapons can also hurt them. Choplifter on the 7800 is a nice update of the original computer game with good and colourful graphics. The helicopter base has a nice fluttering flag and the vehicles are well detailed and animated. There is nice parallax scrolling of the backgrounds as well. Sound is lackluster but the gameplay makes up for it.
