The Speed Rumbler is a car combat arcade game released by Capcom in 1986. You take the role of Capcom’s then mascot and ultimate soldier Joseph “Super Joe” Gibson, this time tasked with saving his family and other hostages from terrorists before 24 hours are up. Super Joe comes equipped with a gun and the ability to do a dodge roll, but you’ll find that you tend to die quickly when not fighting in the game’s signature vehicle.
Most of the game involves dodging traps and enemy soldiers and vehicles with your car. You must maneuver it around them and return fire or, if it gets too hairy, just zoom past them and keep going. There is a time limit in the upper right corner of the screen after all. When the car comes close to death Super Joe can go it on foot and, if he survives long enough, an unnamed ally will bring him a new ride. Sometimes you’ll come across a hostage in a cage and can free them to get power-ups or extra points.
The game can be pretty fun once you get the car up to speed and you actually shoot some guys down (or run them over) and avoid traps. Some enemy vehicles will one-hit kill you if you collide with them and that, plus the general high difficulty of the game, will lead to a lot of deaths that kill the pace a bit. Fortunately checkpoints are more forgiving than most of The Speed Rumbler’s arcade peers from this era. Everything is in a top-down perspective so the car controls can be somewhat wonky to those used to behind-the-back driving games.
Enjoyment of this game very much depends on whether or not you can wrap your head around how driving games worked back in this 2D era. If you can this game is fun to play for a bit, though the difficulty may ultimately turn you off. Everyone else would likely get too frustrated right at the beginning to continue. The Speed Rumbler has been released here and there with Capcom arcade compilations for anyone looking to play it as the actual arcade game had a fairly low manufacturing run.