Play Rambo: First Blood Part II Online

Summary

Rambo: First Blood Part II on the Master System feels like a love‑letter to Commando and Ikari Warriors, but with a few quirks that set it apart. You control Rambo armed with an M‑60 that never runs out of ammo—though only two bullets can be on screen at once—and a handful of explosive arrows that are essential for blasting tanks and locked gates.

The co‑op mode lets a second player jump in as Zane, a yellow‑headbanded sidekick, and the two can fight through four stages, each ending at a gate that flashes when you’ve cleared enough enemies. Lives are generous: you start with three and earn another for each cleared stage, but the game ends for both players if either runs out of lives after the second stage.

Movement is eight‑way while you can only fire in five directions, and moving down oddly points your gun upward, a mechanic that can catch newcomers off‑guard. Power‑ups drop from prisoners you rescue in huts, boosting shot range, speed, arrow count, or even turning arrows into four‑direction blasts; only one item appears at a time, and the mysterious “?” can wipe the screen clean or grant an extra life.

Originally released in Japan as Ashura, the game featured two Buddhist monks on a rescue mission. Sega’s North‑American re‑skin swapped them for Rambo and his partner, added a Stallone‑style title screen and Goldsmith’s theme, and softened some enemies. The PAL version, Secret Command, kept the Rambo sprites but reverted the music and stage‑clear art to the Asian motifs of the Japanese original, and it still lists the characters as Bishamon and Ashura in the manual.

Both Ashura and Secret Command later resurfaced on the Wii Virtual Console and even make cameo appearances in the Yakuza series when you fire up a Master System within those games.

Storyline

Rambo: First Blood Part II is an overhead run‑and‑gun title for the Sega Master System that loosely follows the 1985 film of the same name. In the licensed version the player takes on the role of Rambo, battling enemy defenses and freeing prisoners hidden in huts across the first four stages, mirroring the movie’s rescue‑mission plot.

The Japanese release, titled Ashura, swaps the soldier for a pair of armed Buddhist monks named Ashura and Bishamon. Their objective is the same in spirit: infiltrate enemy territory and rescue kidnapped friends. Both versions keep the core theme of a daring extraction behind hostile lines.