Bionic Commando/YMMV

"Joe: I hope this story will be told for a long time..."
 * Alas Poor Villain: The ending to Rearmed 2 has a lot of this, with Super Joe remarking that none of the game's villains were bad people, just decent folks who ended up doing bad things due to a series of unfortunate events. It also includes a Heel Realization by Super Joe, which somewhat humanizes his previous Complete Monster portrayal in the next-gen game.
 * Crowning Music of Awesome: The Main Theme, all games.
 * The Power Plant theme, both the original NES and Rearmed versions.
 * From the sequel, The Gauntlet.
 * Preparations. Specifically, 1:12-1:47. When you go to face, that part repeats as you make your way to him, as he engages you in mocking conversation. It's one epic build-up.
 * Goddamn Bats: A variety across all the games, from the remote-control aces of the NES game to the knife-wielding psychos in Rearmed to the pesky snipers of the sequel.
 * Demonic Spiders: In the sequel, you will rapidly come to hate the upper-tier Biomechs.
 * Harsher in Hindsight: Of all things, the Worlds of Power novelization has an instance of this. Early in the book, Rad Spencer has trouble working the bionic arm, but pulls through. When he gets through the area he speaks to the arm, telling it he'll take care of it, and it'll take care of him. Fast forward to the 2009 sequel, where Spencer's arm ...
 * Jump the Shark: the rest of the sequel's story line suffers from this after Spencer gives the  to , though certain sequences during that last hour are still very cool.
 * Moral Event Horizon:
 * More Popular Spinoff: To an extent. The Rearmed remake was meant to promote the sequel, but Rearmed is often considered the better game, to the point of getting its own sequel(By a dev made from the remnants of the Rearmed team after GRIN went kaput) in the same style.
 * Older Than They Think: Most people believe that the NES game came first, but it is a sequel to an arcade game by the same name. Yes, the first [arcade], second [Nintendo], third [Game Boy] and fifth [ PS3/X360 ] games are all named Bionic Commando. Only Elite Forces and Rearmed break the pattern.
 * That One Level: Area 6, easily. Introduces bouncing mines and a Mook who spawns helicoptering mines in the first area, has some of the hardest climbing and swinging in the game at the beginning of the second area, and then a really tough and annoying rolling mine segment where Giant Mooks throw mines which roll down horizontal shafts, which you can't jump over - you need to use the arm to hoist yourself up (which takes time) or use springboards to go over them. Yeah, this level is hard, what gave you that impression?
 * This level was actually made easier in Rearmed, with the mines being replaced by non-damaging barrels.
 * Although harder difficulties ups the ante to damaging barrels, including one-hit instant kills on Super Hard.
 * Player Punch: is killed off rather anticlimactically just before the final boss fight of Rearmed. Just in case you didn't already know Hitler "The Leader" was evil. Repeated with  in an even less climactic fashion.
 * They Just Didn't Care: The sequel's PC port. Every message about what buttons to press are in the form of console commands. Does your keyboard have Left Bumper or Yellow-Y?
 * Tear Jerker: The ending of the NES version, with Joe's signature.


 * Spencer's youthful exuberance at swinging around hits a sad nerve when you realize why.