Raid on Bungeling Bay

Raid on Bungeling Bay
Commodore 64 cover art
Developer(s)	Will Wright
Publisher(s)	Brøderbund Hudson Soft (NES)
Platform(s)	C64 (original) NES, MSX
Release	C64: December, 1984 MSX: 1985 NES: 1987
Genre(s)	Shoot 'em up
Mode(s)	Single-player Multiplayer

Raid on Bungeling Bay was the first video game designed by Will Wright. It was published by Brøderbund for the Commodore 64 in 1984 and ported to MSX (1985) and the NES (1987). The Commodore 64 version was published in the UK by Ariolasoft, and the NES version was from Hudson Soft.

Apart from offering a 2D overhead view of terrain which was a bit more complex than in other games, Raid on Bungeling Bay is a simple war zone shoot 'em up. The player controls a helicopter launched from an aircraft carrier to bomb six factories scattered across islands on a small planetoid occupied by the Bungeling Empire (the usual villains in Brøderbund games), while fending off escalating counterattacks by gun turrets, fighter jets, guided missiles, and a battleship. There is also a hidden island for the player to reload on. Failure means that the Bungeling Empire develops a war machine to take over the planet Earth. Players have to attack its infrastructure while defending the aircraft carrier which served as home base.

The game offers an interesting insight into the design style of Wright, who would later go on to design SimCity. The islands and factories in the game behave in a sophisticated manner which closely resembled SimCity. Over time, the factories grow and develop new technologies to use against the player. There are also visible signs of interdependency among the islands, such as supply boats moving between them. In order to win the game, the player must prevent the escalation by bombing all the factories as quickly as possible, keeping them from advancing their technology. If left alone for too long, the factories create enough new weaponry to overwhelm the player.