ESWAT refers to two drastically different games developed and released by Sega. Both are RoboCop-inspired action platformers where the player controls Duke Oda, a lowly cop who eventually gets to use a powerful suit of armour, fighting the crooks and sinister organizations that have taken over Liberty city.
ESWAT: Cyber Police is the original version, released in 1989 for the arcades. It is tactical action platformer in the vein of Rolling Thunder and Shinobi, featuring a similar focus on careful positioning and managing your limited ammo. It was later ported to the Sega Master System and several western computer platforms.
The second game, ESWAT: City Under Siege was released in 1990 for the Sega Genesis. Though also an action platformer, the game features vastly different level design, enemies and play mechanics. Whereas getting the ESWAT suit in the original didn't change much beyond giving you a machine gun and the ability to use ammo-limited special weapons, the suit here has a Jetpack and a full arsenal of switchable weapons, both of which need to be used in conjunction to clear the levels. Unlike the arcade version, it wasn't ported to any contemporary system, though it was included in a Compilation Re-release.
Despite the title, it has nothing to do with the "E-SWAT" team from Appleseed.
Tropes that apply to both games
- Arm Cannon: After gaining the Powered Armor, your gun is fired from one. In Cyber Police it is a machine gun shooting three bullets at a time and your other weapons are fired from the suit, while in City Under Siege all of your regular and special weapons are fired directly from the cannon.
- Degraded Boss:
- In both versions, the cyborg twins reappear as weaker midbosses near the end of the game.
- In a series-wide example, the hovercraft pilots are a pair of (rather weak) stage bosses in Cyber Police. In City Under Siege, they become generic enemies in one level.
- Denial of Diagonal Attack
- Dual Boss: The cyborg twins.
- Mecha-Mooks: A lot of your onscreen enemies are robotic or machines, from human-sized droids to hovering Attack Drone mooks. They expectedly last longer than human enemies.
- Never Bring a Knife to a Gun Fight: There are mooks in both games which tries roughing you up with knives, despite the fact that you're a cop with Powered Armor that is armed to the teeth with various firearms. The outcome is as hilariously one-sided as you'd expect.
- Outranking Your Job: You get promoted rather quickly, starting from Patrolman/Sergeant/Lieutenant (unknown which rank you actually start from) to Captain to Assistant Chief to Chief of Police and finally to ESWAT after completing missions (City Under Siege starts your rank as Captain and skips Assistant Chief), yet you are alone on your missions and do not command anyone else during the game. Also, what an odd promotional system where you have to be named Chief prior to being promoted to ESWAT, which seems to imply that all ESWAT officers outrank their boss (unless there is a Police Commissioner who outranks ESWAT, if not the Mayor who is in charge) and were all named the Chief of Police prior to joining the ESWAT division of the police department and gaining clearance to equip the Powered Armor!
- Powered Armor: Your playable character and some of the bosses wear powered armor.
- Second Hour Super Power: After a certain point in both games (catching the three bank robbers in Cyber Police and beating the twin cyborgs in City Under Siege), Duke is promoted from Chief to ESWAT rank and gain clearance to the ESWAT armour.
- Reformulated Game: Both games have entirely different level designs and visual design, with City Under Siege being noticeably futuristic than the original. The Sega Master System version also has different level design, though it doesn't stray as much from the arcade version as City Under Siege does.
Tropes exclusive to Cyber Police
- Car Fu: One of the bosses is a truck that occasionally charges at you.
- Clothing Damage: The ESWAT armor gets visibly damaged every time you get hit.
- Groin Attack: The second level boss was an extremely tall enemy with a boomerang and a hostage he used as a Human Shield, so you normally had to jump to shoot him when he stood up behind her. However, if you were completely out of bullets, you could walk through the hostage and give him a kick to the family jewels, resulting in a One-Hit KO.
- Yellow Peril: Rat Lee.
Tropes exclusive to City Under Siege
- A.I. Is a Crapshoot: The ending text reveals that the Final Boss and leader of the E.Y.E. terrorist group is a robot.
- Breakable Power-Up: If you have any weapon currently selected for use when you die in missions wearing the Powered Armor, except for the default "Shot", you lose use of that weapon on your next life until you collect it again. Whatever weapons you had available and were not selected (or "Shot" was selected, which remains no matter what) when you die, are allowed to be used on the next life.
- Bottomless Magazines: All of your weapons, with the exception of the one-shot "Fire" super weapon, have unlimited ammo. This is in contrast to Cyber Police where your ammo is limited and you needed to pick up ammo crates to continue firing your weapons.
- Jet Pack: Your Powered Armor has one built in.
- Mirror Boss: The Final Boss is an Evil Knockoff of the ESWAT suit, which possesses most of your abilities.
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Prop Recycling: The police car sprite in the ending is taken from the first Streets of Rage
