Strike Series

The Strike Series were a series of five games from Electronic Arts, where the player took control of an Apache gunship to undertake several missions for the US government (and later on a mercernary organisation known as STRIKE), usually attempting to thwart the plans and lives of various megalomaniacal dictators or warlords threatening the world's safety.

The games were played from an isometric perspective, and as such were more tactical than an out and out shooting game, requiring precision in 360 degrees.

The series included:

Desert Strike, set at the end of the Gulf War where the player must thwart the Saddam Hussein-a-like General Killbaba.
Jungle Strike, which dealt with the son of Killbaba making negotiations with the notoriously dangerous Colombian drug dealer Carlos Ortega in South America after his initial assassination attempts on the President of the United States.
Urban Strike, whose main enemy is H.R. Malone, an insidious politician who takes control of the media and plans to convert the USA into his personal armed fortress.
Soviet Strike, the first of two PS 1 games where the newly-formed STRIKE organisation must take down a mysterious Russian terrorist called "The Shadowman" and his plans to bring back the glory of Soviet Russia through violence. That, or a elaborate Xanatos Gambit by STRIKE to convince Boris Yeltsin of their need for a foothold in Russia.
and finally Nuclear Strike, which closes with the hunt for the ex-CIA warlord Colonel Lemonde in his pursuit to take down the world with the deconstruction and conquest of Southeast Asia before causing enough instability across the world, using stolen nuclear weaponry.

Oddly, it's a franchise that its publisher hasn't yet considered for a modern incarnation, despite fairly strong sales during its heyday.

The following tropes are common to many or all entries in the Strike franchise.
For tropes specific to individual installments, visit their respective work pages.

Ace Pilot: Pretty much EVERYONE you fly with. In the 16-bit games, you got to choose who to fly with (as well as rescue some in later missions to unlock them). Also yourself.
Action Girl: Andrea Gray in Soviet and Nuclear is the best example. News reporter when wearing her brown wig and suit, asskicking inside field agent when in her combat togs with natural spiky blonde hair.
- Naja also counts in Nuclear Strike as the awesome rebel leader in the first mission, and your main copilot for most of it.
AKA-47: Averted. All the vehicles you fly and drive are the officially-named ones, from the classic AH-64 Apache, to the iconic Vietnam-era Huey gunship.
Awesome McCoolname: The pirate Octad (triad) leader Napoleon Hwong in Nuclear Strike's second mission.
Captain Ersatz: General Killbaba is clearly meant to be Saddam Hussein.
- Averted with Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin.
- And more hilariously with Kim Jong-Il, who is actually the villain of Nuclear Strike (as in, one half of a Big Bad Duumvirate- the main villain you are after is his nuclear terrorist partner).
Cool and Unusual Punishment: In Soviet Strike one mission requires you to get information out of the head of the Russian Mafia....by kidnapping him and winching him down into the Moscow Zoo bear cage. He's terrified of bears.
- The Big Bad of Nuclear Strike apparently uses humans on rocket launchers.
Darker and Edgier: The Playstation versions. To give an idea, one mission in Soviet takes place in Chernobyl, where you have to kill a Romanian Gulag dominatrix (yes, you read that right) who had grown to become a ruling guerrilla leader in charge of a nation, apparently powerful enough to make a ploy for the Chernobyl reactor to use the nuclear materials to launch rockets over Europe.
Deadpan Snarker: The player character in Urban Strike's briefings, as well as Ivan Uralia in Soviet Strike. Also your co-pilot Nick Arnold.
Destroyable Items
Dysfunctional Family: Amad's family in Soviet Strike are not the most stable of families. In fact, they'll blindly murder each other with their individual units out of pure rage if they're paired against the one they hate (though its really the uncle thats the problem- he'll kill his nephew and his niece will kill him, but his nephew and niece, who are siblings, won't kill each other).
Easy Logistics
Escort Mission: Several do exist across all five games, but the most famous and frustratingly hilarious one is in Soviet Strike, which involves protecting Boris Yeltsin.....while HE is driving.....in a family SUV....through the streets of Moscow. Hilarity Ensues.
FMV: The next generation titles were loaded with them. Mission briefings, intel and updates used live actors and stock footage, where enemy profiles usually used CG. All the relevant information can be read through as with the previous games, as well as political views and motivations of who you're fighting, with videos available with a button press.
Fog of War
Fox Chicken Grain Puzzle: An interesting take on this happens during Soviet Strike with Amad's family. His sister, his uncle and the sister's boyfriend. If the uncle is near the boyfriend, he will kill him and his unit. If the sister sees her uncle, she will attack him out of blind rage. The mission becomes a bit tricky when you not only have to know where to place the family members away from each other, but you ALSO have to make sure they fight the right enemy units or else they will be obliterated.
Good Scars, Evil Scars: Ivan Uralia, the last copilot you obtain in Soviet Strike, whose hands are horribly scarred purple from his rescue efforts during the Chernobyl disaster. He might be a bit weird, but he's a goddamn hero.
Gulf War
Hey, It's That Guy!: Older audiences might know Colonel Lemonde as Roy Boone in White Lightning, John Cooper in The Rockford Files, or Matthew Blaisdel in Dynasty.
- While younger ones might be surprised that their commanding officer is the security chief in The Secret World of Alex Mack, which was airing the same time as the game's release.
Insurmountable Waist-Height Fence: Your chopper can't change altitude, so you have to fly around two story buildings or mountians. Averted in the last two games.
Isometric Projection
Man Behind the Man: The Shadowman in Soviet Strike. Allegedly one Uri Vatsiznov, fictional former head of the KGB, though this is not 100% confirmed. The codename for a mysterious individual attempting to stage a coup in post-Cold War Russia. He hacks into your site and taunts you throughout the game. He seemingly dies in the first mission but it's quickly revealed he's alive and behind the bad guys in all subsequent missions. He is never seen except in infra-red, and his voice is electronically muffled.
- STRIKE themselves might even be this. After the end credits, it transpires that STRIKE are the true masterminds behind the coup, or at least their bosses, and even allude to killing Trotsky because he didn't play ball, making them a Government Conspiracy going back decades. The coup was apparently enought to frighten then-President Yeltsin into obedience.
  - Also, there is a strong possibility that the real Shadowman is none other than your own co-pilot Nick Arnold, the Shadowman's convenient hostage for much of the game, maybe or not working on orders of the aforementioned conspiracy. Hack once thinks that Shadowman must be a STRIKE member to be able to hack into their systems; his voice, though muffled, is similar to Nick's in later missions, and he has Nick's sense of humour and uses many of his phrases (eg. "viking funeral"). Not only is he Shadowman's hostage for most of the game, but in the final levels Nick is seemingly with all the time, for no obvious reason as he has no apparent value as a captive. Assuming you do indeed kill Vatsiznov in the first mission, its likely Nick replaced him making the Shadowman a Legacy Character, after which he becomes an excuse to kill all of Russia's dangerous madmen (ie. half the villains in the game) who might be the "real" Shadowman.
Money, Dear Boy: Harding Cash's motivation for doing anything for you in Nuclear Strike.
Muzzle Flashlight
Non-Lethal Warfare: Technically the News Chopper in one Nuclear Strike mission which is only armed with pellets, tear gas and smoke bombs. Somehow does not stop it from being able to blow up TANKS....eventually. Also the Scrappy Weapon.
Nonstandard Game Over: Fail an objective and you'll be called back to base to get shouted at by a pixelly Stormin' Norman. In the Playstation games, you can even go rogue and have your allies hunt you down if you refuse to return when ordered. Eventually they'll push the self-destruct button for, of all things, refueling too many times after you are recalled.
No One Gets Left Behind: "Over here!"
Plot Tailored to the Party: The final mission of Nuclear Strike, which involves ALL of your allies whom you must assist.
Qurac: The actual country involved in Desert Strike is never named.
Retcon: One mission in Soviet alludes to the original Desert Strike, possibly retconning it as a STRIKE mission, instead of a US Government mission originally.
Shout-Out: The Libyan terrorists from Back to The Future have set their sights on destroying the Washington Memorial.
Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome: In Nuclear Strike, Nick Arnold is captured and mauled by a tiger after the first mission.
Too Soon: Desert Strike was considered initially to be in bad taste having come out so soon after the end of the way, but ultimately the quality of the game won out and it was a huge seller, spawning its later sequels.
Trapped Behind Enemy Lines
24-Hour News Networks: The plot is delivered by a Lawyer-Friendly Cameo version of CNN, the GBS. As if this isn't obvious enough, GBS is basically the information arm of STRIKE.
Weapon of Mass Destruction: Shiva's Dagger, a doomsday nuclear missile that would be detonated in the atmosphere that would radiate the planet. That Bulgarian gulag dominatrix seeks to seize the Chernobyl reactor, if successful her rockets would destroy most of Europe.
What Could Have Been: The ending of Nuclear Stike includes a trailer for another game, Future Strike, that was never made. It was instead developed into Future Cop LAPD.
Artistic License Chemistry: In Nuclear Strike, you're treated to the line "You mix Nitrogen and Chloride; you get salt". Nitrogen Trichloride is, in fact similar to tear gas.