Hogan's Alley FAQ/Walkthrough By Andrew M. Evans aka AndrewM
(
[email protected])
Version 1.00 Released November 3, 2012
Looking for anything NES? Visit my hopefully-but-probably-not comprehensive NES
Site at www.neshq.com!
--== Table of Contents ==--
Section 01 ----- Revision History
Section 02 ----- Disclaimer
Section 03 ----- Introduction
Section 04 ----- Basic Controls
Section 05 ----- Game Modes
Section 06 ----- Hogan's Alley A
Section 07 ----- Hogan's Alley B
Section 08 ----- Trick Shot
Section 09 ----- Game Genie Codes
Section 10 ----- Miscellany
Section 11 ----- Closing Notes, Credits, and Thanks
--== Section 01 - Revision History ==--
11/3/2012 v1.00 Original FAQ
--== Section 02 - Disclaimer, Legal, and Rant ==--
This FAQ is open and free.
Post it wherever you want, however you want. If you want to post it on your
site, have at it. If you want to translate it, modify it, or do something else
entirely with it, that's up to you. Whatever you do with it please give credit
to me as the original author. And, if you're feeling generous, leave my
shameless plug for NES HQ in there. This FAQ is open and free. Really. Call the
license model whatever you want, but you can post it wherever you want.
Information should be free and open, including NES FAQs.
--== Section 03 - Introduction ==--
I'm Andy, I run NES HQ (www.neshq.com). I don't have any particular attachment
to Hogan's Alley and there's already a, hmmmm, decent, FAQ written for this
game. However, said existing FAQ is restricted in its usage, so I thought I'd
whip this one up. This FAQ is the result of my own limited experience with the
game, so it's entirely possible that I may have missed the glaringly obvious.
If this is the case, I'd ask that you shoot me an e-mail and let me know!
So, on to the game. The Wikipedia(*1) entry notes:
"Hogan's Alley" is the FBI's training camp tool to train new recruits. The game
flashes "cardboard cut-outs" of innocent civilians and thugs in front of the
player and the player must react quickly to "take down" the bad guys and spare
the innocents.
The game itself is a pretty standard shooter - an early Zapper game for the
NES, published by Nintendo in 1984 in Japan and '85 in the US. The graphics and
the gameplay reflect it's early release date, but it's still a popular game in
spite of these shortcomings.
One other thing I gleaned from the Wikipedia article that may also be of
interest to the readership of this FAQ(*1):
"Hogan's Alley was a shooting range on the grounds of the Special Police School
at Camp Perry, a training facility for the National Guard of the United States
The Special Police School closed during World War II. In 1987, approximately
three years after the release of the video game Hogan's Alley, the FBI Academy
in Quantico, Virginia established a small, simulated city called Hogan's Alley
to serve as a venue for training operations.
(And I promise that's my last Wikipedia quote!)
--== Section 04 - Basic Controls ==--
The controls are pretty simple. Lifted verbatim from the Hogan's Alley manual:
Controller 1 -
SELECT button
When this button is pressed, the arrow (->) on the screen moves. Line up the
arrow with the game you wish to play.
START button
Press this button to begin. Starting is also possible with the Zapper.
Pause:
If you wish to interrupt play in the middle of a game, press the START button.
The pause tone will sound, and the game will stop. Press the START button
again when you wish to continue play. The game will continue from where you
left off.
--== Section 05 - Game Modes ==--
Hogan's Alley contains three different game modes, each one a little different:
Game A - Hogan's Alley A:
Hogan's Alley A is more consistent with an actual shooting range, where the
targets are pulled down and then the shooter has to choose which targets to
shoot at and which to avoid.
Game B - Hogan's Alley B:
Hogan's Alley B is, unlike A, a landscape where the bad guys come out of
different places. There are several different rotating landscapes in B mode.
Game C - Trick Shot:
Instead of shooting bad guys, the target in Game C is a series of cans. The
object is to shoot the cans to kept them aloft and, in doing so, to guide them
into the platforms with the most points.
Commonality:
Ten misses in any of the three modes and the game ends.
Game A and Game B require shooting the same targets. As such,
there is some commonality to the scoring:
Gangster A (Looks like a petty criminal wearing red) - 500 pts.
Gangster B (Looks like a gangster, wearing a tan trenchcoat)- 1000 pts.
Gangster C (Looks like the Don, wearing a suit) - 2000 pts.
--== Section 06 - Hogan's Alley A ==--
Notes from the manual:
- Find the gangster from among the panels, and shoot him.
- Three panels will appear facing sideways.
- All three panels will turn toward the front at the same time. Find the
gangster, and shoot him.
- If the panel is hit just right, it will turn around.
- If you shoot anyone other than a gangster, the panel you shoot will flash,
and you will be penalized with a MISS.
- You will also be penalized with a MISS if you fail to shoot a gangster that
has appeared.
- The display on the top of the screen indicates the number of the seconds
that the panels face forward.
- The people drawn on the panels (gangsters, the lady, the professor and the
policeman) and their positions change continuously, calling for quick
judgement.
- As you advance to later levels, the display time (seconds) for the panels
shortens, and so the difficulty increases.
That pretty much sums up the gameplay for Game A. Some additional tips and
observations:
- One or two panels turn in Game A. Never none (of course), never three
- Avoid looking up at the timer, it doesn't do any good. Ya either got it, or
ya don't.
- Don't try to shoot based on points. The game is limitless, so try to survive
- Probably best to start with the zapper aimed at the middle gangster for the
sake of response time
- There is NO PATTERN. In the course of writing this FAQ I've played through
this game more times than I'd like to admit. No pattern, at all.
- Scoring is as described above, with bad guys being worth 500/1000/2000 pts
- If you're looking to cheat the easiest way to do so would be to get an
emulator that supports save states. Save the game as each round starts,
watch where the bad guys pop up, and then load the save state. This raises
an important question, however: who in the world are you trying to impress?!
--== Section 07 - Hogan's Alley B ==--
Again, notes from the manual:
- Find the gangsters from among the panels that appear in the windows of the
buildings or from out of the shadows, and shoot them.
- This game is played in the same way as Game A; shoot only the panels that
have gangsters drawn on them.
- Five panels will appear in the windows or out of the shadows in each scene;
however, their positions and the order in which they appear vary.
- The scene will change five times. If there are no MISSES, five panels will
appear in each scene. Five scenes (composed of 25 panels) makes up one
round.
- As the rounds progress, the panels will move more quickly and will face
forward for shorter periods of time, making play more difficult.
Game B, as noted above, offers a lot more variety than Game A. The manual's
explanation of the scenes/panels is mildly confusing. To clarify a bit:
- There are five different scenes/landscapes
- In each landscape five panels will appear (if there are no misses)
- Therefore, a single 'round' is composed of five, five-panel scenes
I'll attempt to detail each scene and give a grid of where the panels appear.
In doing so:
S - This is a stationary panel
M - This is a moving panel
Scene 1:
Looks Like a building on either side with a space between
-----
|S| |
-----
|S|M|
-----
So, as you can see, there are stationary panels on the left side of the
screen and a moving panel on the lower-right.
Scene 2:
Gun shop - Building in the center with space on either side
-------
| |S|S|
-------
|S|S|S|
-------
This one gets a little more tricky, as there are five potential places to find
a panel now. One nice thing is that you'll get a small heads up since all five
panels are stationary
Scene 3:
Construction? Side of the gun shop with a fence on the right
-----
|S|S|
-----
|M|M|
-----
Bottom two move, top two don't. Pretty easy. The bottom-left panel can be a
bit tricky since it's a pretty small target area.
Scene 4:
Hogan's Alley - Alley between the fence and the building
-----
| |S|
-----
|M|S|
-----
This is a pretty easy one since nothing comes up on the fence on the left side
of the screen. This is also actually a mirror image of Scene 1.
Scene 5:
Building
-----
|S|S|
-----
|S|S|
-----
Four windows, four stationary panels.
The only other thing worth mentioning about Game B is that, after surviving the
round you'll see 'Good!' displayed on the screen.
--== Section 08 - Trick shot ==--
Trick shot is a departure from the first two rounds in that you're shooting
cans across the screen instead of panels. Again, the manual summarizes this
nicely:
- Shoot the cans as they are thrown, keeping them in the air and guiding them
onto the platforms at the left.
- Cans are thrown in from the right side of the screen, so shoot!
- If you hit a can, it will fly up.
- Keep shooting at the cans to keep them in the air, and guide them onto the
platforms at the left.
- The points for each platform are displayed at the platform. The points will
flash, and be added to your score whenever you get a can onto one of the
platforms.
- You are penalized a MISS if a can falls to the bottom of the screen before
reaching a platform.
- You can avoid MISSES by placing cans on the safety platform, but you won't
get a very high score.
- Five cans will be thrown out for each round. They will be thrown from
various directions.
- The cans move faster with each round.
Additional tips and observations:
- The 'safety platform' the instructions reference is the middle platform. It
counts for 100 points.
- There's no time or round limit, so it's better to shoot 2-3 cans a round
onto the easy platforms and then aim the other 2-3 cans for the 5000
platform.
- You also get 100 points every time you shoot a can, so repeatedly shooting
the same can can be a points bonanza.
- You can shoot cans off the top of the screen. If you do this and they
disappear they count as landing a platform but no additional points are
awarded.
- I've found it easier to shoot the cans onto the 5000 platform by hitting
them below the platform and shooting them up, rather than trying to land
them onto the platform from above.
- After surviving five rounds the screen displays 'SHARPSHOOTER!'. Then,
every five rounds after that you'll be called a 'SUPER SHARPSHOOTER!' These
display essentially for surviving, so even if you've missed nine cans by
the end of round 5 you'll still see the text.
--== Section 09 - Game Genie Codes ==--
5 misses allowed-Game A - IAEKOIAP
20 misses allowed-Game A - AZEKOIAP
Infinite misses allowed-all games - AAOGETPA
Each miss counts as 2-all games - ZAOGETPA
--== Section 10 - Miscellany ==--
A section for a few other fun facts:
- Hogan's Alley was released as an arcade game
- As of the release of this FAQ, there are at least two Hogan's Alley hacks
available:
"I Shot Andy Warhol" by Cory Arcangel
"Terror Alley" by Matthew Visyak
--== Section 11 - Closing Notes, Credits, and Thanks ==--
Please be sure to check out NES HQ at www.neshq.com, which is the most popular
NES-specific site on the Internet. Maybe you'll feel compelled to contribute
to it as well and help build the most comprehensive NES resource on the net.
And finally, send any questions to me at
[email protected].
Credit:
*1 - Wikipedia's Hogan's Alley page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hogan%27s_Alley_%28video_game%29
