I'd go with Ninjas & Superspies without a shadow of a doubt. Ideally supplemented by the Palladium Weapon Compendium series.

I'd trim down or ignore entirely the cybernetic implants, the more over-the-top gadgets and vehicles, and possibly the mystic martial arts stuff too. Just guns, kung fu and tradecraft.

But God in heaven, does this game need and/or deserve an update. Not necessarily in terms of rules, but the tech level in the huge equipment lists. At least if you're setting your game any time after 1990.

Savage Worlds. Or Fate. Seems to me like exactly the type of thing those systems'd handle well.

Savage Worlds or Dogs of W.A.R.

If you wanted crunchy: Spycraft 2E. Its VERY good at that sort of thing.

Seriously.

GURPS with various books (High Tech) would work too.

Palladiums Recon would fit probably.
Possibly Twilight 2000 sans the Post Apoc theme?

Dogs of war without a doubt!!!

I kind of want to use Savage Worlds but it does not handle distinct unarmed martial arts styles at all — at least out of the box. Does anyone know any supplement that addresses this?

Dogs of WAR looks fun but I found BoL underwhelming.

GURPS and Spycraft are awesome (look at all those fiddly bits!) but intimidate me (too many fiddly bits).

Has anyone ever run a similar "men's adventure" scenario?

Still Dogs of W*A*R.

Fourth-ing Dogs of War.  Sure, the system is a bit skimpy but if you've got players in the appropriate mindset and add in a liberal amount of explosions, you should be good.  Something like DwD Studios' Covert Ops is similar to Dogs of War, but has a little more system attached to it; if you do use Covert Ops, I'd recommend making the starting characters level 5 or so, so that have a bit more skills and competence to them.

Classic Spycraft might be another good choice.  There's less fiddly bits than 2.0, it's significantly cheaper and there is a starter version pdf floating around out there.

Off-the-wall recommendation:  Classic Traveller.  You roll up a bunch of experienced bad-asses and substitute an airplane or tank for spaceship if you get one on the mustering out benefits.  I haven't played CT enough to know if combat is suitably action filled, but it seems like it fits based on the trailers for the Expendables movies.

GURPS with the Tactical shooting supplement and the cinematic rules turned up to eleven.

Quote from: The Butcher;778057I'd go with Ninjas & Superspies without a shadow of a doubt. Ideally supplemented by the Palladium Weapon Compendium series.

I'd trim down or ignore entirely the cybernetic implants, the more over-the-top gadgets and vehicles, and possibly the mystic martial arts stuff too. Just guns, kung fu and tradecraft.

But God in heaven, does this game need and/or deserve an update. Not necessarily in terms of rules, but the tech level in the huge equipment lists. At least if you're setting your game any time after 1990.

It depends on one thing...dramatic logic or no?

If no, go with your gut, Ninjas and Superspies, with whatever supplements to taste.  It would be the perfect blend of action feel without narrative metagaming genre stuff.  GURPS and xCraft are probably too crunchy for the action feel if you're already not a big user of the systems.

If yes, then go with SW, Fate, X of Y, xWorld, whatever genre metagaming platform floats your boat.

Quote from: The Butcher;778057I'd go with Ninjas & Superspies without a shadow of a doubt. Ideally supplemented by the Palladium Weapon Compendium series.

I'd trim down or ignore entirely the cybernetic implants, the more over-the-top gadgets and vehicles, and possibly the mystic martial arts stuff too. Just guns, kung fu and tradecraft.

But God in heaven, does this game need and/or deserve an update. Not necessarily in terms of rules, but the tech level in the huge equipment lists. At least if you're setting your game any time after 1990.

A group I used to play with did this on Obsidian Portal/VT using Mongoose Traveller, worked ok.

Same ones I'd use for GI Joe - Spycraft (preferably 2.0, but 1e would do fine) or Ninjas & Superspies.

I'd probably go with BRP.  (Which, honestly, probably isn't the best fit, but I'm comfortable with it and could house rule it a bit to better fit the "action movie" combat.)

I'd use Covert Ops from DWD Studios. It got a fast and clean equipment section, allows the more skilled to accomplish more (not just accomplish better), and a fun push-your-luck set of mechanics. It's also easy on the learning/teaching and includes a random mission generator.