This is a weird game to have in a
re-releases column because, if my
memory serves me correctly, it
didn't actually get released in the
first place. As I recall, it was a
conversion of a coin-op with a different name which was written
and reviewed, but then withdrawn
at the last possible moment just as
it actually hit the shops, which
meant only a few people ever got
the chance to buy it. It's a multi-stage beat/shoot-'em-up featuring
lots of James Bond-style antics
like skydiving, scuba diving,
penalty-box diving (oops, been
watching Marco Van Basten in the
European Championships a bit too
much, I think), motorbike riding
and that sort of thing, although for
some inexplicable reason the
'picking up implausibly beautiful
enemy spy babes with impossibly
corny chat-up lines and,
er,
interrogating them'
bit seems to have
been missed out
completely. What's
left is a weird mix of
short sequences
involving such amusing
antics as
free-falling through
the sky avoiding and
shooting enemy
parachutists, walking along in front of
some retina-melting
red-and-yellow
backdrops avoiding
and shooting enemy
agents, riding a
motorbike along a
city street avoiding
and shooting enemy
motorcyclists, and...
Well, you get the
idea. Each of the
sub-games is
quite cute in its
own simplistic little way, but they
all end after
about 30 seconds and then,
despite the tape
containing a separate 128K
version on
one side,
it's multi-load
time.
This means, of course,
that Speccy +2 owners
have a particularly miserable time. Y'see, after they've
used up all their lives and continues they have to rewind, without
the aid of a tape counter, to a
point somewhere in the middle of
the tape to reload the first stage.
Not to put too fine a point on it,
this is a complete pain in the bum.
Still, the rewinding lark shouldn't
prove too much of a bind because,
after about three practice plays,
you'll find yourself sailing right
through to the end without any difficulty whatsoever. You won't ever
have to rewind the tape again.
Phew.
Seriously though, Spec-chums,
isn't it about time we stopped
putting up with this kind of stuff? I
remember old 48K games with
6,000 locations in one load, why
should we have to suffer this
ridiculous nonsense for 30 seconds of scrolling shoot-'em-up
against a looping backdrop? This
could be a decent little game without all the faffing around, but it's
almost totally ruined. Lazy programming - I'm sick of it. Just Say
No.
| Arcade version screenshot... |
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| Click here to view all 10 pics |
| Ratings given by other magazines |
| |
8/10
|
|
9/10
| |
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| Info supplied by the SPOT*ON database |
