1.Project -X-
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Tis'  the  wacky-blockbusting-chart_topping  shooty  game  from the boys in
Wakefield  first..   Title/game  over  music  and  SFX by Allister Brimble,
end-game  music  by  DENS  Design.   so  for reasons of bias I'd better not
mention  that in the review, although if you get there, have a good listen,
cos it's awesome :-(

The  first  bit of music we here is the title music (god, what a surprise?)
which  starts  off  quietly  with  a  repetition  of a note on the high 'g'
followed by a somewhat 'housey' 'train' type of sound (well how else do you
explain  it?)  and  the  classic house-beat comes in.  Altogether, it comes
over  well, as a through composed house tune with all the elements required
to make a good song in the genre.

MELODY]---      57%     The reason that this has a low mark, is because house
                        music doesn't usually have a theme as such, more like
                        loud noises, and piano chords, but it's not something
                        you could whistle down the street.

FEELING]--      45%     Bleurgh! It's nothing to Allister's tune, it's just
                        that I don't personally like house music.

SAMPLES]--      88%     These are good, they are clean, crisp with no signs
                        of hiss.

ORIGINALITY]--  40%     Can you really get an original sounding house tune on
                        the amiga these days? To me, after a while, it all
                        starts to sound the same. Good to dance to, but not
                        much else.

--< OVERALL >-- 66%     For a house tune, and coming from me, that's quite a
                        respectable mark. The reason I give it a relatively
                        high mark is because of what Allister has done. A
                        shoot-em up needs a fast paced beginning to set the
                        pace of the game and increase the adrenalin flow.
                        This tune does that well. It is a bit repetitive
                        after a while, but then again, what house tune isn't?



There  is  an  old-timer  music mode in the game, which is activated on the
title-screen and it's another tune, which is opposite in style to the dance
track,  being more in the mould of the 'classical' amiga tune.  To me, this
doesn't  quite  come off, and therefore does not warrant being given a full
review,  since  it  is not 'main' music, and I would've only given it about
50%

When  you  start  the game, you are given a little 'ditty' while each level
loads  in.   This  is  composed  mainly  of  drums, with a little bass line
creeping  in now and then.  The drums are very simple (and off the SR-16 if
I'm  not  much mistaken) and probably written in 10 minutes.  That's not to
say  that  they  don't serve the purpose.  It is my view that this is again
written  to  increase  the  pace just before the game begins to prepare the
player.   It  has  very clear samples once again, but is a bit too cute and
dinky  (especially  the  bass  line  which is doo doo, dah dah dow dow etc.
(well can you think of a better way to describe a bassline, if you do, then
please tell me!)) and not powerful enough.

Now, the sound-effects..

I can quite easily say that they are probably the most varied sound-effects
I have ever heard on an amiga game, I was well impressed with the amount of
speech,   diversity   of  shooting  effects.   It  had  speech  for  almost
everything,  very  'arcadey'  even tho' it's a bit obvious that the samples
are  not  all  from  the  same  voice!!   A  couple  of different explosion
sound-effects wouldn't have gone a miss, 'cos the one sample they have is a
bit  dinky  and  not  like  the  satisfying feeling you get from a POWERFUL
explosion  (like  say, the smart-bomb from Silkworm) but other than that, a
definite  thumbs  up  on that front.  What you also get is a low bass synth
sound in the background during the game, which changes from level to level.
In  level  2 for instance, you get a whooshing wind sample.  These are very
effective, especially the wind, and serve to waste another channel (!)

"GUNS!....POWER UP!....DESTROY WAVES FOR POWER UPS!....SHIELD....ON!..."

(How much memory on samples? Nuff!)

SFX  ]-----     92%

The  only other bit of music in the game I have heard is a little played on
the  bonus  level,  which  basically  consists of a little drum beat in the
background,  with  a bass line.  The tempo of this is fast and goes well to
enhance  the feeling of speed in this part of the game.  Yet another thumbs
up from me!

Whoops,  silly  me,  I  almost  forgot  the  game-over  tune.   Is it worth
reviewing  this  tune,  nah!   The reason why, is because it basically is a
couple  of  long samples from the 1812 overture by Tchaikovsky interspersed
with  a  couple  of  'cannon  shot'  samples.   It works very well with the
visuals  although the samples are 'quite' bad quality, obviously sampled at
around  'G-1'  on  the  'tracker'  samplers, but that's not his fault, they
probably ran out of chip-mem.