Commodore Free 63/Commodore_Free_Issue_63_2012-08-06_-.d64/c16 & +4 pt 2

Text File | 2023-02-26 | 13KB | 509 lines

       Continued from Part 1

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         REVIEW: MOON BUGGY
           By Sixteen Plus
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Title:      Moon Buggy
Publisher:  Anirog
Year:       1985
Language:   English
Genre:      Arcade

http://www.commodore16.com/php/images
/files/Moon_Buggy_(hack_OPI).zip

Based upon the classic 1982 arcade
game Moon Patrol
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_Pat
rol by Irem,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irem it
soon quickly arrived to our system a
mere 3 years later near as soon
after we tore off the festive
wrapper off our good old grey
breadbin on 1984 Christmas morning.

As the basic plot goes, you are a
sector commander in charge of the
moon base defences. On a routine
patrol you have suddenly come under
attack by alien forces supposedly
operating from the huge star cruiser
stationed just beyond the horizon
(according to the inlay blurb). Your
mission is to get from point A to
point Z. Your All Terrain Moon Buggy
(or A.T.M.B as the military prefers
to call it) is fitted with high
speed vertical laser missiles to
blast the aliens back from whence
they came. Also fitted is a tank
cannon in front of the vehicle
capable of blasting away rocks and
enemy tanks which inevitably gets in
your way.

There are also many craters and
mines to avoid. Fortunately your
A.T... ah sod it, your moon buggy is
capable of jumping over these
extremely hazardous obstacles (maybe
they installed short burst thrusters
underneath). It can also accelerate
and decelerate which you may find
you'll be doing quite often.

All the alphabetical checkpoints in
the game which you see at the top of
the screen altogether are divided
into 5 zones. After every zone is
completed, the landscape changes
colour and you gain an extra life
before continuing on. If a stray
bullet hits you or if you crash
intro a rock, a mine or a tank or
fall down a crater you will
inevitably lose one of your lives.
Luckily you have 5 lives at the
start of the game, that's plenty
enough. If you manage to clear all 5
zones then you will receive a 2500
point bonus, then the game repeats
itself back from the start for you
to go plough through again and for
your hi-score.

That's the game. On with the review.
This is an arcade game which I have
very fond memories of playing whilst
on holiday as a 10yr old child.
Whilst obviously the C16 will not
match the arcade original in
cosmetics, it matches up pretty well
in the gameplay.

Some of the background graphics,
particularly the rocky surface many
may recognise from Skramble also by
Anirog. I'm guessing that some of
the same code was used as Jef Gamond
programmed both games. The
mountainous scenery in the
background uses some parallax
scrolling with twinkly stars above
them which looks quite impressive
for its time. The aliens look half
decent too and with the cool way
they materialise themselves. The
explosions are also particularly
nice. The rocks and mines though are
just basic rocks and mines, they
look OK if nothing special.
Everything looks nice and colourful.
But the moon buggy itself though
looks quite bland where it's only
made up of one dull grey colour,
yuk. But at least that the low
gravitational jumping is effective.
The horizontal scrolling is pretty
smooth too.

The sounds are really just your
usual standard basic affair. Nice
enough explosion FX and stuff, but
the moon buggy firing sounds are a
tad grating and tinny which you may
find turning the volume down a bit
for.

Playing the game itself is a doddle,
but it's also a fair decent
challenge. The controls are good and
extremely responsive whenever you
need to speed up or slow down to
avoid the enemy fire. The collision
detection is pretty much accurate
too. The buggy's vertical bullets
are extremely rapid, but for
horizontal fire there's only one
bullet at a time on screen here I'm
afraid which also may take a couple
of clicks to release the next one
after.

It may not take anyone too long to
complete this game though, but it
still pretty much remains
challenging, and as it wraps itself
back around to the start after
completion, this makes for a perfect
game for hi-scores.

There are few arcade ports on our
system, and much of them aren't
really very good apart from a few
exceptions. Fortunately this is one
of those few exceptions, and I would
easily tuck it in somewhere in the
top 5 of my arcade conversion list.
So if you're a fan of the arcade, or
even just a general fan of vintage
shmups then give this one a play now.

Presentation: 6

Joystick or keyboard control.
Hi-score. Seems to have all the main
elements of the arcade.

Graphics: 6

Some decent parallax scrolling. Nice
use of colour and some decent
graphics. The buggy itself looks a
bit wiffy though.

Sound: 4

Some simple spot effects which might
have you turning down the sound a
bit.

Playability: 7

Simply straight-forward to instantly
pick up and play, and fun from the
word go.

Lasting Appeal: 7

This is one of those classic games
that you'll always have time for many
years later.

Overall: 7

A faithful and extremely playable
representation of an arcade classic.

Clocked by Sixteen Plus

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     REVIEW: SABOTEUR! (PLUS/4)
           By Sixteen Plus
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Title:      Saboteur! - Plus4
Publisher:  Durell
Year:       1985
Language:   English
Genre:      Arcade Adventure

http://www.commodore16.com/php/images
/files/Saboteur.zip

The classic game which was immensely
popular on the bigger systems
eventually arrives on the Plus4. The
blurb reads... You are a saboteur,
highly trained in martial arts. You
are employed to infiltrate a central
security building which is disguised
as a warehouse. You must steal a
disk that contains the names of all
the rebel leaders before its
information is sent to the outlying
security stations. You are working
against the clock, both in getting
to the disk, and in making your
escape.

What the blurb fails to mention is
that you also need to plant a bomb
in the warehouse, although this is
detailed more in the instruction
booklet.

I've already reviewed the C16
version and it's quite accepted that
it's not that great. Does the Plus4
version fare any better?

So your main objective is to first
locate and pick up the bomb, then
locate the disk and swap the disk
for the bomb within the given time
limit.

Once you've swapped the disk for the
bomb, a new timer countdown begins
where you have to quickly make your
escape via the helicopter before the
bomb explodes.

In the meanwhile, you need to avoid
the enemy cameras which fire upon
you. Avoid or kill the dogs and
security guards. You can slowly
sneak up on the guards but if you
get too close too quickly then
they'll hear you.

The graphics unlike the C16 version
I am happy to say are top notch,
nicely detailed and large as it's
meant to be, much like the C64
version. The sound effects are basic
yet functional. At least it has
sound unlike on the C16. The title
screen music is OK if nothing
special. The title screen itself is
quite nice and there is a high-score
table.

The animation and movement of the
saboteur himself is great and the
controls are fluid and responsive.
You have all the weapons as in other
higher platform versions at your
disposal, well basically the whole
game is here, nothing has been left
out including the trains and
helicopter which are missed on the
C16 version.

Playability wise, it's great fun and
there is a lot of replay value to be
had for the higher skill levels,
nine in all where the bomb will be
placed in a more difficult location
and specific terminals to open
specific doors you will need to find
to progress further.

Overall, this is a fantastic
conversion for plussy owners or
C16'ers with a 64K memory upgrade,
and given that you also have the
inferior yet slightly playable C16
version for free then it's very good
value. This game is undoubtedly one
of the biggest Plus4 classics and
comes highly recommended.

Presentation 8 Joystick or keyboard
control, 9 skill levels. Hi-Score
table. Excellent presentation
throughout.

Graphics: 8

Large, smooth and finely detailed.

Sound: 5

OK title tune, basic sound effects.

Playability: 8

Compulsive from the start, a huge map
to explore and very engrossing.

Lasting Appeal: 8

Once you beat the easy level, there's
plenty to come back for in the later
levels for years to come.

Overall: 8

It's a Plus4 classic which C16'ers
can only envy over.

Clocked by Sixteen Plus on Level 1

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       REVIEW: SABOTEUR! (C16)
           By Sixteen Plus
*************************************

Title:      Saboteur! - C16
Publisher:  Durell
Year:       1985
Language:   English
Genre:      Arcade Adventure

http://www.commodore16.com/php/images
/files/Saboteur_C16.zip

The classic game which was immensely
popular on the bigger systems
eventually arrives on the C16. The
blurb reads...

You are a saboteur, highly trained
in martial arts. You are employed to
infiltrate a central security
building which is disguised as a
warehouse. You must steal a disk
that contains the names of all the
rebel leaders before its information
is sent to the outlying security
stations. You are working against
the clock, both in getting to the
disk, and in making your escape.

What the blurb fails to mention is
that you also need to plant a bomb
in the warehouse, although this is
detailed more in the instruction
booklet.

There is a separate Plus4 only
version which I will be reviewing
next, but first we shall review the
C16 version which also works on the
Plus4.

So your main objective is to first
locate and pick up the bomb, then
locate the disk and swap the disk
for the bomb within the given time
limit.

Once you've swapped the disk for the
bomb, a new timer countdown begins
where you have to quickly make your
escape by the roof before the bomb
explodes. The C16 version does not
include the helicopter at the end
due to memory limits.

More on the memory limits. The
programmers state "Saboteur is a
martial arts arcade adventure with
112 different screens, which was
originally designed to run on
computers with a least 48k of RAM.
So to fit it in the C16's much
smaller memory we have had to make a
number of cuts (for example, you
cannot kill the guard dogs, or use a
joystick). This version occupies
almost every single byte available
on the C16 - we are sorry for the
cuts, but we believe you will still
find it very enjoyable to play".

This is fair enough. I'm sure even
the best programmers would struggle
to fit the full original game within
16K of memory.

However what they fail to tell you
is that the playing area and game
characters are much smaller. The
graphics are extremely crude and
there is no sound whatsoever. There
are also no cameras which try to
shoot you, and the two main
noticeable factors are that there
are no trains and no helicopter at
the end.

The toughness of the game I feel is
a little easier compared to other
versions, you don't take damage
quite as quickly although it does
take a little longer for the energy
to replenish itself I feel. At least
though that the map is more or less
the same as other versions. There
are the usual nine skill levels
where the bomb is placed in a more
difficult to reach location. Also,
at least that they give you the
actual C16 screenshots on the back
of the inlay cover which is quite
honest for a software house given
the state of this conversion.

Your saboteur moves quite well
considering, and the game is
basically the same as other versions
that it does feel a little that you
are playing Saboteur, but the
limitations of the C16 really seems
to let it down but this isn't the
fault of Durell.

I applaud them for their effort.
They took on a seemingly impossible
job and at least made something
recognisable including most elements
of the game, but it is quite
laughable all the same when you
compare it to other versions on how
it's meant to look.

At the end of the day, there are
just some games that just don't
really work well enough on an
unexpanded C16, but there is some
fun factor to be had if only for the
lols. It's really not that good a
game but I've seen far worse
conversions on the humble C16, and
if you take the limitations into
consideration it actually doesn't
play too badly which actually takes
some doing.

Presentation: 3

Only keyboard control, a very cut
down version with a tiny playing
area. 9 skill levels.

Graphics: 3

Very minimalistic and bland.

Sound: 0

The silence is deafening.

Playability: 4

It is playable. The graphics and lack
of sound are a little deceptive but
they managed to cram in most of the
basic gameplay.

Lasting Appeal: 3.5

But there's limited enjoyment and
little lasting replay value, but if
you don't make comparisons then you
just might have another go.

Overall: 3.5

Not totally terrible and kudos for
effort given the memory limitations
of the C16. Check the Plus4 version
out though if you can.

Clocked by Sixteen Plus on Level 1

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