Innholdsfortegnelse for No. 265 i Retro Gamer

I was just scrolling through Facebook Marketplace and a flight simulator popped up for sale. Not a game, an actual sit-in-a-cockpit flight simulator that proper soldiers might use to, you know, learn how to fly. I’m looking at it now. It’s listed as “A10 Fighter Jet Simulator (THE TANK BUSTER)”. It’s only £10,500. I cannot tell you how tempted I am to cash in this month’s Retro Gamer paycheck and buy it. It’s an odd thing to see listed on there amongst the free hi-fi equipment. Well, free until you click on the link, and it then says “open to sensible offers”. I’ll make you a sensible offer – my boot up your jacksie if you keep listing things as free when clearly you want lots of money for them.…

First-person shooter fanatics didn’t have to gamble with their hard-earned cash this month, as the critics felt Tom Clancy’s Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 was a winner on the HD consoles. Scores included 9/10 from Official Xbox 360 Magazine, 8/10 from Official PlayStation Magazine, 4/5 from 360, 78% from Play and 7/10 each from X360, games™ and Edge. OXM felt that it “isn’t a massive leap forward for the series” but was “the best Rainbow Six and the best Xbox 360 squad shooter yet”. By contrast, games™ felt that “the strong multiplayer carries it, as does the better-than-most gunplay” but complained of a solo campaign that was “all corridors and parking garages, empty convention centres and bland penthouse apartments”. Sega Superstars Tennis was also being served up across various formats, and scored…

KNUCKLES: HORDE OF ENEMIES ■ Sonic’s rough and ready rival is always up for a bit of friendly competition, and in this case that means a race through Green Hill Zone to a remix of Super Sonic Racing. Just watch out for the Motobugs and Buzz Bombers, which are way bigger than usual. TAILS: TOXIC SKIES ■ Getting a lift from the friendly fox has always been a good way to keep Sonic out of harm’s way, but it’s not an option for most of Sonic Generations. However, it’s a necessity in this tricky stretch of Chemical Plant Zone, so make the most of him. AMY: TAKING THE LEAP TOGETHER! ■ Sonic may despair of his clingy companion sometimes – quite often, actually – but she’s the perfect partner for…

If you’ve ever wanted to try Sonic Generations, you’re in luck – an expanded remaster titled Sonic X Shadow Generations is releasing imminently, and includes both the original game and an all-new Shadow Generations campaign. As Takashi Iizuka tells us, Sonic’s silver-screen exploits were the impetus for the new release. “The second Sonic The Hedgehog movie was a success that teased Shadow The Hedgehog at the end, and almost immediately, we knew there was going to be a third movie with a focus on Shadow,” he says. “The movies have done an amazing job of entertaining and introducing our characters to so many people who may have never played a Sonic game before, and probably haven’t played the older games with Shadow.” Although Shadow was introduced in Sonic Adventure 2…

ROUND ONE: KING GRAGON ■ This skeletal creature wields a long halberd while occasionally raining daggers down on Rastan. Their kingly garb includes a crimson dress and golden cloak. HOW TO BEAT THEM Their halberd has a long reach, but they rarely use it. Wait until they jump then leap in with a few swift swipes. ROUND TWO: KING SLAY ■ Snakes spit blue fire at Rastan as King Slay athletically leaps around the screen. They also have a set of purple wings, which they use to escape danger. HOW TO BEAT THEM Low blows are definitely the best here, avoiding King Slay’s attacks and sapping their strength at the same time. ROUND THREE: SYMPLEGADES ■ This deadly wizard is dressed in ornate clothes and casts blue fire at Rastan.…

RASTAN SAGA II ■ Taito quickly turned around this sequel to capitalise on the series’ popularity. The sprites are even larger (!), and there’s another vast range of striking enemies. Unfortunately, while it has some fresh gameplay elements such as destroyable blocks, co-op play, new power-ups and a bouncy soundtrack, the game feels rushed, especially with its laughably difficult – and unimaginative – boss fights. Rastan Saga II was ported to just the Sega Genesis outside of Japan but under its original title rather than Nastar. WARRIOR BLADE: RASTAN SAGA EPISODE II ■ Unbelievably, Rastan and his enemies got even bigger for this third arcade game, now featuring a second monitor and moulded into a Golden Axe template. Two further playable characters join our familiar friend, a female warrior named…

AMIGA ■ The Amiga was the main platform for X-Out, and its development focussed primarily on this version. As a result it is the most polished iteration with excellent graphics, superb sound and gripping playability. If you have to choose one version, it should be this one. ATARI ST ■ The Atari ST version was created at the same time as the Amiga version thanks to Heiko Schroeder’s cross-compiler, but differs significantly from it – the playfield is much smaller, the scrolling is a bit jerky and the music by Juergen Piscol sounds clearly inferior to the original. That certainly doesn’t make it a bad game, but it’s also nowhere near as good as its 16-bit brother. C64 ■ The C64 version released in April 1990 was the first 8-bit…

WHAT IMPROVEMENTS CAN PLAYERS EXPECT? A ton! Firstly, the graphics have been completely overhauled and now feature native widescreen, multiple parallax layers, lots of new particle and lighting effects, and it all runs at 60 frames per second. Chris Huelsbeck has rearranged his legendary music, and there are also three all-new tracks by other musicians. Those who prefer to listen to the original Amiga and C64 compositions, can do so both in the game and in a jukebox – we recorded it in the highest possible quality directly from the original hardware. We also have made the shop much easier to use, and finally two players can now play at the same time. But the game itself remains the same! This is still the original X-Out experience, with all the…

When Sonic The Hedgehog was released for the Sega Mega Drive in June 1991, it injected fresh life into the platform genre. Aside from introducing a character who became a cultural icon, the lightning fast, visually vibrant game introduced new play mechanics and took presentation to a whole new level. It also led to a surge of copycat platformers based around mascots and one of those was Tinhead, a cutesy robot who could whizz around various worlds while shooting bullets out of the top of his head. Developed by MicroProse UK, it was published by Spectrum HoloByte and, for a very long time, it was a Mega Drive exclusive. Tinhead was designed by Richard Lemarchand who had cut his teeth helping to port F-15 Strike Eagle II to the Mega…

» PLATFORM: AMIGA » RELEASED: 1989 » DEVELOPER: CINEMAWARE If you needed any idea of Cinemaware’s ambition, you only had to examine its name. It’s there as clear as day, ‘cinema’ and Cinemaware was one of the few developers of the time to use its games to capture the sheer scope and scale that a good movie could offer. From the dramatic dogfighting of Wings to punching out Nazis in Rocket Ranger, the games of Cinemaware felt larger than life and did a great job of translating movie tropes into digestible and entertaining game mechanics. By far one of its biggest achievements was It Came From The Desert, a wonderful love letter to the iconic B-movies that dominated cinema throughout the Fifties. Before the game even begins you’re treated to…

By late 1997, Britpop was fading, Oasis had released their disappointing third album, Be Here Now, but Core Design, based in Derby, England, was thriving thanks to the first two Tomb Raider games. With Tomb Raider II dominating the gaming charts, the team was unsure what to do next. “I assumed we would continue making Tomb Raider games, especially given how successful it had been,” explains Gavin Rummery, lead programmer at Core. “We were supposed to be making Tomb Raider III on a brand-new engine. But because we wanted two years to do it, Eidos insisted that another team was tasked with making additional levels for Tomb Raider II – but as a full game, which was dubbed Tomb Raider II.5 internally.” The team were meant to be developing Tomb…

» PLAYSTATION » 2000 » METRO CORPORATION The late-Nineties and early Noughties were really the golden years of the extreme sports genre, a time when publishers were willing to make games based on everything from scooters to sky surfing. The odd one that seemed to capture my imagination was wakeboarding, because BursTrick always stood out to me when I saw it in magazines, since it had the kind of colourful arcade aesthetic that I love, and which was falling out of fashion at the time. I never managed to pick it up back then, but I liked the idea of it enough that when I finally did find a copy in 2014, I decided to grab it. For those unfamiliar with wakeboarding, it involves someone holding onto a long rope…

Glance at CYGNI: All Guns Blazing’s wildly impressive visuals, and you’d be forgiven for thinking it is the work of a vast team, backed by a substantial budget. KeelWorks may well one day be that kind of studio, but when it started on CYGNI it had a headcount of three. More staff and contractors joined through the development, but the outfit remained modest in scale. Which makes the team’s technical achievement with CYGNI all the more stunning. “CYGNI’s element of depth and polish was a tremendous challenge” Nareg confirms. “When we talk about this game, there’s a lot of misconception out there that it was a AAA budgeted super high-end creation, and that’s not quite true. I always bring back the example of Jessica Rabbit, from Who Framed Roger Rabbit.…

» WONDERSWAN COLOR » 2002 » DIMPS One Piece has been a popular manga and anime series for over 25 years now, but I’m not a fan and I know I’ll never become one. It’s not that the adventures of the Straw Hat Pirates hold no appeal to me, it’s just that I’d have over 1,100 episodes to catch up on if I started the anime series today, and I find that kind of time commitment to be daunting. Even so, my unfamiliarity with Luffy and pals is no barrier to interest in their licensed games. One Piece Grand Battle: Swan Colosseum is a fighting game that feels like a hybrid of Super Smash Bros and more traditional fighters. Battles take place in arenas with platforms to jump on and…

» System: Switch » Buy it for: £49.99 » Buy it from: Online, retail Hyrule is in trouble once again, and with Link having been sucked into a dark void, it’s the turn of the titular princess to play the hero. The game plays much like the top-down Zeldas of old, but Zelda herself solves problems by cloning the objects she encounters throughout the game. Dungeon design lives up to the series’ strong standard and allows for some level of improvisation, which is always welcome, and the miniature-style presentation is lovely if marred by inconsistent technical performance. It’s just a shame that you occasionally have to dip into Link’s bag of tricks, as finding alternative ways to win battles with Zelda’s copying mechanic is challenging fun. >> Score 87%…

<INTRO> THINGS HAVE BEEN BUSY FOR C64 OWNERS AT THE TIME OF WRITING. THIRTY-ONE GAMES ENTERED THE RESET 4K COMPETITION (BIT.LY/RESET4K-2024), AND THE BRILLIANT PAUL KOLLER RELEASED SPELUNKY64 – BIT.LY/SPELUNKY64 – WHICH DESERVES A FULLER REVIEW IN THE NEXT ISSUE. THIS TIME WE LOOK AT A REVIVED LABEL, A FASCINATING MULTI-PART VECTREX GAME, THREE GOOD GAMES GET REVIEWED AND WE LOOK FORWARD TO A NEW STE TITLE. </INTRO> <BODY> A casual conversation led to the resurrection of Tengen Games. “Several years ago I was talking to a friend of mine about old videogame companies and mentioned off-hand how cool it would be if ‘whoever owns Tengen now’ would resurrect the brand,” Jeff Silvers tells us. “In December 2022, I realised that nobody owned the trademark and that it had been…

After making its name with astonishing looking Amiga and Atari ST games, Factor 5 soon moved over to consoles and found great success, before winding down in 2011. It’s since been resurrected, but the team are focussing on those earlier years. DARRAN So what’s the first Factor 5 game you remember playing? TIM It was Katakis on the Amiga and I flipping loved it, possibly more than R-Type, even though it’s a bit of a rip-off. NICK I think it was BC Kid, the Amiga version of Bonk’s Adventure, at the local play scheme. I quite liked it but it was very rarely ever played, most of the other kids seemed to prefer Sleepwalker. “Wasn’t Rogue Squadron III the one with the disco-dancing sequence at the beginning?”DARRAN JONES DARRAN I think…

“Spec Ops: The Line really deserves to be remembered more than it has been” What’s the biggest miss in gaming history? I’m not talking about the games that flopped because they deserved to, but those that deserved to do better. The first that jumps to mind is 2006’s Okami. Stunningly beautiful to look at, with a hand-drawn traditional Japanese art style, it just came too late in the PS2’s life cycle at a time when players had already locked eyes onto the PS3 and Wii. It might’ve received acclaim across the board, but somehow never found an audience. It has since been re-released a couple of times, yet somehow remains remembered as a near-flawless masterpiece that barely anybody played. Then there’s the GameCube’s Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem. Nintendo had set…

» AMSTRAD CPC » 1987 » SENSIBLE SOFTWARE If you lived in the Eighties like I did, you probably couldn’t afford many videogames. It’s also highly likely that most of your future gaming purchases were decided by what you would read in magazines, which in my case was Amstrad Action. While I never really cared for the techy stuff that the magazine covered, it did have an excellent reviews section and anything that was awarded Mastergame status instantly got my interest. One such release that I had my eye on was Ocean’s Wizball, which sounded like my sort of game. I loved the idea of restoring the game’s world to its once vibrant colours, and the fact that it had shoot-’em-up elements only added to its appeal. I simply couldn’t…

The success of the Commodore 64 and Spectrum saw other companies take note and it wasn’t long before Amstrad entered the market with its own range of computers. Unlike their competitors, they typically launched with green or coloured monitors and built-in cassette decks, giving them quite an advantage due to many people only having a single television in the household. Although it had a massive following in France, and the UK, lazy Spectrum ports and a lack of killer exclusives meant that Amstrad’s machine trailed behind its competitors and it went on to sell just over three million units across its entire range. We’re focussing on the original tape-based CPC 464 here and covering the titles that really made the machine sing. How many of the following classics did you…

» MASTER SYSTEM » 1987 » SANRITSU It’s no secret that videogames generally used to be a lot more difficult than they are today, so it’s not uncommon for me to revisit an old favourite, only to receive the kind of vicious thrashing that makes me worry that I’m past the peak of my gaming powers. Fortunately, games like Alien Syndrome exist to convince me otherwise. I first encountered the Master System conversion of Sega’s run-and-gun as a young child – young enough that I had no awareness of the Alien film series that so clearly influenced it – and I found the game too difficult to be much fun, rarely even reaching the first boss. Well, the kid I was may have had the advantages of more free time…

BOSS 01 DESCRIPTION: This rather disgusting-looking foe seems to have a brain where its body should be. It gives us endless nightmares just looking at it. HOW TO BEAT THEM: The first thing to do is to take out the two orange tubes. Once that has been achieved, the head of the beast will detach and fly around. At the top left, just below the ceiling, you cannot be hit by it, so position yourself there. BOSS 02 DESCRIPTION: You’d hope a life underwater would mean this metallic monstrosity would have rusted up – no such luck. This is going to be a tough fight. HOW TO BEAT THEM: First destroy the grapple arm in the middle. Then turn to the two lower ones, whose colour coding ensures that no…

Founded in Cologne in early 1987, Factor 5 first released its accomplished Amiga R-Type clone Katakis before tackling the official Amiga R-Type conversion. An Amiga adaptation of Manfred Trenz’s intense C64 run-and-gun Turrican followed, which garnered acclaim and led to a popular series that later moved from the Amiga to the SNES and Mega Drive in the early to mid-Nineties. Before then, Factor 5 pushed Commodore’s 16-bit computer with its Ballblazer sequel Masterblazer and its conversion of Bonk’s Adventure – BC Kid. As the Nineties progressed, the firm impressed with Indiana Jones’ Greatest Adventures for the SNES, and the Game Boy ports of Animaniacs and Contra: The Alien Wars. It then transitioned into PlayStation development with the best-seller Star Wars: Rebel Assault II and the underrated Ballblazer Champions. In 1998,…

SNES ■ Gordon Fong was handed the programming reins for the SNES version of Tinhead and the game was completed. For commercial reasons, it wasn’t released by MicroProse but a ROM image knocked around the internet shortly afterwards and it finally got an airing as a physical cartridge release in 2019 courtesy of Piko Interactive. Since the SNES gamepad had more buttons, all three shots – horizontal, diagonal and bouncing – could be played in quick succession. ATARI JAGUAR ■ A Jaguar version was considered but didn’t get past the initial investigation stage. Even so, a version was actually made. “The Mega Drive and Jaguar both had 68000 processors at their heart so, when Nick Thompson was working on a Gunship 2000 port to Jaguar, he – for fun (and…

Just as the universe of Riven moves in mysterious ways, the stars aligned on the day Richard Vander Wende became a director for the game. Or as he puts it to us, “It was a total, serendipitous fluke. But it’s a testament to the power of pursuing your passions and curiosities, no matter how unpromising the path ahead might seem.” Having worked at Disney, where he created artwork for the film Aladdin, Richard found himself between jobs with “no clue” where to turn his attention next. But then a friend gifted him a ticket to the Digital World Expo computer show in Los Angeles. There he happened to spot Robyn Miller, the man responsible – along with his brother Rand and their studio Cyan – for the 1993 puzzle adventure Myst.…

Immersion in a strange universe has always been part of the appeal of Riven. When Cyan Worlds set out to remake the game, bringing its islands to life in virtual reality as well as on flat screens was part of the plan from the start. The virtual reality experience is available on the Meta Quest 2 and 3 headsets. You can also play this version on PC, provided you have a very high-spec PC with a VR setup. If you do, you’re in for some amazing scenes. Both PC VR and Quest versions look striking and have been well received. However, some reviewers have noted that some graphical compromises were necessary for the experience to be possible for the Quest. The Quest version also includes a few extra loading screens…

Another aspect of Project Eden that stands out is its Arena multiplayer mode. There are three modes to choose from: the first is Deathmatch, where you and a friend can control one of the four characters to win a bunch of matches, Team Mode lets you and a friend solve puzzles in a few maps, and Racing Mode enables you to control one of the Rovers through an obstacle course, avoiding traps and falling debris. Joby Wood, level designer on Tomb Raider IV and V, was brought in to help with the Rover racing map. “Gavin asked me to create a map for Eden by using existing assets. The new system they had developed for Project Eden was really great,” Joby recalls. Peter Barnard also remembers making a few maps…

When a studio from the world of visual effects and film makes its debut in videogames, you might imagine it would flex its cinematic muscle working with a genre like action adventure, where there’s an explicit opportunity to showcase skills around lighting and camera work and narrative drama. But looking back to gamings past? That seems a little more unlikely. It turns out, however, that the Edinburgh-based KeelWorks saw things a little differently. Earlier this year the studio released its first game in the form of CYGNI: All Guns Blazing, a dazzlingly polished 2D shooter with a cinematic quality arguably never seen in the genre before. KeelWorks has a history making remarkably high-quality animated cinematics – and composing scores and other music for worlds like film and television. The founding…

» MANUFACTURER: Mattel » YEAR: 2006 » COST: $69.99 (launch), £120+ (today, boxed), £50+ (today, unboxed) Combining two things that kids love into a new, better thing is a sound strategy for business success – except, of course, when it isn’t. Anyone looking for proof of how disastrous this can be should look to Mattel’s HyperScan, which aimed to hook tweens with its combination of videogames and trading cards. Each HyperScan game has associated Intellicards that could be purchased in randomised booster packs, which the console recognises using the same RFID (radio-frequency identification) technology later employed by Skylanders and Nintendo’s Amiibos. Once scanned, cards can grant players extra characters, power-ups and more. Despite hosting popular properties such as X-Men, Ben 10 and Marvel Heroes, the HyperScan flopped hard. The hardware…

We’ve mentioned several mobile games Mike’s worked on across these pages, either as a designer, programmer or tester, but his credits in that field stretch on a long way. Here’s a look at some of the titles he worked on at IOMO. From 2002, Scooby Doo! In Jeepers Creepers! casts the player as three different members of the gang: Shaggy, Velma and Scooby himself. Solving all the required clues in a level naturally allows you to unmask the villain at the end – and yes, they’d have gotten away with it if it wasn’t for you pesky, um, mobile players. 2003’s 007 Hover Chase was published by Vodaphone and finds James Bond participating in action-packed races played from a top-down perspective. It’s based on the pre-title hovercraft sequence from Die…

CRATER SONG <INFO FORMAT: NES CREDITS: JOHN VANDERHOEF (DEVELOPER), JORDAN DAVIS (MUSIC, SOUND FX) PRICE: $9.99 DIGITAL DOWNLOAD / PHYSICAL TBC WEB: BIT.LY/CRATERSONG-NES /> <BODY> The latest game set in John Vanderhoef’s Orebody universe won the Best Narrative Award in the Byte Off IV competition for NESMaker games (see RG262). Twins Arco and Minuette are born to the Melodic Tribe but are banished for being cursed, leading them to seek out the meteor at the heart of an ancient crater. The game’s unusual control method sees the player using two joypads held vertically (like Wiimotes) to control the twins simultaneously. In the Space Harrier-inspired levels, they must dodge enemies and ‘sing’ to remove obstacles. In the puzzle sections, they must avoid contact with enemies and sing while standing on the…

What’s your favourite Sonic The Hedgehog character? Antony Longmore Knuckles, because as a kid I always enjoyed rooting for the villain. He later became good and I loved playing as him in Sonic 2. It made the game more difficult Jake Sonic, Sonic. Stuart Gipp Rouge The Bat, because of her big sexy bat boobies. Please don’t put this in the magazine. Brian H Dr Robotnik… he keeps Sonic in a job 100%. Ravseig – Joao P Shadow. I was 14 when Sonic Adventure 2 came out, after some childhood years with the Mega Drive and Saturn titles. The taciturn hedgehog edgelord character resonated with early teen me, aided by impeccable character design. This has stuck with me ever since. The Poppies Metal Sonic, because he’s able to copy Sonic’s…

» XBOX » 2004 » STARBREEZE STUDIOS/TIGON STUDIOS When I started working on games™, one of the first big press trips I went on was to Stockholm. If memory recalls, the game I was going out there to write a preview about was Starbreeze’s Knights Of The Temple: Infernal Crusade. However, there was also an opportunity to talk about Starbreeze’s impressive motioncapture studio and I was particularly excited about it because one of the people working there had apparently been involved with The Matrix. After being impressed by the sheer number of bicycles that seemed to outnumber the city’s cars, I was equally bowled over by the motioncapture studio. Everything felt so professional and film-like and a world away from the previous jobs I used to do. I was in…

If you’ve spent any time looking into modding retro consoles in recent years, you’ll undoubtedly have come across Voultar. As well as providing instructional videos and streams, Voultar designs custom mod kits which are sold via voultar.com, and you can follow his work via @Voultar on Twitter and YouTube. We caught up with him to find out about his modding journey so far, as well as the brand-new SNES Edge-Enhancer video mod. How did you first get into console modding? Back in 1999, I often hung around a mom and pop video rental store. The store had a back room where they would ‘chip’ PlayStation systems for customers. The smell of solder and flux permeated the store in the after hours and I loved it. Modding of any sort was…

It’s no secret that major birthdays can bring about a mild feeling of crisis – many of us will have spent some time reflecting on what we’ve done with our lives, and the things we wished we’d done. It turns out that videogame characters aren’t immune from this either, and you only need to look at Sonic to see that. Sonic’s tenth anniversary in 2001 was a time of great uncertainty for Sega, and while Sonic Adventure 2 was a good game to celebrate the occasion, it served as a swan song for both the Dreamcast and the company’s time in the console market. Five years later, Sonic The Hedgehog (commonly known as Sonic 06) arrived on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 and received a notably negative critical reception, marred…

METAL SONIC ■ Calling back to Stardust Speedway in Sonic CD, this encounter pits Sonic against his automated antagonist in a running battle. Metal Sonic will try to charge at Classic Sonic from behind, blast him with electricity and crush him with scenery, and is vulnerable when visibly exhausted. SILVER THE HEDGEHOG ■ This telekinetic terror races through Crisis City, flinging cars and other debris at Sonic. When he levitates multiple objects, they create a path that allows you to use the homing attack to strike him. For the final phase, lateral movement will evade his attack and create an opening. SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG ■ This is a reprise of the outer space race from Sonic Adventure 2. Stay ahead of Shadow to grab the glowing orbs that float around…

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Thanks to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Conan films, barbarians were hot property in the mid-Eighties. By 1987, Tecmo had already released Rygar, and Palace Software was busy on its home-computer slash-’em-up, Barbarian. Clearly, loincloth-clad, hyper-muscular warriors were in fashion, and arcade fans soon had the ultimate slash-’em-up to sate their bloodlust. Taito’s Rastan has two different plots depending on which version you play. In the Japanese game, having obtained the consent of the Princess Of Ceim, Rastan is on a mission to bring back the severed head of a dragon. Should he succeed, all the treasures of the empire will be his. The rest of the world got a somewhat more bizarre tale: having admitted to surviving his younger days by thieving and murdering – yes, murdering – Rastan is now king…

AMSTRAD CPC ■ While graphically pleasing, some serious gameplay issues exist here as the Amstrad struggles to reproduce Rastan’s fast-paced action. Randomly spawning enemies don’t help, and the jerky scrolling and general turgidness make it a chore to play. It’s a shame the devs weren’t permitted 128K of memory… or more time. MASTER SYSTEM ■ Produced by Taito, this is a rather curious affair, spinning a fresh tale of destiny, cold steel and a kidnapped princess. This is a rather nice-looking game, although its sprites are quite small. The levels are abrupt, and while its star isn’t quite as mobile as in the arcade game, and there’s some slowdown, it’s still one of the best home ports of Rastan. APPLE NGS ■ Another great-looking game on this 16-bit computer, and…

What benefits did the Amstrad offer over its peers? The Amstrad had the ability to put any of the 16 colours from a palette of 27 in any pixel on the screen. There were also no attributes like on the Commodore 64 and Spectrum. Why were so many Amstrad ports of the time similar to their Spectrum counterparts? I guess the majority of Amstrad ports were similar to their Spectrum counterparts probably because they were written by the same person who did the Spectrum version. Also the sprite sizes and coding would be the same on the Spectrum, compared to taking the C64 art, so unfortunately for Amstrad users it makes for a faster port. For the likes of the games I had to port to Amstrad, the artist did…

If you’re going to go all out, you might as well do it right. So it was only logical that Rainbow Arts should advertise its X-Out as “the ultimate shoot-’em-up”. In retrospect, this may have been a bit of an exaggeration, but there is no doubt that the game, which was essentially developed by just five people, got a lot of things right: smooth left-to-right horizontal scrolling, a multitude of powerful weapons, a rechargeable super shot, plenty of enemies and impressive boss battles. The game also surprised with a very unusual scenario – for a change, the invading aliens were fought not in space, but underwater. According to the game’s manual, this invasion took place in 2019, which was a long way off in 1990, the year the game was…

THE TRILOBITE ■ This is the starter model in X-Out: it’s not much of a looker, and only has room for two extras and two satellites, but it also only costs 3,000 credits. This is more than enough for the first few levels, but after that you should only keep it in your hangar as a last resort. Though if you’re up for a challenge, try to down a few bosses with it. THE STINGRAY ■ The Stingray isn’t going to win any beauty prizes either, but it can do some serious damage. You can attach up to five extras and three satellites, which is enough for most standard situations. At 4,000 credits each, this is a very solid recommendation. However there are better ships available if you’ve got the…

» SNES » 1992 » BEAM SOFTWARE Sometimes, the right joystick in your hand can make a huge amount of difference to how much you enjoy the game you’re playing. That’s never been more true than playing Super Smash TV on the SNES. Eugene Jarvis’ arcade classic is a twin-stick shooter like his earlier game Robotron: 2084 and it’s no less chaotic and fun to play. As was often the case at the time, Smash TV’s popularity in arcades meant it was converted to every home system you could imagine, from the C64 and the Spectrum to the Mega Drive and Amiga, and they were all largely pants to play. The reason? It was incredibly hard to emulate that twin-stick setup in the home, especially as many console joypads were…

Play Tinhead today and you’ll still go away with one thing: a head pulsating with catchy earworm tunes. The work of videogame musician Paul Tonge, commissioning Tinhead’s soundtrack was almost an afterthought during the development process, “We were a fair bit into development before we starting thinking about sound,” says the game’s producer Stuart Whyte, but there’s no doubt Paul did an amazing job. He had been approached after Alistair Brimble, David Whittaker, Tony Williams and MicroProse’s own internal team turned the job down. “They were all too busy or unable to support the Mega Drive,” Stuart says. Richard Lemarchand, the game’s designer, recalls being nervous about working with Paul. “I’d never specced out music for a game before and Paul was already a legend in game music,” he says.…

The impressive sights and sounds of Riven arrived on the Sony PlayStation and the Sega Saturn just a few months after the initial PC and Mac launch. Japanese studio Sunsoft developed both console versions. In Europe, Sega published the Saturn game and Acclaim published the PlayStation release, while in Japan, Enix published both conversions. A magazine advert for the PlayStation conversion proudly promoted the size of the game with the strapline of “5 discs deep. A universe wide”. This was accompanied by imagery showing off the rather chunky jewel case. Sunsoft managed to whittle the disc count down to four for the Saturn version, for which they also achieved brighter graphics. Both versions are solid enough, but they do suffer slightly longer load times than many PC and Mac owners…

» PLATFORM: Xbox » YEAR: 2003 » COST: £24.99 (launch), £40+ (today, boxed), £15+ (today, unboxed) As a prolific manufacturer of third-party console accessories, Joytech had made a lightgun or two prior to its foray into the Xbox gun scene, and the Sharp Shooter brand had previously been established for guns on other platforms. The branding wasn’t the only thing that was recycled, though – the body of the gun itself is exceptionally similar to the PlayStation and PS2-compatible Sharp Shooter of the era, from the handgun shape to the red-dot sight that can be attached. The Sharp Shooter was a rather curious item upon its release. XBM noted that “the accuracy of the gun is top-notch” despite “feeling slightly cheap” but the bigger problem was the lack of software…

After Vicky Arnold, the first female writer for Lara Croft, had left, Gavin Rummery was left to write the game’s script. “One day we were told to arrange voice recordings – but at that point we had no script! I assumed we’d get the services of Vicky, but that wasn’t to be, so I wrote all the story and dialogue over two weeks as best as I could!” Gavin reveals. “Originally the main enemy was meant to be Dr Molenski, but I switched it to being his daughter, then the idea that she was related to one of your party members and that was the reason they were being lured into the depths. It was the best I could come up with and it’s the only script I’ve ever written…

The CYGNI team name checks all manner of games and other sources when discussing CYGNI’s influences. Taito’s 1994 arcade wonder RayForce might come as no surprise, as like CYGNI, it has depth of setting at its heart, with ground and air enemies. Gradius gets a shout-out too, thanks to its mesmerising atmosphere and on-the-fly ship upgrade system. The movie Starship Troopers held a great sway as well, providing an inspiration for the insectoid enemies and ferocious battles. But – considering CYGNI’s extension of the Euroshmup tradition – the most distinct games that the KeelWorks team point to are two examples of that form; albeit ones from US developers. Eclipse Software initially released Tyrian as a shareware demo in 1995, before subsequent versions followed. To this day, it has a reputation…

Raised on BBC Micros, other home computers and Eighties arcade cabs, Mike Tucker’s obsession with videogames flourished at an early age. His love of the medium developed into a desire to make his own games, but an abandoned text adventure project and unsatisfying computer science course left him disillusioned. He left college and went into game testing instead. He landed a position at Sales Curve Interactive (staff featured below), where his most notable project was Carmageddon, and years later caught the crest of a mobile gaming wave. When that bubble burst, he grabbed the opportunity to make his own stuff, ultimately leading to Bitmap Bureau’s retro-styled successes. What was your first experience with a videogame, Mike? The first thing was a Grandstand Scramble desktop game, when I was six, which…

Bitmap Bureau’s best-known game to date is undeniably the Smash TV and Aliens-inspired Xeno Crisis, a top-down twin-stick-styled shooter developed for the Mega Drive and released in October 2019. Available on cartridge, packed inside an authentic-looking case, it was an instant hit with collectors of Sega’s 16-bit system. But smartly, Bitmap Bureau didn’t limit its astoundingly tough-to-beat baby to the old-school console, as it was released for PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch around the same time. Arguably, these were better ways to play the game, given the dual-stick set-up of their controllers – but no doubt Sega purists will argue otherwise. After these 2019 releases came Evercade, Dreamcast and Vita in 2020, Neo Geo and Neo Geo CD in 2021, Nintendo 64 and GameCube in 2023, and…

» System: PC (version tested), Switch » Buy it for: £5.99 » Buy it from: Online The developer of Donut Dodo is back with another early Eighties arcade-style platformer, with your job being to collect all the cash in short, scrolling platform stages that feature obstacles such as loops, spikes, slides and more. The more you can collect in a short time, the higher your score multiplier will rise, and you can push it further by collecting diamonds. Just like Donut Dodo, it looks and sounds authentic, but adding scrolling and vertical stage wrapping ramps up the difficulty – it’ll take some time to nail down preferred routes through stages. It’s a good game, but one for the dedicated. >> Score 80%…

<Amiga: Roguecraft, which earned a Sizzler award in RG261, is now available digitally. Head on over to bit.ly/roguecraft-amiga /> <Amstrad GX4000: Inspired by the UFO Robot Grendizer manga, Goldorak is a great vertically scrolling shmup. You can download it by visiting bit.ly/goldorak-gx4000 /> <Atari STE: Junosix updated the classic coverdisk game Droid (above) with a Special Edition, which is also available for Amiga. Name you price and get it from bit.ly/droid-ste /> <Game Boy Color: The beautiful Excelsior: A Puzzle Exploration Game from Polyducks launched a demo before its Kickstarter campaign. You’ll find it at bit.ly/excelsior-gbc /> <NES: The Storied Sword (previewed in RG247, reviewed in RG259) is now available as a physical cartridge. Visit bit.ly/storied-nes /> <Various: In a very original concept by Snauts, Grazers sees the player protecting or hunting…

For Brandi Ahmer, AKA Gamer Ahmer, her love of videogame collecting started after experiencing a certain plumber for the first time. “I fell in love with gaming in the Nineties” Brandi recalls, “I remember first visiting my cousin’s house and seeing everyone take turns playing the NES. I was fascinated with Super Mario Bros and patiently watched and waited until I got my chance to play. My parents eventually got me a Nintendo 64 for Christmas and I was hooked on gaming!” It was after finishing her education that the collecting bug took hold. “I started collecting retro games when I graduated college and began my career. I remember stumbling into a videogame booth at a flea market and the memories came flooding back. I wanted to replay and collect…