Spectrum Round-Up #2

Budget games were great, a real lifeline for kids my age back in the mid-to-late-80s. I fondly recall my good friend Luke and I frequently visiting our local Blockbuster video store and browsing the rack of budget games they had for sale, but both there and featured heavily in the magazines that covered the 8-bit micros at the time were games bearing the name of Joe Blade, but for some reason I never played them. They are a trilogy of flick-screen arcade adventures - a type of game that appeals to me, and they were always near the top of the budget charts and were well received by most of the magazines too, so I really don't know why I never gave them a try. Time, then, for this pitiful blog to do its job once again. Behold:

Joe Blade (1987)

This first instalment sees Joe as a lone commando sent into an enemy fortress to rescue six hostages, then set a few bombs, and escape before they blow. Sounds like a cinch! There are guards patrolling most rooms though, and you have limited ammo for your machine gun. Luckily you can pick up more as well as keys, guards uniforms (temporary invincibility), and food to replenish Joe's health metre which depletes rapidly from contact with guards or other enemies. You will also find the aforementioned bombs here and there (there are six in total). Touching one brings up a mini-game where you have to put letters in the right order. If you do, you'll have 20 minutes to find the other bombs and arm them in a similar way before escaping. If you don't, the bomb will blow, killing you. It's a good idea to find the hostages before messing about with these! It's simple like most budget games, but the monochrome graphics are really nice (colours change now and then), there are tons of screens, it's good fun to play, and would be addictive enough anyway, but the placement of all the items (hostages, bombs, pick-ups) is randomised every time you play which makes it even more addictive, not to mention great value for money... 8/10