Maze Games #15

Druid (1986)
By: Electralyte Software / Firebird Genre: Maze Players: 1-2 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Atari 8-bit First Day Score: Acolyte
Also Available For: Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum, MSX2, Tatung Einstein, Famicom Disk System

Like many games of its time, Druid was released on a wide variety of systems including the Speccy, my old favourite of the time. Instead of looking at that version for this here review, however, and even ignoring an excuse to do another review on my newest favourite system, the MSX2, I decided to take a look at what was, to my knowledge, the original version, and on a system I've never played a single game on before. Well, I say 'system' but it's actually a number of systems that fall under the 'Atari 8-bit' umbrella, but more on that another time. For now, let's concentrate on the splendidly-named game in question which recently returned to my brain after many moons away. I don't think I even heard about it in its day, in fact, and few details have reached my ears since, so I was quite excited to recently learn that it's apparently like Gauntlet.

Currently Playing...

Gauntlet by US Gold / Atari (1990) - Master System

I've been a fan of Gauntlet for many moons now. I first discovered it on my trusty Speccy thanks to... I can't remember what, actually. I thought it was the 'Giants' compilation but a check reveals that it only contains the second game. Oh well, I had it on my Speccy somehow anyway, and then, a little later, I was lucky enough to find the ultra awesome arcade version with simultaneous four-player support. All I needed was three friends and I was off (chortle!). A little later still and it made an appearance on my beloved Master System and I vowed to buy it henceforth.

Buying console games wasn't that easy at that time, however, as I was still at school, and by the time I could buy games for myself, Gauntlet IV had been released for the Mega Drive which was a conversion of the first game as well a new adventurey thing too. No matter how good the MS conversion might be, the MD one would be better, surely? That was my reasoning at the time, and it was very wise reasoning for it was indeed a very excellent version of the game, but as these many years of men have passed, and much that once was has been lost, my yearning for Gauntlet MS-stylee has remained undimmed by the passage of time. And now, I'm happy to say it finally graces my MS collection!

Indie Nuggets #6

Clam Knight (2020)
By: Hector Toro & Bibiki Genre: Maze Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: PC First Day Score: 1,052
Also Available For: Nothing

It must be two years or more since I regularly nosed around Facebook (or indeed any other social media), but shortly before my self-imposed exile, one of the many retro pages I follow mentioned this game which caught my eye due to its appealing graphics. It's was made in just 11 days by Héctor Toro (with audio assistance from Bibiki) for the 2020 Summer Game Jam tournament and, though made only for PC, is modelled on the games for Sega's wonderful Master System. It has a backstory from that era too. It's set in a place called Summerland where tales are told of the legend of the Clam Knights who held the forces of the Crabbers at bay for centuries, but were finally defeated. Since then the pesky crustaceans have held Bikini Beach’s castle, but a young clam named Marvin has stepped forward, determined to become a Clam Knight and rid the castle of their filth. Who will help him with this brave, perhaps foolhardy quest?

Lynx Games #2

Gauntlet: The Third Encounter (1990)
By: Atari Genre: Maze / Run 'n' Gun Players: 1-4 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Atari Lynx First Day Score: 44,816
Also Available For: Nothing

When I was younger I loved the two Gauntlet games. I had them on a compilation (I forget which now) for my Speccy, and my local arcade had the full-on four-player version of the first game there for years, so I had lots of opportunities to do my Gauntleting. They were very high-profile games too, but it wasn't until years later I realised... where the hell was Gauntlet 3? Well, as it turned out, there were two different takes on a third game in the series and neither was anywhere near as high-profile as the first two. One was made by Software Creations for the 8 & 16-bit home micros and was not very Gauntlet-ish. The other was developed by Epyx and released only on the handheld console they developed - the Lynx. Would it prove to be any more Gauntlety than the weird home micro offering? Yes it would, as it turns out, but it's still far from a typical Gauntlet game.

Bomberman Series - Part 15

Super Bomberman 2 (1994)
By: Hudson Soft  Genre: Maze  Players: 1-4  Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES  First Day Score: 38,500
Also Available For: Nothing

I was a big fan of Bomberman right from the first game of his that I played, namely Super Bomberman for the SNES, so it was a significant surprise when I found out years later that there ended up being four more games in the series! The fourth and fifth games were only released in Japan so I kind of have an excuse there, but the second and third ones? How did I not hear about them? I blame the pesky magazines of the day which must have failed to cover them. Yes, that must be it. Hmm, anyway, this of course means I've never played this particular Bomberman game before, nor any later games in the SNES/SFC series, which makes them among the few games in the traditional style I've not played. Happily, things looked very familiar from the moment I started it. There is of course a silly backstory to facilitate the action, this time involving the 'Five Dastardly Bombers' who apparently want to take over the universe - an ambition that has prompted them to take over five worlds.

ColecoVision Games #1

Venture (1982)
By: Exidy Genre: Maze / Shooting Players: 1
Difficulty: Easy-Medium First Day Score: 173,800
Featured Version: ColecoVision
Also Available For: Arcade, VCS, Intellivision

I had intended to restrict all of my ColecoVision coverage here to 'Round Up' posts since the games in question are usually very simple and also invariably available on other systems too, but I was recently reminded of Venture while looking at t-shirts on the Redbubble website of all places. A short while playing it later and I decided that not only should I burble about it here but that it should even receive a proper review (not that I've gotten around to many Round Ups so far anyway!). Like many games of its day it first appeared in arcade form but the Coleco was the first system to see a home version, and it was apparently a launch title for the leathery company's spiffing new console too (voontle). I was too young to be among those first few lucky owners myself, but if I had been I suspect Venture would've taken up a lot of my time. Well, that's assuming my parents were kind enough to buy me the console and game, obviously. It was one of the more reasonably-priced consoles though!

Random Game I've Never Heard Of #14

Guzzler (1983)
By: Tehkan Genre: Maze Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: Arcade First Day Score: 27,350 (one credit)
Also Available For: SG-1000

I was actually playing a pretty awful old shmup with a view to entering a score in a retro league when I noticed the name of this game just above it. I hadn't heard of it but I thought I'd give it a quick go anyway. Given its name, I expected it to be a blatant Pac-Man clone or perhaps even some some of binge-eating game, like a food version of Tapper, but it was not. While it is indeed a maze game, it's not like the one starring that flappy-jawed yellow gobbler at all. Each stage is a single screen in size and feature mazey-like layouts, but the similarities are not extensive besides that. It even took me a few minutes to work out what was going on when I first tried it. I guess that shouldn't be too surprising!

Bomberman Series - Part 14

Bomberman World (1992)
By: Irem Corp Genre: Maze Players: 1-4 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Arcade First Day Score: 158,900 (one credit)
Also Available For: Nothing

For our next visit to Bomberland we return to the arcades - a place our explodey friends have visited surprisingly few times over the course of their careers, and only once prior to this release. Like the previous effort, Bomberman World is again brought to us by Irem and should prove very familiar to fans of the first game. It's actually little more than an update, although I guess you could say that about several games in the long series. The backstory sees the return of the heinous King Bomber and, after briefly trying to reform himself, he has 'reverted to his evil ways' and deployed robot armies across the world. These idiotic clankers have now taken control of the UN building so the Bomberman Brothers (who apparently number four now - White, Red, Yellow and Blue - as the game is four-player) begin their 'ultimate battle to save the world from an evil takeover'. That's jolly decent of the pyromaniacal imps.

Puzzle Games #21

Binary Land (1985)
By: Hudson Soft Genre: Puzzle / Maze Players: 1Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo NES First Day Score: 153,400
Also Available For: MSX, Fujitsu FM-7, NEC PC-6001, NEC PC-8801

I don't get game-related gifts for Christmas that often but this year my wife bought me a cool little clone handheld thingy. It looks like a PSP but is actually filled with NES games along with an emulator, and the first one I've spent much time with is Binary Land, an early Hudson Soft puzzle/action game which tasks you with reuniting two penguin lovers. This is done over a series of single-screen stages, each formed from a grid of 15x10 blocks and viewed from overhead, in which both penguins - Gurin (male) and Malon (female) - are dropped in separate locations. Your job is to bring them together at their special meeting point - a heart at the top of each stage which grows cold and diseased in a harsh metal cage until their combined splendour liberates it. The twist is, in an unusual and initially-confusing move, you control both of the stumbling flappers simultaneously, with the movements of one mirroring those of the other!

Steam / GOG Downloads #2

Instant Dungeon! (2013)
By: Simple Interactive Genre: Maze / Puzzle Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: PC
Also Available For: Android, iOS

Like many of you I'm sure, I have amassed quite a large collection of games on Steam, Good Old Games, and similar services over the past few years, and also like many of you I suspect, I have yet to play most of them. It's about time I did though, and I figured that good old Red Parley gave me the perfect excuse as always. The first I have chosen is this, a cheapie purchase I saw on Steam which looked like one I might enjoy. This is mainly on account of it being an overhead-viewed maze game, a genre I generally find very appealing, and one that I was glad to find indie developers haven't forgotten about either.

Bomberman Series - Part 13

Bomberman '94 a.k.a. Mega Bomberman (1993)
By: Hudson Soft  Genre: Maze  Players: 1-5  Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: NEC PC Engine / TurboGrafx-16  First Day Score: 71,100
Also Available For: MegaDrive
Download For: Wii Virtual Console, PlayStation Network

This amazingly awesome series had taken a detour to SNES-ville since its last PCE instalment but it was probably still its last entry on NEC's wonderful box of tricks that was considered the best. It retained the same basic gameplay as the rest of the series but the visuals, audio, and stage design were all better than ever. So much so, in fact, that it was hard to see how the format could be improved any further. That didn't stop Hudson from making a swift return to their favourite system to try though. Expectations would be higher than ever but initial impressions were very positive. Having said that, the link-up mode present in '93 seems to be missing from the title screen here but the more important 'Normal' and 'Battle' games are present and correct, and it's also hard not to notice a green kangaroo-like creature present here as well, being ridden by an excited-looking White Bomberman. What in the blue blazes could that be? I shall henceforth find out.

Maze Games #14

Cloud Kingdoms (1991)
By: Millennium Genre: Maze Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: Commodore Amiga
Also Available For: Atari ST, PC, Commodore 64

Having somehow never previously heard of Cloud Kingdoms, it was some appealing box-art that first drew me to it. It features a rather odd but amusing green creature, largely spherical but for a sizable conk, holding a bottle or lemonade whilst surrounded by several similar but more hostile-looking creatures of differing colours, as well as a terrifying spider and bemused snail. As appealing as I found its cover, however, it didn't actually tell me much about the game itself. I resolved to find out and soon discovered that it's a floaty maze game set high above ground amongst the titular kingdoms which are both many and highly varied, and it's a game whose altitude plays a key part in proceedings too. More on that later though.

PC Round-Up #1 - Part 1

Anyone who considered themselves a gamer in the late 80's and 90's had heard of John Carmack. He, along with Jon Romero, was head programmer at id Software who became rather famous for their first-person shooters (just a couple of little games called Doom and Quake). Like all coders, however, he had to start somewhere. I've already taken a look at one of Mr. Romero's first games so now it's his fellow founder's turn, and while these aren't the very first games ever to be completed by Mr. Carmack, they were released in his early years as a coder and would go on to have much significance, for id Software and gaming generally.

Catacomb (1990)

First developed for the Apple II at the end of the 80's, the first game in the Catacomb series is a simple maze shooter. You're a magician called Petton Everhail who has been asked to rescue the Kieralon Empire by freeing their catacombs of the terrifying monsters that now dwell therein. There are ten mazey stages populated by numerous enemies. Petton can run at quite a pace and shoot fireballs without limit (including more powerful charge shots), but the enemies can run just as quickly so fast reactions are needed, especially since his energy meter is depleted rapidly and he only has one life. It's a short game, though pretty tough due to the fast and numerous enemies, but it shouldn't take long to get through it. It was still a pretty cool little game in its day, but early DOS games were never really the pinnacle of gaming and it hasn't aged well. It's certainly worth a quick play for its historical significance, specially for id Software fans, but nothing more than that... 4/10

Bomberman Series - Part 12

Super Bomberman (1993)
By: Hudson Soft  Genre: Maze  Players: 1-4  Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Nintendo SNES  First Day Score: 138,700
Also Available For: Nothing

Growing up as a gamer here in the UK came with a few benefits but it also had its drawbacks. The MSX and NES weren't popular here and we didn't even get the PC Engine at all, so the first time many of us were able to sample the delights offered by Bomberman and his fine games was with this release on the SNES. It was initially launched just a few months after Bomberman '93 which was quite comfortably the best game of the series up to that point, but could the introduction of a new format continue its gradual evolution? I guess we'll see about that later but one thing it did do was introduce a new bad guy in 'the evil Carat Diamond and his cohort, scientist Dr. Mook' who want to steal Bomberman's advanced combat capabilities for use in their special Robot Tournament. Black Bomberman has apparently reformed his character and attempts to stop the diabolical plan but is captured while doing so. Somehow he escapes and warns White Bomberman just as wave upon wave of enemy robots begin their advance toward Peace Town, the home of both antenna-wagglers.

Maze Games #13

Loaded a.k.a. Blood Factory (1996)
By: Gremlin Interactive / Interplay Genre: Maze / Run 'n' Gun Players: 1-2 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: Sony PlayStation
Also Available For: Saturn

As should be pretty clear from the title screen alone, Loaded is not a game for children. Though certainly not the first game to feature blood 'n' gore in a remotely realistic way, it was probably the first such game I played. It was therefore also the first game to make me question whether the inclusion of so much crimson content added enough to a game to make it worth restricting the number of people that could play it. We'll find that out soon I guess! It's set in the far future and features a space-faring mankind who have colonised many worlds in all corners of the galaxy. One such colony is the Raulf maximum security prison planet where six psychotic mercenaries are among the inmates. They have more reason than the many other inmates to feel aggrieved, however, as they have all been framed for the crimes of an evil space pirate known as F.U.B. who is now warden of the prison.

Puzzle Games #18

Be Ball a.k.a. Chew-Man-Fu (1990)
By: Hudson Soft Genre: Puzzle / Maze Players: 1-2 Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: NEC PC Engine / TurboGrafx-16 First Day Score: 232,810
Also Available For: Nothing
Download For: Wii Virtual Console

Puzzle games can often be among the stranger titles hosted by their respective systems and this PCE release by Hudson is definitely no exception. A brief perusal of the American instructions (Be Ball is the Japanese version) reveals that 'the people have been deprived of their favourite foods - fried rice and egg rolls - by the evil Chew Man Fu'. To what end? Your guess is as good as mine, but luckily 'two feisty twin sisters' named LaLa and LingLing have bravely stepped up to 'turn the tables on the wrong-doers'. Jolly good then! Of course, as you probably already guessed, this is done by... moving four coloured balls around. Obviously. Each stage, you see, features four different coloured balls and four plates of matching colours. Your job is simply to move each ball to the corresponding plate before moving to the next. This may not be as easy as it sounds, however, especially when you learn that there are supposedly a somewhat bewildering 550 stages to battle through.

Maze Games #12

Gauntlet 2 (1986)
By: Atari Genre: Maze / Run 'n' Gun Players: 1-4 Difficulty: Easy-Medium
Featured Version: Arcade First Day Score: 28,627 (starting with 2000 health)
Also Available For: NES, Game Boy, Amiga, Atari ST, Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC, ZX Spectrum

The immense success of Gauntlet pretty much guaranteed that a sequel would soon be on the way; the only question really was what direction Atari would take with it. It turned out they took the safer option - more of the same - but that's mighty welcome when the 'same' is as rip-snortingly spiffy as Gauntlet! There is again no back-story that I can determine so we are simply presented with a choice of the same four brave, fearsome, yet varied characters - Warrior, Valkyrie, Wizard, and Elf - and sent forth into a series of very mazey dungeons to vanquish as many terrifying foes as possible. Multiple players can choose the same character this time (duplicates are coloured differently) and there are again a hundred stages in total which appear in a random order from the sixth onwards, but for the most part they will just seem like more stages from the first game.

Gaming Memories - Part 15

Most of my posts in this series of features have relayed my many happy years with the console or computer in question but the previous one, a few months ago now, was a little different. It was regarding my tenure as a Game Boy owner which, sadly and for reasons I'm not really able to fathom, I owned only for a rather brief period. Looking back now I find it strange, then, that a decade or so later I decided to give Nintendo's by now-ultra successful handheld another chance.

By now the Game Boy was a bit old hat though, so I figured I'd instead go for the newer, fancier Game Boy Advance, and if I was going to do that I might as well get the very latest model which was at the time the 'SP'. In fact, if I'm honest, it was the recent news of some limited edition versions of the SP that really swayed me (as well as a very brief encounter with an old friend's GBA which I saw running a Street Fighter Alpha game rather impressively) and I duly sought out and purchased the one that most appealed to me - an 'NES Classics' model whose colour scheme was based on... the NES, believe it or not. As can plainly be seen in the picture here, it was certainly a great looking device, resembling an NES controller when open and an NES console itself when closed. This made it a lovely item for my collection but would I spend any more time using it than I did its predecessor?

Stealth Games #1

Castle Wolfenstein (1981)
By: Silas S. Warner / Muse Software Genre: Stealth / Maze Players: 1 Difficulty: Medium-Hard
Featured Version: Apple II
Also Available For: PC, Atari 8-bit, Commodore 64

Having quite recently experienced my first 'stealth' game in Splinter Cell, I figured it was a good time to look at what must be the first ever example of the genre, which also happens to be the beginning of a popular (and active) franchise. It was released all the way back in 1981 by Muse Software and its name is surely already known to gamers old and new alike, but I doubt too many know much about it. The setting is the titular castle during World War II and it's your job to infiltrate it, find the secret war plans within, and escape. Its flick-screen rooms are viewed from above and most of them contain Nazi guards of which there are two types, but unlike most games featuring such dangerous and malevolent enemies, it's not always necessary to kill them.

Bomberman Series - Part 11

Bomberman '93 (1992)
By: Hudson Soft  Genre: Maze  Players: 1-5  Difficulty: Medium
Featured Version: NEC PC Engine / TurboGrafx-16  First Day Score: 76,500
Also Available For: Nothing
Download For: Wii Virtual Console

It may have only been a couple of years but after numerous sequels and spin-offs the Bomberman series has finally returned to the place many gamers feel it belongs. That's right, the mighty PC Engine! This triumphant return brings with it the renewal of the epic battle between White Bomberman and the despicable Black Bomberman who this time, as relayed in the amusing intro sequence, has now attacked a city and stolen the seven circuit boards that power it, scattering them across several nearby planets. That fiend! Thanks to this heinous plot, Bomberman unsurprisingly has to battle across the seven unique worlds - Planet Quarry, Blossom Planet, Planet Inferno, Planet Wither, Planet Surf, Icicle Planet, and Planet Techo. Each hosts eight stages - seven normal ones followed by a boss stage, and to begin with they're mostly a single screen in size but quickly get bigger, scrolling either horizontally or vertically up to about three screen lengths (or widths).