Amstrad Action
1st August 1991
Quattro Firepower
There are four "arcadey" blasters and much mayhem for your money in this compilation of shoot-'em-ups...
3D Starfighter
Anyone remember Star Raiders on the Atari VCS? A truly ground-breaking game involving a flight into space and a great deal of xenophobic murder without much in the way of a real objective.
Strangely enough, this game follows in much the same mould. The action is dead simple; basically, kill everything you see until you achieve enough free space to reach light speed. You have a shield at your disposal, but it does have a limited power factor so use it sparingly.
The graphics are OK - the scrolling starfield is particularly nice. The sound is limited to bog-standard bleeps and zap noises. The gameplay is iffy. The docking sequence with your mothership adds variety, but otherwise it could quickly get dull.
MIG 29 Soviet Fighter
A sub-standard After Burner clone. A 3D shoot-'em-up with lots of enemy fighters to take out.
The landscape rushes under your plane at high speed and enemy aircraft head towards you at a similar pace. You are initially equipped with a formidable machine gun, but extra ammo and different weapons can be picked up along the way. These goodies come in the form of gently falling parachutes. One of the weapons is a bit dubious - a nuclear bomb which has just the effect you'd imagine...
The bad guys are basically stupid and will fly straight into your cannon fire at the slightest opportunity. The really tricky guys are the tanks. You can't shoot them, but they can shoot you.
The graphics are for the most part OK, but the poor sprite zoom on crashing should have been left out. The screen is too jerky and cluttered and the overall effect is confusing. Sound is as violent as the game and adds greatly to the fun. Unfortunately, there isn't much fun to begin with.
Operation Gunship
Now this is nice. An 8-way scrolling shoot-'em-up in the mould of Time Pilot or Thunderforce. Having said that, the game borrows a few features from gnarly old Broderbund title Choplifter.
The object of the game is to fly around a war-torn landscape, rescuing hostages as you go. Once you have eight hostages on board you can return to the landing sight and deliver them into the safe hands of the authorities.
A little cursor floats in front of your helicopter: this is an indication of where your bombs will land. Bullets are fine for wasting airborne goons, but ships and ground installations must be bombed.
The graphics are very colourful and detailed and the sound effects and music suit the game to a tee. All this tarty stuff would be ok in itself, but the game too is very impressive. Supremely playable, with lots to see and do.
Terra Cognita
This game is seriously ancient - one of the first vertical scrollers to appear on the 8-bit machines. It tries in some ways to mimic old arcade classics like Star Force and Slap Fight, but has a slightly more strategic touch to it.
The ship you control can move in any direction and fires a long, straight laser beam. Passing beneath you as you fly are various types of tile. Each tile has a different property. Some will destroy you on impact, while others may present bonus features or power-ups. The tiles you really want to avoid are time-warp tiles. These have the distressing habit of sending you back to the beginning of a stage.
The tiles form at times maze-like sections and it is possible to fly up a dead end. This is very annoying and it means that levels have to be mapped.
The graphics are fine and the scrolling smooth, but it doesn't hang together well. It was impressive in its time, but doesn't cut the mustard these days.
Verdict
A pretty rotten bunch. Operation Gunship is the only game worth getting excited about.
