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Building your very own nuclear bomb on the kitchen table has long been a subject of popular appeal among engineering students. While other university goers spend their time getting drunk, they work to get on the cover of a technical mag with the completed bomb. One such elderly loon has come to the attention of a terrorist gang which has kidnapped both him and his shapely daughter. Their kidnapping is video recorded by a surveillance system and shown to our publicity conscious hero. A few weeks have passed and the bomb has been built. Impossible demands have been made and an one hour deadline set before the bomb is detonated...

His first clue is a tip-off that the terrorists have a connection with a deserted docklands warehouse complex. As it turns out, the place is crawling with terrorists, and the mercenary hero has just his fists and a knife with which to defend himself. Energy is shown by a green strip wrapped around a digital watch showing how much remains of the one hour countdown. Realistically enough, the mercenary has just one life: lose that and it's all over. But there is a bullet-proof vest to be found, which greatly improves his resistance to damage.

If you hit a terrorist his trousers begin to flash (honest!) showing his rapidly diminishing energy. Knock him down and he detonates a suicide device, neatly removing his body from the scene. The first terrorists are thankfully unarmed, but later ones are weighed down with plenty of hardware. So getting an Uzi machine pistol or AK-47, plus ammo, is very important. Fortunately, each time you enter a location the hidden objects briefly flash.

As items are collected they appear on a roll of film at the bottom of the screen. This is important for recording vital evidence. Periodically, policemen will appear and arrest the mercenary - if he doesn't have enough evidence to prove his good intentions, he's thrown in jail!

Once the mercenary has all the evidence he thinks he needs from the docklands, he can move onto the second location via a Ferrari F40. Obviously, he needs to find the ignition keys, but the car's also outfitted with machine guns and surface-to-air missiles. A special key card is required to activate this 007-type equipment.

Once out onto the open road the fastest route to the next location must be followed, but there's plenty of turnings to get lost down. If a map has been collected, arrows appear on screen to show the way. For super speed there's a nitrous oxide button, but if overused it'll bum out. To make things harder, there are enemy cars and helicopter gunships to contend with.

The next location is a disused army barracks, complete with mothballed tanks. The terrorists all seem to have guns here, and one man in a dug-out can only be taken out with a grenade. Complete this level and it's back to the car for a race against time to the airport where the daughter is being held aboard a boobytrapped airliner.

After another car section is city park. The professor is hidden here, guarded by plenty of terrorists.

Vendetta as a package is typical of the System 3 all-out approach to producing games on the 64 - high standards all the way through with Dokk and Tony Hager coming up with some highly authentic graphics. The attention to detail is outstanding: the subtle use of colours creates a very moody, downbeat atmosphere and the video playback is the best game introduction I've yet seen in a game (wonderful Matt Gray music!).

And if the Ninja-style action wasn't enough, there's the amazing driving sequence with a smooth scrolling road and combat: what a brilliant way to link the levels together! If you thought the Ninja games were great, Vendetta will blow your mind!

System 3 have done it again, with a superb updating of the Last Ninja gameplay and a good racing combat sub-game as well. The superb video perfectly sets the scene for the arcade action to follow. The ability to gun down opponents, rather than having to bruise your knuckles, makes gameplay a lot more fun. The little windows which open to show what object you've found are excellent, as are the backgrounds, although the last one is a bit too Ninja-ish. All this would be great if that was all there was to the game, but there's more: namely the superb racing section. Not only is there a top-notch road effect - there's combat as well. Quite simply, an amazing product.

This one is right up my alley with its superbly crafted modern setting and at last some *real* weapons to use (swords and nunchukas can get sooo boring after a while). The name of the game is violence and Vendetta excells at that. With a knife to hand, the hero gives as good as he gets, but when he's got the Kalashnikov or the Uzi things go well over the top: it's great! The build-up of graphics is still very much a part of the Last Ninja type of game but it's rapid and the end result is well worth the (momentary) wait. If any criticism could be levelled at the game it could be that there's only four levels, but on top of this you have a race game that compares extremely well with Turbo Out Run and Power Drift (why wasn't Chase HQ done like this??). Stan Schembri certainly earned his money with this one!

Work has only just started on 16-bit versions.

Presentation 91%
Superb video intro and inter-level screens, but multi-load a bit of a pain.

Graphics 94%
Finely detailed isometric graphics, great windows, and a very impressive road effect. Beautiful F40!

Sound 89%
Excellent, highly atmospheric intro tune and good sound FX.

Hookability 91%
Combat is hard, but that only makes it that much more urgent to get the AK-47! Addiction is further increased by the urge to find the F40.

Lastability 94%
Just one life for four ten-screen locations and four driving sections makes a very tough, but highly rewarding challenge.

Overall 93%
A superb combination of two perfectly integrated game types.