Software Projects 1984
Genre: Action
Rating: 5/6
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
System: ZX Spectrum

Jet Set Willy was the follow-up to the very successful platform game Manic Miner and, like its predecessor, it was written by Matthew Smith, a very young programmer with a wild imagination, of whom great things were expected. That's not exactly the way it turned out, but more on that later.

Ocean 1995
Genre: Action
Rating: 4/6
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
System: PC

Again the free world needs you and your american technology. The Arabic madman's son joined forces with a South American druglord and you are sent to the jungle where his plans must be reduced to smoking ruins with your helpful Comanche, and a bunch of new vehicles.

Mastertronic 1986
Genre: Action
Rating: 3/6
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
System: Plus/4

The myth of the 'wild west' is full of hero figures, usually referred to as 'lone rangers'. All alone they fight all kind of evil (bankrobbers and of course Indians), always with a hand on their gun. That's the true American dream: riding through the prairies, spreading 'true justice'.

Art Department 1993
Genre: Sport, Action
Rating: 2/6
Language: Deutsch
Licence: Freeware
System: Amiga

Karamalz is a brand of Malzbier, so what we have here is a promotial game. Promotial games are mostly simple versions of classic arcade games or short Adventures. This one sticks out from the crowd by being a sports game. It's a surprisingly complex ice hockey simulation!

Data East 1985
Genre: Sport, Action
Rating: 3/6
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
System: C64

One of the biggest hits in the arcades of the mid-80s, converted to the C64. Most people will know the gameplay from International Karate these days (if at all), but Karate Champ was the game which started it all!

Anco Software 1990
Genre: Sport, Action
Rating: 2/6
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
System: PC

Fast, furious, involving - GREAT! That's Kick Off 2... on the Amiga. On the PC it's somewhat fast... and well... that's basically it. Everything that made this game the best football game on the Amiga was left out on the PC. On first sight it seems to be there, but then the handling is just not quite the same... The slight border was crossed and now you will just run past the ball if you're one pixel too far away, however you can count on knocking the ball away when you just wanted to run around it. You can pretty much forget about the kind of handling the Kick Off series introduced back in its Amiga days... it was perfected later on in the Sensible Soccer series - however pretty messed up here in its PC version. Also the AI is pretty stupid. On the one hand you have your own teammates madly kicking the ball back into the direction of your own goal as well as spinning around for no obvious reason. Fortunately the players in the computer's team do the same kind of stuff as well, so that makes up for it.

Hal Laboratory / Nintendo 1992
Genre: Action
Rating: 5/6
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
System: Game Boy

Kirby is a small bubble that can breath in air or small creatures and then blow it out at speeds that kill whatever is in its way. It can jump and fly, and it's got a mortal enemy it needs to dispose of. Welcome to Kirby's Dreamland, one of the easier platformers, which has become hugely popular with the not-so-adept-with-the-controls crowd. The game is fairly straight-forward: you proceed through four lands, each of which has its own architecture and monsters, and each of which has three stages. You fight a boss at the end of each stage, only to fight the main level boss at the end of each level. After finishing all stages, you fight the main bosses again, after which you meet the final boss. While clearing your way through the usual monsters requires nothing more than blowing air at them, most bosses throw things at you you've got to inhale and spit back at them. Yet, because you can fly and because you can always shoot, the game is much easier than, let's say, Mario platformers.

Richard Jordan 1999
Genre: Action, Adventure
Rating: 5/6
Language: English
Licence: Freeware
System: PC

Remaking a classic game is always a controversial, but also popular venture. There's always the question of the point, because why do a straight remake when there's the original (running on every imaginable device thanks to emulation). On the other hand, if a supposed remake strays too far from the source, the old fans complain as well. A difficult balancing act.

English Software 1986
Genre: Sport, Action
Rating: 3/6
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
System: C64

The Middle Ages: was it an age of chivalry and knights in shining armors? Or a dark age of oppression and plague? We'll maybe never know for sure. One thing is for sure though: people liked brawling back then - just like today! And that makes all the other questions completely useless and uninteresting!

Psygnosis 1994
Genre: Action
Rating: 0/6
Language: English
Licence: Commercial
System: PC

A whole bunch of unvoluntary humor! This game confirm several cliches at once.



1. A movie conversion

The game has nothing (really nothing) to do with the film. Some very short video excerpts are shown betweenthe levels but that's all. A few characters and settings from the film show up but they are futile.