Portable Addiction: 07-Oct-92 #015
From: Michael Current (aa700@cleveland.Freenet.Edu)
Date: 11/08/92-08:54:19 PM Z
From: aa700@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Michael Current)
Subject: Portable Addiction: 07-Oct-92 #015
Date: Sun Nov 8 20:54:19 1992
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. . . . . + .+
+ . ## ### ## . +-----------------------------------------+
+ ## ### ## + PORTABLE ADDICTION ISSUE #15 OCTOBER 1992
. ## ### ## . +-----------------------------------------+
+ ## ### ## . Editor ......... Tjerk Heymens Visser
. ### ### ### + Co-Editor ........... Yiri Tjade Kohl
#### ### ####
+ ####### ### ####### InterNet: tjerk@nikhef.nl
##### ### ##### + shintaro@utopia.hacktic.nl
. . . Support: Burning Chrome BBS Holland
For Lynx and Super Nintendo + Phone:..... +31-20-6969263
. . + . Fido node:...... 2:280/462
Thankx to: Andre "ALU" Luyer, Stefan de Droog, Dominator,
Astro, Games 'R' Fun, Compendium, Bart Smit Toy Stores,
FunTronics, Patrick Roelandt, Camelot and all the others
made this issue of PA possible...
Disclaimer: None of the sent in material is checked on originality
by either the Editor or the Co-Editor of P.A. so we are
not responsable for any material that has been copied
from a copyrighted source. Thank you.
You are free to copy P.A. as long as no changes are made
to the contents. It is also allowed to use parts of P.A.
in other publications only if it is an exact copy of the
article used in P.A. and the author and issue number of
P.A. are mentioned.
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
And here's ye good ole "Crap Contentz"!!!! Yeah!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The Ed Sezzz ...................... Editorial crap by CoEd Shintaro Y
Hot News 'n' Gossip .................... [Latest news, all systems]
Universal Soldier ............................... [SuperNES Review] Y
Zelda III (*).................................... [SuperNES Review] Y
Notes from Duesseldorf ....................... [Atari Messe report] T
SuperNintendo Ratings ............................. [Rating report]
Atari Lynx Ratings ................................ [Rating report]
Rampart ............................................. [Lynx Review] T
Shadow of the Beast ................................. [Lynx Review] Y
Steel Talons ........................................ [Lynx Review] T
The Last Bit ....................... [All about the next ish of PA]
(*) = P.A. MegaGame
(T) = Written by Tjerk
(Y) = Written by Yiri
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
The Ed Sezzz ....
Ah, what a nice month this has been. I finally got some vacation myself as
I went sailing for a week. Just before my depart, I saw Shadow of the Beast
at the local FunTronics store, so I bought it to have something to do during
the nights. Read all about the graphical delights of that in the review in
this issue.
First, however, there are some MAJOR changes in this issue, which you will
probably have noticed already. The GameGear and GameBoy departments have
been scrapped, and the SuperNES has gotten a role in Portable Addiction. We
know that a SuperNES is not a portable, and we know that there's many people
around with GameBoys and GameGears, but we just didn't feel like doing those
two anymore. And since this newsletter has always been our hobby, we want
to keep it that way. If we'd continue doing 'Boy and 'Gear, our lack of in-
terrest would probably have a negative effect on the quality of the reviews.
We know that a lot of people won't like this change at all, but changes have
always got a good side and a bad side. The good side is that from now on,
everybody can read the latest news about the SNES here. And since we get our
games almost directly from Japan upon release, we think that we can offer a
reasonably up to date service.
Anyway, Portable Addiction will continue with the SNES and the Lynx, and of
course we might still change our name to something else (Total Addiction,
perhaps?). For now, enjoy!.....
Co-Ed Yiri "Shintaro" Kohl
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# + H o T N e W s 'N' G o S s I p + . #
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The CD-ROM Drive for the SuperNES will probably be released this christmas.
The package will be bundled with Super Mario 5 (probably to increase the
sales!).
Zelda IV has just been finished and it's Japanese release is imminent. The
game will be released in the west in about 4 months (we hope!).
Bart Smit, one of the biggest toy store chains in Holland, is planning
to stop selling Lynx games. But they have just closed a deal with Atari
Benelux to sell the Lynx Batpack. It contains: the Pouch, Batman Returns,
Lynx II, an Addapter and the Battery pack. It costs Hfl 299,- while the
Lynx II costs Hfl 249,- in all other shops. The Batpack will only be sold at
the Bart Smit toy stores.
Games 'R' Fun stopped selling Lynx games a few months ago, but they mainly
rely on their own import, that is not a big market for the Lynx. The
only shop with up to date stuff seems to be FunTronics. Even the Virgin's
MegaStore, which appeared to do the Lynx some good one month ago, doesn't
get any recent games. Figures show that the game ratio Lynx-GameBoy is 1:30
in Holland! Argh!
We were present at the Atari Messe in Dusseldorf. Read a full report later
in this issue.
At the Firato (a huge electronics event in Amsterdam) Atari showed of it's
Falcon030 again. Although I still don't like that thing at all, a lot of
other people seem to do. Nintendo had a small stand compared to last year,
where they had the biggest stand on the Firato ever. Lots of SNES games were
showed off, but most of them were still American versions. Nintendo still
doesn't make or sell adapters themselves, but who cares?
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+-----------------------------------------+
UNIVERSAL SOLDIER SNES REVIEW
+-----------------------------------------+
Two Vietnam veterans. Reincarnated as Cyborgs. One of them begins to re-
member. The other one declares war on the first. That seems the be the va-
gue storyline of the movie of the same name. Jean-Claude van Damme and Dolf
Lundgren are the two cyborgs in question. Universal Soldier, the SNES game,
is about the same movie (how coincidental!). Since the version I playtested
wasn't supplied with a manual, I can't quite figure out which one you must
control, but I bet it's good old Dolf!
Your soldier must negotiate a number of platform-style levels while collec-
ting power-ups and energy. By holding down the fire button you can also use
a shooter which you can rotate 360 degrees. Your standard shooter can be up
graded to full power lasers, triple shots or bouncers. You also have a limi-
ted supply of energy walls (two vertical bars screen height which move from
the player to the sides of the screen). Not only that, you can also change
shape and transform to a spiked ball and roll thru the levels killing every-
thing that's in your way! This adds up to a nice arsenal of destructive
equipment!
All this equipment is used for killing the many (and then I mean MANY) ene-
mies that you'll encounter. You'll need a quick finger to fire fast enough
to survive! Luckily, the previously mentioned power-ups are everywhere, so
it shouldn't be too much of a problem to power up your weapon to the max.
As there's plenty of hidden things in the game, such as extra lifes, you'll
always be exploring more of it. The game is quite big and this adds to the
lastability. Hidden blocks filled with power-ups are everywhere, but so are
hidden corridors which are only accessible if you turn yourself into a ball.
You'll be exploring for ages.
The graphics are very good, although no special use of the SNES's abilities
has been incorporated. The animation of the main character is excellent and
everything moves at a good pace (not that much slow-down). The backgrounds
could have done with a bit more color though, as I found them a bit on the
dull side. Collision detection is good, and although the main character has
the tendency to stand on one leg if you get close the edge of a platform the
background collisions are very well executed too. I guess most people will
like the backgrounds, but about why I don't like them, just read on....
Though normally I would place the graphics and sound criticism at the same
place, you first need to know an important thing about the game before I can
rate the sound. For those of you with an Amiga in the cupboard (NOT an Atari
ST as then you won't be able to know anything about it!) you will absolutely
remember Turrican and Turrican II. Well, the man that supplied the review-
copy of this game (at Games 'R' Fun) introduced it to me as Turrican III and
that's exactly what this is. Unfortunately the atmosphere of the original is
lost. This doesn't mean that it's a crap game, but it just means that this
is not the Turrican as I used to play it. The animation of the player is the
same, the enemy graphics are the same, the power-ups are the same, and only
the backgrounds are not the same. Turrican II used excellent copperbars on
the Amiga and gave the game a feeling like: Yeah man! I'm having fun and I
am losing all my lifes but I don't give a s**t since I'm having fun! It's
that feeling that's missing. You're having fun, but it's not the colorfull
fun it used to be. Of course all this doesn't count if you never played the
original, as the whole atmosphere of this game is very good. It's only very
different and that's the problem I'm having with it (but since I don't give
low ratings if I find something crap while I know that something IS actually
quite good, I didn't give the Feel a low rating....).
The music is very good and changes throughout the game. I don't think that
the music was done by Chris Huelsbeck (sorry if I misspelled your name bro!)
but it still contains many of the tunes heard in the previous Turricans. The
in-game sound effects are quite effective too, but I found them a bit flat.
(Yeah, call me a tedious bore, but I just tend to be very critical at types
of games of which already millions exist!!). The sound FX sound all a bit
threatening (which is good, as together with the graphics this recreates the
feeling of the movie a bit) and so is the music.
Turrican was one of the most playable games on the Amiga, but as always the
console world is used to better stuff. As a console game, Turrican's just a
bit stiff. The controls are the only thing I didn't quickly get the hang of
and I think that the controlmethod of a game is VERY important when it comes
to playability. Fortunately the game is so enjoying that this small glitch
is forgivable (once again it's more that I'm used to a bit different control
method than the one found in this game). If you like to blast a lot, walk a
lot, explore a lot and see a lot, Universal Soldier is for you. And, but you
already got that, if you already know Turrican, just don't expect too much
from it.
+- RATINGS --------------+
! Graphics ......... 8.0 !
! Music/Sound FX ... 8.0 !
! Feel ............. 7.0 !
! Playability ...... 8.0 !
! Addictiveness .... 7.0 !
! Lastability ...... 7.3 !
! Overall .......... 7.8 !
+------------------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+-----------------------------------------+
ZELDA III SNES REVIEW
+-----------------------------------------+
Once again princess Zelda has been kidnapped. This time some evil Prince of
Darkness took her with him to a place that isn't even in the same dimension
as the land of Hyrule! Of course it's up to our Link to, once again, rescue
the princess. Before Link can go to the Darkworld however, he must first
find three crystals with which he can retrieve a some sort of magical sword
which is stuck in a stone (Hmmm... sounds a bit like King Arthur eh?). Only
then he can enter Darkworld and begin his search for Zelda!
Zelda is an adventure game viewed from the top. The screen scrolls in eight
directions while Link remains in the middle of the screen. Hitting <START>
brings up the inventory screen, and <SELECT> enables you to save your posi-
tion (Battery Backup). The <X> button brings up the map presented slightly
tilted (using the 3D chip) which you can scroll around. Hitting <X> again
displays the entire map on-screen. The <Y> button uses the activated inven-
tory item, while <B> is used for attacks. <A> is a multi-functional button,
which let's you talk to others, pull things, swim faster, charge etc..etc..
Killed enemies sometimes leave goodies behind such as crystals, which can
later be used to buy stuff. Others leave small hearts, which pump up Link's
heartpower. At the beginning of the game, Link can only take 3 hits, but
this amount can be increased during the game. Not all creatures are enemies
though. Lot's of people or animals will help you by giving you equipment or
advice. All sorts of items can be found, but the most important one is the
mirror which enables you to travel between the two dimensions.
One of the greatest aspects of Zelda III is that you can totally interact
with the background. You can light torches, pick up bushes, blow up walls,
charge into trees, push things and the list goes on and on. This gives you
a feeling like "man, I can do anything in this game that I'd like to do!!!".
Some parts of the map seem inaccessable at first, but as the game progresses
you'll find objects which enable even more interaction like lifting ENORMOUS
rocks which lie in your way. There's just too much to sum up here.
The game is filled with puzzles, mazes, creatures, objects and hidden rooms
and everytime you play, you'll find something new. The way the game is set
up is very good and some of the puzzles are VERY ingenious. And when you get
stuck in a puzzle you can always go out and find new things before returning
to the puzzle in question. This makes for a game that keeps you busy for a
long time. The only problem being that one day... some day... you'll finish
it. But that's with all adventure games, and this one it bigger and better
than any other adventure I've seen!
The graphics are very good. The perspective doesn't always match, but with
these gametypes it's very difficult to draw an attractive background that is
still right. A good use of color has been made and special effects have been
used in a very nice way, e.g. to create mist in a forest and the like. The
most stunning thing in Zelda must be the rain and thunder at the beginning,
which really makes you feel that the weather is VERY bad. The sound is of a
very high standard, with superb music and an excellent use of sound FX. The
rain I mentioned before can still be heard when you're inside a house, but
you can clearly hear that that rain is OUTSIDE and not inside the house. The
game looks and sounds just perfect for a game like this!
The game is very addictive. You'll constantly have the urge to find out a
bit more or get a little further. Unless you really, truly hate this type of
game, you'll be hooked within minutes! This is the game that'll even have
you dreaming of possible solutions at night!
As I already told you, Zelda is big. Unfortunately, most puzzles are solved
for you, as characters in the game tell you exactly where to go, or what to
do. Although this doesn't mean that you've completed it within a week, this
makes the game more of a run-around-and-beat-em-up than an exploration game.
I've solved this problem in quite a simple way: I bought the Japanese ver-
sion. When you got no idea of what to do, or where to go, you'll just HAVE
to explore! And this is what I like doing most: exploring and finding sa-
tisfaction when I've figured out what to do by myself. The game isn't im-
possible at all when you're playing the Japanese version. It's just a hell
of a lot harder, which is VERY good for the lastability. When you get stuck
there's always SOMEONE nearby that knows the solution.
The conclusion is simple. Zelda is THE best game of it's type EVER, and a
must for every SNES'er out there. If you really like a challenge, get your-
self the Jap version. This only effects the lastability, but I think that
that's one of the most important ratings of all, since it also indicates the
value for money....
+- RATINGS --------------+
! Graphics ......... 8.5 !
! Music/Sound FX ... 9.1 !
! Feel ............. 8.5 !
! Playability ...... 9.0 !
! Addictiveness .... 9.5 !
! Lastability ...... 9.7 !
! Overall .......... 9.5 !
+------------------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
Notes from the Atari Messe in Duesseldorf 21, 22 and 23 August 1992.
I was present at the Atari Messe this year as representative of the
International Lynx Club Holland. A lot of space was reserved for the
Falcon030 of course, but still we had 300 square meters to show the Lynx.
While everybody was drooling over the Falcon, we locked our eyes on
eproms we got to see.
Here is a report on all the eproms we saw, and we had a little chat with
John Skruch. He worked on games like Checkered Flag, Rampart, and Batman
Returns.
Telegames did not have a stand there, but there were some people from
Telegames there. That's how we got to see those Eproms.
The following Eproms were present at the Messe:
Steel Talons ............... (see review in this issue)
Pinball Jam
World Class Soccer
Shadow of the Beast ........ (see review in this issue)
Kung Food ........................ (released in the US)
Basketbrawl ....... (Did not work, released in the US
but was not yet in Europe at the
time of the messe)
And Telegames showed us these cartridges:
Storms over Doria
Off Road
Double Dragon
Pinball Jam:
I like Pinballs, so I was looking forward to this. The intro
looked nice, and the digitized voices sounded great. But when the actual
game began it was a big disappointment. There were too many clashing colors.
it was just too busy... And I was just waiting for 1 minute for the ball
to come down, it just kept bouncing. On the Lynx it didn't give me any
thrills. Keep away from this game......
World Class Soccer:
Soccer is the most popular sport in Europe, so it is natural that every
system has various soccer games. This may be the first one for the Lynx,
but it is also has really bad scrolling. It really gave me an headache
after a while.
In this game you can choose the a country you want to play with, and your
opponent (another country). All country's in the world are available.
The feel is good actually, but you just can't look at it for longer than
10 minutes.
If you want a soccer game for the Lynx I'd advice you to wait for one of
the other soccer games for the Lynx. If you want a sports game Hockey is
not bad at all.
(Short note from Shintaro here: I believe that it's Manchester LTD that's
coming soon. That will probably be one of the best footy games around.
Oh, and another note about the fact of all countries being available.....
too bad that the players are ALWAYS white, even when you select a country
like South-Africa!)
Storms Over Doria:
This game looks really great! Good graphics, and it uses menu's. This
game is really big. It's worth a shot if you like RPG's.
Off Road:
This game was not finished yet. There were only tracks and the shop etc...
There were no cars yet. It looked quite good, but as there weren't any cars
yet I can't give you an idea of the playability.
It shows only a part of the track on screen.
Double Dragon:
I really hope that Telegames will export its games to Holland, because
Double Dragon has really great graphics. The sprites are BIG! They looked
cartoony to me. As a Beat 'em up it is better than Ninja Gaiden. There is
a good diversity of kicks and hits, and it is clearly visible what you do.
The first level is a bit too easy though, but the arcade original had the
same problem.
Saturday 22-08-1992
A guy from the International Lynx Club Germany showed a keyboard that he
had attatched to his Lynx. He said that he was able to read the Mickey
and Suzy registers. You could program the Lynx' RAM with it.
Thomas Huber (Verkaufsleiter Consumer Produkte Atari GmbH., I guess that
it is "Sales manager consumer products Atari Corp Germany" in english)
took a look at it, and later he brought an American with him. He later
turned out to be John Skruch.
He thought the keyboard (named Linkey II by us) was fun, but it would not
be usefull. He later saw Slime World at 28 MHz (That German guy designed
the 24 MHz stuff for the Lynx, later he tried 32 MHz, but that didn't quite
work, 28MHz is really the max). And he really liked it. He freaked when he
saw the joystick addapter the german made for the Lynx. It used a 2600
Joystick, but another joystick with 4 buttons could also be used, you then
you would also be able to use the Option 1 and 2 buttons on it.
I will try to get a description of the joystick addapter, I think a lot of
people on the net will like it. But it might take a while...
After all that John Skruch gave us some info on some Lynx games he worked
on.
Batman Returns: The first 30.000 cartridges have Catwoman with red hair.
Time Warner didn't like it. Catwoman does not have red hair in the movie,
and her hair doesn't show that early in the movie, so they had to remove
it. John Skruch said she now looked like a mouse with tits.
He expects those carts to become collector items.
There is a level select and invincibility cheat in Batman Returns. He only
said it involved the joypad...Start searching guy's!!!!
A 12 year old Japanese kid wrote him about the grey stripes in Blue
Lightning, the kid wondered what it was. Skruch wrote him that it was
Pilots heaven, and if you land there you would get a million points bonus.
So thats how they cover up bugs....:-) The kid believed him....He's probably
still trying to land there....
You all know the Pacland cheat code 330NE. But do you know what it
stands for? 330 N. Eisenhower Lane of course. The old Atari address
in Lombard Illinois.
He also told us that Slime World's level 6 has 4 exit's. Right off the
first exit is a fake wall. Shoot it, and you will find other caves.
John Skruch told us that these caves did not have monsters, and that it
would spell Option 1 Green on the computer map (as a hint to the Zit pop
game. But when I tried it (with invincibility cheat) it had monsters, it
did not spell Option 1 Green, and I found only 2 other exits.
Maybe one you guy's can get to this.
Checkered Flag had the weirdest bug he ever saw.
When 2 human players crossed the finish line at the same time in a
tournament the computer would put those players in 2nd and 3rd place. The
winner would be a ghost car, a white outlined car. In the next round the
ghost car would start on pole, but as none was driving it wouldn't move.
And all the other cars would be stuck behind it, they couldn't get around
it. This bug was removed before production.
Cancelled games, or did not ever exist:
Time Lord
Tower Toppler
Barbarian Bodyguard
Metal Arc
Geo Duell
Taxi
Lucky Stars
Zorro (was just added to our list by Atari Germany....)
Hyperdrome
720 Degrees will come in Feb. '93
Ultra Star Raiders is on hold.
European Tournament Soccer will come in June '93.
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
SUPER NINTENDO ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM AND SUPER FAMICOM
Title Rank Votes
1) NEW ENTRY !! Prince Of Persia 9.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Top Gear 9.0 1
3) Street Fighter 2 8.9 18
4) Zelda III 8.7 15
5) Super Mario World 8.2 64
6) Super Castlevania IV 8.1 36
7) Contra III 8.0 20
- NEW ENTRY !! Axelay 8.0 2
- NEW ENTRY !! Super Aleste 8.0 2
- NEW ENTRY !! S.P.A. Football 8.0 1
11) Final Fantasy II 7.9 29
- Super Smash T.V. 7.9 29
- Ranma 1/2 7.9 7
14) F-Zero 7.8 42
15) Lemmings 7.6 18
16) Sim City 7.5 16
- NEW ENTRY !! Joe & Mac 7.5 2
18) U.N. Squadron 7.3 29
- Hole-In-One Golf 7.3 6
20) Gradius III 7.2 13
- Legend Of The Mystical Ninja 7.2 12
21) Actraiser 7.1 38
22) Super Ghouls 'N Ghosts 7.0 40
- NEW ENTRY !! Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 4 7.0 2
- NEW ENTRY !! Addams Family, The 7.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Dino City 7.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Extra Innings 7.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Krusty's Super Funhouse 7.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! On The Ball 7.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Phalanx 7.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Raiden Trad 7.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Smartball 7.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Top Racer 7.0 1
33) Pilotwings 6.8 26
34) Super Tennis 6.7 12
35) Super Soccer 6.5 4
36) Super R-Type 6.4 14
37) Populous 6.3 21
38) Final Fight 6.2 25
- Super Off-Road 6.2 18
40) NEW ENTRY !! Golden Fighter 6.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Robocop 3 6.0 1
41) Lagoon 5.7 9
- Super E.D.F. 5.7 7
43) Darius Twin 5.3 18
John Madden Football 5.3 14
45) Waiahali Golf 5.0 2
- NEW ENTRY !! Battle Blaze 5.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Magic Sword 5.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Strike Gunner 5.0 1
49) Wanderers From Ys III 4.5 14
50) Super R.P.M. Racing 4.2 9
51) Ultraman 4.1 16
50) Paperboy 2 4.0 5
- NEW ENTRY !! Rocketeer 4.0 2
- NEW ENTRY !! Super Adventure Island 4.0 2
- NEW ENTRY !! P.G.A. Tour Golf 4.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Pebble Beach Golf 4.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Pro Soccer 4.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Rival Turf 4.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Space Football 4.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Wrestlemania 4.0 1
59) Drakkhen 3.8 14
60) Hyperzone 3.6 5
61) Laimbeer's Combat Basketball 3.3 7
62) D-Force 3.2 8
63) NEW ENTRY !! Pilotwings 2: Aces High 3.0 1
64) NEW ENTRY !! Nolan Ryan Baseball 2.0 1
- NEW ENTRY !! Super Battletank 2.0 1
65) Home Alone 1.4 5
66) Pit-Fighter 1.2 6
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
VIDEO GAME RATINGS REPORT : ATARI LYNX
Title Rank Votes
1) NEW ENTRY !! Steel Talons 10.0 1
2) Klax 8.5 60
- Checkered Flag 8.5 49
- Rampart 8.5 13
5) Robotron 2084 8.4 39
6) Chip's Challenge 8.3 54
7) Awesome Golf 8.2 20
8) Crystal Mines II 8.1 14
9) Warbirds 8.0 63
- S.T.U.N. Runner 8.0 45
- Super Skweek 8.0 5
12) Slime World 7.8 48
- Shanghai 7.8 22
14) Zarlor Mercenary 7.6 40
15) Blue Lightning 7.4 53
- Xenophobe 7.4 44
- Lynx Casino 7.4 7
18) A.P.B. 7.3 30
19) Roadblasters 6.9 37
- Scrapyard Dog 6.9 19
21) Rampage 6.8 31
- Hydra 6.8 4
23) Qix 6.6 18
24) Xybots 6.5 14
- Toki 6.5 8
26) Gates Of Zendocon 6.4 42
- Batman Returns 6.4 5
28) Blockout 6.3 23
- Rygar 6.3 19
30) Ninja Gaiden 6.2 23
- F.U.Chess Challenge 6.2 14
32) Electrocop 6.1 41
33) Ms. Pac-Man 6.0 23
- Hockey 6.0 6
- NEW ENTRY !! Kung Food 6.0 1
36) California Games 5.9 60
37) Bill & Ted's 5.8 19
- Viking Child 5.8 11
39) Gauntlet III 5.2 32
- Ishido 5.2 4
40) Paperboy 5.1 18
- Pac-Land 5.1 16
42) Hard Drivin' 4.0 10
43) Robo-Squash 3.9 16
44) Turbo Sub 3.9 13
45) Tournament Cyberball 3.6 14
46) Basketbrawl 3.0 1
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+-----------------------------------------+
RAMPART LYNX REVIEW
+-----------------------------------------+
Rampart is a good mix between action and strategy. You have to destroy
all ships, and you have to defend your teritory and build up your walls
strategicly.
The game consists of 3 parts. The most important parts are of course the
battle and build up parts, and in the third part you have to place your
cannons. This is not too important. These 3 parts make up one battle phase,
a level consists of a fixed number of battles, of course the number of
battles vary per level. To make things a bit more difficult there is a
time limit for each part of a phase.
The controlls are simple, but the crosshairs are difficult to control.
Normally they can't be moved fast enough, and if you speed them up they
are too fast, I often miss my target by miles. But eventually I will get
used to this. The rest is good, you can controll the Tetris-like pieces
easily.
This game is addicting at first, and it will stay so for a while because
of the Com-Lynx feature. But you can't skip any levels exept the first one.
In Com-Lynx you can play on one of the 8 different fields. This looks nice
but you need a bit of time to play the game, Com-Lynx or not. In Com-Lynx
mode you can change the number of battles. The difficulty in the Com-Lynx
battles is that there are 2 enemies. The other player, and his ships
(controlled by the computer). So you have to destroy the ships because they
shoot at you, and you have to destroy the other players castle.
A war on two fronts is allways dangerous and they are often lost, but in
Rampart you have to fight them in single player mode. You have ships attacking
from two sides, that's quite hard to win. But it is unplayably hard.
The gameplay is hard, maybe because the programmers were doing Batman Retuns
at the same time.... For little kids it might be a bit too hard, and for
other people it won't be a Veni, Vidi, Vici game either.
The first couple of screens look good, and the intermission screens look
very nice too. The graphics of the game itself are nothing special, but
it doesn't make the game look bad. This game just doesn't need any flashy
graphics, but I wouldn't mind it.... So you will get enough play-time out
of your money.
The sound is not all too special. There is no in-game music, only the
sound of cannon shots (not bad...) and a trumpet to call the cease-fire.
I wouldn't want any in-game music in this game really. Now you are fixed
on the battle, with the cannon sounds only stimulating it. I believe that
music would take something away from it.
So it is a good game that will give you hours of fun and it playing it
won't become a drag because the computer also has different strategies.
I'd really want to see 3-D Rampart on the SNES, I don't know what the
view point will be, but if the rest of the game stays the same it will
be a sure hit.
+- RATINGS --------------+
! Graphics ......... 7.0 !
! Music/Sound FX ... 6.0 !
! Feel ............. 7.0 !
! Playability ...... 7.0 !
! Addictiveness .... 8.0 !
! Lastability ...... 8.0 !
! Overall .......... 8.0 !
+------------------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+-----------------------------------------+
SHADOW OF THE BEAST LYNX REVIEW
+-----------------------------------------+
At last. The wait is over. Beast has arrived. Since the Messe in Dussel-
dorf I just couldn't wait to get my hands on the official release of this so
when I walked into the local computershop and saw it,..... well, let's just
say that I (once again) went home a lot poorer than before. But now Beast
was mine!
A weak storyline introduces the main character as sort of a mutated idiot,
and since this seems to be the fault of the "Beast Lord" you set out for re-
venge. Sounds fair enough but why couldn't they just hold onto the original
storyline? The original was much more interesting. At least my father got
sacrificed in a most terrible way in some sort of bizarre ritual and THAT is
supposed to be the reason of my revenge! But enough of this now. On to the
game itself...
Beast is viewed from side-on. You must walk thru a beautifully detailed
landscape, while hitting many enemies many times. In the meantime, you must
solve simple puzzles (the ones like: Oh, this door is closed. I should go
and find a key. Ah, to get this key I first need to kill this monster etc.)
and stay alive. An energy bar at the bottom of the screen indicates your e-
nergy and option 1 brings up your inventory (Yeah, you must pick up things,
and use 'em at the right spot too!). That's all there is to it actually.
Except for, that is, that that's not ALL. Beast is big. Huge! So it's a
beat 'em up (albeit a simplistic one), a puzzler, a platformer and an explo-
rer game. The game is just BIG!!!! (Now don't start screaming this around
before reading the next paragraph and learning what WE mean by BIG, as here
we don't really point at the size of the game!).
Now why is it big except for the fact that it takes quite some time to get
thru it? Well, let's start at the graphic department. A huge amount of pa-
rallax layers have been used to create sort of a semi-3D-feel (players of
the original Beast will know what I'm talking about). For those who know the
Amiga version, it might be nice to know that this game looks exactly the
same!!! Yup, that's right! These graphics are easily the BEST ever seen on
the Lynx. Since I cannot even find words to describe the excellence of the
graphics I leave it to you, the reader, to check 'em out yourself. The ONLY
gripe I have with the graphics is, that only a bit more darker room is suit-
able for playing. If there's too much light around, many of the colors come
out the same, which makes the game confusing at times.
The sound is of a high standard. We haven't really heard any good music on
the Lynx for quite some time, so it was a relief to hear Beast in action. As
every scene has different music (and with a scene, I mean a location, since
you can enter and leave buildings, trees, etc.....) the music doesn't get on
your nerves. The quality of the sound could have been better if proper sam-
ples had been used. The music is still good enough to compensate for this
though. All the original music is here, although in this revamped version a
lot of the music sounds a bit more jazzy. The sound fx are good too and the
music and fx combine nicely.
The entire feel about this game is very good. As soon as you'll start pla-
ying this you'll get in a very grim mood. The credits upon booting the game
indicate that something with the quality of an expensive movie is coming up,
and as soon as the title-screen appears, you know that that's right. Before
you start the game, you can still select your control method. Then it's on
to the game, and as soon as you die, the original game-over screen appears,
along with the original (sad) game-over music. New here is the ability to
continue (up to 3 continues available!). At this point I found a small bug
in the program, 'coz when I selected to begin a new game (instead of using a
continue) the screen went black and only the title MUSIC was heard.
The game is quite playable. The game is not just a showcase of excellent
graphics and superb sound, but also a very good game in it's own right. The
layout of the locations have been slightly modified, so that even players of
the original Beast are able to get full enjoyment out of this. Where the o-
riginal Beast was just a "run-left-or-right-and-hit-your-enemies-very-hard-
and-climb-the-occasional-ladder", this Beast has moving platforms, swinging
ropes, different guardians and an increased number of "puzzles". To give a
small example: in the original Beast there was a spot where you had to turn
a switch. In this Beast, you'll first have to find a cog-wheel to repair a
machine that controls the lift TO that switch. These puzzles force you to
run around a bit more and make the game longer. And since the game is quite
a bit bigger, and takes quite some more time to get thru, the coders have
given you an energy bar, instead of 12 energy points (although it takes a-
bout 12 hits to die.... ).
Since Beast is quite big and you've got to start ALL over again when you're
out of continues you probably don't want to play this game again once you've
completed it. But until that time, you're gonna have lots of fun. Over and
over again you'll be stunned by the visual effects, and every time you die,
you'll be screaming that it's not fair and still have another go! Psygnosis
seem to do the same to the Lynx scene as they did to the Amiga scene: They
bring the best graphics with the best music! And on the Lynx they've thrown
in the playability factor too, which makes this game a definite MUST-BUY!!!!
Rush out NOW and empty your wallet!!!! Just don't expect to be playing this
for more than a month or so as Psygnosis on Lynx still has that same problem
it always had on Amiga: Lastability-Playability ratio... The game just does
not last long enough. But that aside, it's a megagreat game!
+- RATINGS --------------+
! Graphics ......... 9.7 !
! Music/Sound FX ... 9.2 !
! Feel ............. 8.5 !
! Playability ...... 8.5 !
! Addictiveness .... 8.5 !
! Lastability ...... 6.8 !
! Overall .......... 8.5 !
+------------------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+-----------------------------------------+
STEEL TALONS LYNX REVIEW
+-----------------------------------------+
This helicopter wargame was a great hit in the arcades. But when we heard
that it would come to the Lynx we wondered how it would look, because Hard
Drivin' was not the greatest version. And Steel Talons could be a lot better
And when we heard that it would be done by the same programmer, we lost a
bit of hope. In the arcades it could be played with 2 players, if this
would be incorporated in the Lynx version it would be a great hit.
Now for the Steel Talons that we saw on the Lynx.
This game looks really nice. It does not look like Hard Drivin' at all
(thank God...), because I feared it would. It is only the second Lynx
game that incorporates filled polygons, so they haven't done badly at
all.
I saw 8 missions and 1 training mission in the eprom that I saw, but the
final version luckaly turned out to have all 12 missions.
The playability is good, but it sometimes uses odd colors, or colors that
didn't gave the game it's finnishing touch.
In previous Lynx conversions we saw that duplicating the exact arcade game
(or something close to it) can't really be done with these kind of games.
So Steel Talons had to give in a bit. The most missed option is the Comlynx
mode. The controlls for this kind of game are of course limited on the
Lynx, so it was not a surprise that you can't simulate the AH-64 Apache.
The scrolling is smooth, totally unlike Hard Drivin', but I believe that it
can still be done better.
The title tune is statisfactory, and the FX are good enough, but your
commander's voice could have been better. The way it is now it would have
been better to leave it out. I had a hard time understanding it, only with
headphones it was nearly acceptable. Now it only eats memory and I'd rather
have better tuned controls or some extra enemies in stead of these voices.
Overall the sound is nothing special in this game. The music and FX will
not give you thrills, but it does not make you feel that it is badly done.
The controls are nice, especially since you can choose between 2 view
points. And the controls are fine with both of them. The chopper reacts
immediately when you hit the controls, but it takes a bit of time to get
used to. There are various button-button and button-joypad combinations.
It is not really akward, but when there is a mistake in the manual......
(normal rockets are opt.2 and B, not opt.1 and B).
If you choose the cockpit view point you will notice that the chopper leans
foreward if you fly fast foreward, and it leans backwards if you fly
backwards, this all adds to the realism in this game. The second view point
is from behind the chopper, this is less realistic but it may come in handy
some times.
However, there is one thing that I don't like in this game, and that is that
you can play on when you've failed a mission. Personally I want to finish
a game because I want to see what all the levels look like, and of course to
see the victory screen. But if you can see all the the levels the first
time you play it, there is less motivation to do your best and succeed in
all the missions.
+- RATINGS --------------+
! Graphics ......... 8.5 !
! Music/Sound FX ... 7.0 !
! Feel ............. 9.0 !
! Playability ...... 8.0 !
! Addictiveness .... 7.5 !
! Lastability ...... 6.5 !
! Overall .......... 8.0 !
+------------------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
THE LAST BIT.... OR BYTE, THAT IS.
Well, that's it for an issue full of changes. We hope some of you like it.
Next month we hope to have a review of Super StarWars on the SNES. In the
meantime, I'm off to Zelda, where I now have to collect the 4th of 7 gems!!!
It's such an excellent game... Bye for now!
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------+
--
Michael Current, Cleveland Free-Net 8-bit Atari SIGOp
Carleton College, Northfield, MN, USA / UUCP: ...!umn-cs!ccnfld!currentm
Internet: currentm@carleton.edu / Cleveland Free-Net: aa700
-----------------------------------------
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