1st April 1992
Is TNT 2: Double Dynamite the most explosive compilation ever, or has it got half the blasting power of a damp firework? We sent Ian Osborne to investigate
TNT 2: Double Dynamite
TNT 2: Double Dynamite has a lot to live up to: it s predecessor was rather brill. Has it got what it lakes to blast aside the opposition, or will it bomb? I think we should be told...
Skull And Crossbones
Skull And Crossbones is a tale of piratical pillage and plunder - slash your way through eight levels of monotony, disemboweling baddies en route. Pity it's such a dreadful game - you'd have more fun walking the plank or getting hauled round the keel. A bog-standard hack-'em-up with nothing to set it aside from the other three million on the market, how it scored 73% in issue 88 is beyond me.
There's no skill involved - all you do is stand in front of a baddy, hit the fire button until he dies, then find the next baddy etc. To make matters worse, your sprite regularly turns his back on the enemy!
The sprites are fairly well drawn but look like morris dancers when fighting and backgrounds are disgusting! I know the Speccy isn't exactly brilliant when it comes to colours but a little shading wouldn't have gone amiss.
Hydra
It's the 21st century and world leaders seem to have lost their marbles! Not only have they allowed a terrorist called The Shadow to take control of the skies and seas, but when an important package needs transporting through hostile territory, who do you think they send? Just you! Either the package wasn't so important alter all, or your boss found out about the incident with his wife, a garden hose, and the jelly baby at last years' Christmas party!
Unfortunately, the game's just as bad as the plot, but this time you won't be laughing. Although set on a river, no attempt has been made to create a water effect - you could just as easily be driving along a road.
The graphics are awful: the river's just a solid strip, the scenery blocky and boring, and the sprites are so poorly defined its hard to tell the baddies from the power-ups!
Badlands
Mark told me if you remove the word 'lands' from the title, you get a fair description of the game. A multi-player racing game viewed from above, Badlands is basically a Super Sprint clone, even down to the spanner power-ups. The only attempt at updating gameplay is a cannon mounted on each car, which temporarily slow down opponents.
The computer-controlled vehicles have them but they're never fired. Control is the standard left right rotation with the fire button as an accelerator. This is always awkward until you get the hang of it, though Badlands handles better than most.
S.T.U.N. Runner
Is this the worst coin-op conversion ever? It was great in the arcades, with sooo much character and atmosphere! Trouble was it featured a massive sit-on cabinet so few arcades bothered to stock it.
The Speccy version's a disaster. The main sprite looks like a curling stone with water wings, and the tunnel effects give no feeling of speed or even movement. The screen looks more like a backdrop from a badly filmed Sixties rock concert than a computer game. Playing it for more than a few minutes makes you feel physically sick, and that's not a facetious remark.
Robot Monsters
With its 8-movie plot and ridiculously long title, Escape From The Planet Of The Robot Monsters is one weird game. The Reptilions have invaded 'Synthetic Industrial Planetoid X' and enslaved the human inhabitants, forcing them to build robots for the planned invasion of Earth. Your task (as if you hadn't guessed) is to shoot the baddies and rescue the humans.
A shoot-'em-up in the Commando mould, Robot Monsters plays fairly well. The small sprites are ideally suited to the gameplay, even though some of the robots look like the Weetabix crew. The bullets are well defined, which is a blessing - there's nothing worse than the disappearing bullet syndrome ' (except being force-fed three hundredweight of stewed prunes). Scoring 90% in Issue 62, the gameplay's dated considerably since then. It's well executed but too samey to hold your attention for long.
TNT 2: Double Dynamite comes highly recommended - to programmers who want an example of how not to write computer games!
ALAN ... 54%
