Tiki the Kiwi has to rescue twenty of
his mates from Wally the walrus, doesn't sound very interesting, but it
makes for some great game play. It turns out the Kiwi's do not just
play rugby, there is something else going on way down under. Classic
cute platform action,the Japanese seems to be good at creating these
cute arcade characters. This was also a big Nintendo game, the
Commodore and Sectrum games have to be compared not only with
each other but also with the Nintendo version, the Spectrum falls well
short.
Kiwi is armed with a bow and arrows, he later finds stronger weaponry
as his quest continues. You can also use some of the equipment of your
enemies as transportation, as well as swimming.
The Spectrum version does scroll but
it has monochrome graphics, the screen doesn't contain as much detail
as the Commodore (putting it mildly), on the Commodore the graphics is
smaller, colorfull and has more detail on the backgrounds. The gameplay
on the Spectrum is not that bad, the problem however is that it seems
to be a different game from the Commodore, the outlay of the
levels are different.
The biggest problem however is obvious, bland backdrops, there is
nothing there, the Commodore however has beautifull and colorfull
graphics. I stated this before, by 1989 it was game over for the
Spectrum, it couldn't compete anymore.
Obvious Commodore winner. Nemesis Nemesis
was one of the most anticipated progressive shooters to come out of the
arcade, unfortunately it wasn't very good on the either machine. It is
standard fair, shoot enemies, collect power ups, select weapons, shoot
more baddies.
The problem with the game however was
that you get to go right back to the start when you get killed, highly
fistrating, if this was done better the game whould have rated higher.
The Commodore is better in all
respects, better sound, graphics, scrolling and color.
Another Commodore winner.
NebulusWhat
a unique and cool concept, you are tasked with destroying towers, you
do this by climbing the tower, and setting off an implosion at the top.
What sets the game apart is the unique perspective, you walk around the
tower, the whole tower scrolls 360 degrees. This looks really cool,
specially when you enter a door and the other side of the door is on
the other side of the tower. Very nice effect.
You can jump, shoot at some objects,
use lifts and you the aformentioned doors to travel up the tower. When
something touches you you do not die, you rather fall to the level
below you, if there is nothing below you, you drown. After destroying
every tower, on the Commodore, there is a bonus section where you
travel to the next tower shooting fish.
From the screenshots it might seem that the two games are very similar,
and they are, the level outlay, play and tower movement is near
identical. The Commodore has nice sound effects and obviously uses
color better. The Spectrum however has a major drawback, the sprites
flicker quite badly, headache time. If it wasn't for this I would have
called it a draw, with the flickering however and the bonus section on
the Commodore it is the Commodore, a clear winner again!
