Good old Space Invaders – it's a timeless classic. Just shoot the aliens as they move left and right in formation, as their constant hail of bullets wears down your defences. The graphics are blocky but at least there's colour, and a beautiful melody plays before the start of each level. I like the way it changes as you progress; on the first level, the melody is rather sombre, but by the fourth level, it's quite cheerful. You can even save your high scores! It's a difficult game, though; if you get past the fourth level, you must have ridiculously good reflexes.

See also: Classic Axiens, Classic Muncher.

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7

A Pacman clone that's better than most. You know what to do; eat all the pills in the maze and avoid the ghosts. You can also collect letters to make up words, which will give you lots of points and an extra life. Unlike most other Pacman games, this one is fast and it's really slick as well, but at the same time it's not too hard. Add some good graphics and several different maze designs and you've got a neat game, apart from the power pills not lasting long enough.

See also: Classic Axiens, Classic Invaders.

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7

Three classic games are bundled together in this package – Breakout, Space Invaders and Pacman. Breakout is frankly rubbish; there's only one row of bricks, and pretty soon, another bat appears on the screen so that you're playing Pong instead – extremely bizarre! The other two games aren't bad at all. The graphics in Space Invaders are actually rather good, and it's not too difficult. Pacman looks almost identical to the original, and you'll soon be gobbling up those pills merrily and whizzing your way through the five levels in little time. In summary, forget about Breakout and play the other two games to your heart's content.

See also: Classiques Volume 2.

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7

Three more classic games for you to play, although they're not as good as the ones in the previous volume. There's a racing game where you just drive for as long as you can, avoiding the other cars – not exciting at all. Then there's a cute Pingo clone where you have to push bricks around in order to squash some fluffy monsters, while trying to push the three diamonds together so they touch each other. It would be the best of the bunch if it wasn't so stupidly difficult. The third game sees you as a snake eating pills in a maze; as you grow longer, you must be careful not to trap yourself. This is probably the best game of the three, but it's too easy and quickly becomes boring. So, one OK game and two mediocre ones. Oh, dear.

See also: Classiques Volume 1.

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5

Based upon a great manga comic strip, famous among French teenagers in the 1980s, this game is unfortunately far from the original. You control Cobra and his cyber friend Armanoid, and you must save a young girl (girls were the main reason for the success of that comic...) from the Evil Salamandar. As soon as the action starts, you know that you're in front of a bad game. The sound effects are exactly the same as in Flash, another game from the same authors, and the gameplay is exactly the same too! Well, they changed the backgrounds and the characters... All you have to do is shoot everything around you. The screen scrolls in every direction but you don't know where to go because enemies come from everywhere and the buildings around you are always the same. Boring and disappointing – you'd better watch the original manga instead.

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4

Based around the little known film of the same name, Cobra is one of the most bizarre film licence games ever! Similiarities between the film and the game are that you must shoot a lot of people, and you must rescue beautiful Ingrid from the evil Night Slasher. But that's where the similarities end. You see, in the game, you must eat burgers to get better weapons (knife, gun and machine gun) and are constantly under attack by dive-bombing ducks, for some reason! Each of the platform-filled levels are pretty much the same (OK, they're identical, but with harder bad guys) and I reckon you'll be bored long before you get to the Night Slasher. Graphics are nothing special (though there's a wicked picture of Stallone on the loading screen), the sound is virtually non-existent, and the whole thing is just so average, it hurts. The movie was a stinker, and the game is little better!

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5

Fly an AH-1W Super Cobra through four levels of shoot-'em-up action. Your helicopter is equipped with a machine gun and a limited supply of missiles which you'll need to use to destroy the guns that are scattered across each level. You can obtain more missiles or some extra firepower by shooting certain aliens and collecting the bonus icon that appears. You also have a small number of 'enemy blockers' which freeze the aliens and guns for a short time. The aim in each level is to destroy all the guns and collect all the pods, and you'll then face two giant helicopters which must be shot in order to progress to the next level. The graphics are nice and colourful and the difficulty level is set just right to make this a fine, action-packed game.

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8

Colossus 4 Chess
(CDS, 1986)

Chess has never been my forte, and it shows when I'm playing against the computer in this game. Be warned – it plays a pretty mean game! However, it is very customisable, although there aren't any menus; you'll just have to remember which keys to press. You can also see your previous moves, and a nice touch is that you can see the computer thinking ahead, and what move it thinks you're going to make. The perspective view of the board is great as well, although you can change it to the 2D view. A lot of people reckon this is the best chess program on the CPC, and it's not hard to see why.

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8

The three planets belonging to the XATOR Confederation – Zorak, Alfard and Grisum – have been taken over by intelligent androids, and the only way to remove them is to destroy the planets. It seems a rather drastic solution! Explosive devices have been placed on each of the planets, and you have to arm them by flying around the planets and collecting batteries to insert into them; each device requires three colours of battery. This game was re-released in the UK as The Last Commando, and it's a very good space shoot-'em-up indeed. The graphics and music are both up to Dinamic's high standards, although completing the game requires a lot of luck as well as skill.

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8

Combat School
(Ocean, 1987)

The Elite Marine Corps are the toughest army in the USA, and you're aiming to be recruited and join their ranks. You'll have to complete some gruelling events first to show your strength, including an assault course, three firing ranges, an iron man race, arm wrestling, and lastly, a fight with your combat instructor. If you beat him, you're in, and you'll be sent on a mission to rescue a hostage in a US embassy. This is one of those joystick-waggling games, and in all the times I've tried it, I've completed the assault course once. Nice graphics, nice tunes; shame that it's far too tough. If you're strong enough to tackle the assault course, you're probably good enough for the real thing!

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