Screenshot of Alphakhor

Alphakhor

(Loriciel, 1989)

  • Knowledge of French is required in order to play this game properly.

In the year 2006, a deadly virus is threatening humanity’s existence. However, there was an outbreak of an identical virus in 1463, and it was stopped successfully. It’s up to Xavier Nollevo, who has invented a time machine, to go back to the Middle Ages and save humanity! This is an adventure game where you must explore a medieval town in the search for the magic formula, helping various characters as you go along. You have to be careful, and eat and drink all the time, and watch your money as well. The pictures are excellently drawn, and while it’s not a particularly large adventure, it’ll keep you occupied for some time – provided you understand French, that is.

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Screenshot of Altair

Altair

(Inmensa Bola de Manteca, 2014)

Reviewed by Missas

Altair is a CPC conversion of the original coin-op game released in Spain in 1981. 33 years later, it finally arrives on the CPC and it manages to remain totally faithful to the coin-op version. It clearly demonstrates the gaming era that was predominantly focused on achieving high scores rather than progressing to new levels. The graphics are, as expected, basic and chunky but they are colourful and vivid. The animation is good, while the in-game sound may be considered annoying by today’s standards, but it exactly captures the atmosphere of the arcade halls of the 1980s. The gameplay is fast-paced, and although it is repetitive, you won’t get bored easily because the challenge is well balanced and the grab factor is strong.

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Screenshot of Altered Beast

Altered Beast

(Activision, 1989)

Reviewed by Javier Sáez

The master of all Gods, Zeus, commands you to rise from your grave and rescue his daughter. How could you refuse? After all, Zeus will send you some power-ups to increase your fighting abilities. Whenever you collect a few of them, your character will turn into a beast – either a werewolf or a dragon, depending on which level you are playing. This is quite a bad coin-op conversion. You’ll see graphics close to the original game, although the sprites lack definition. Apart from that, your character moves slowly, the scrolling is awful and hitting the enemies requires patience most of the time. There’s a tune playing throughout the game, but it doesn’t improve the overall impression of it.

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Screenshot of Alternative World Games

Alternative World Games

(Gremlin Graphics, 1987)

Reviewed by Pug

Eight wacky world events await you in this game – a sack race, plate balancing, river jumping, boot throwing, pole climbing, running up a wall, pillow fighting, and last but not least – pogo. Each event can be practiced, and believe me, if you want to get anywhere with this one, you’d better do that. The controls for each game are different, sluggish and add a high degree of confusion. The graphics are very detailed with good animation, but the rate at which everything moves, mixed with the hard to understand controls, just ruins everything.

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Screenshot of Amaurote

Amaurote

(Mastertronic, 1987)

The city of Amaurote has been invaded by a plague of giant insects, but instead of getting out a can of fly killer, you have to eradicate them by using bouncing bombs – and with 25 districts of the city to clear, it’s going to be a long task. In each district, you must clear all of the insects using the bombs, and then you must ask your commanding officer to send you a supa-bomb in order to destroy the Queen insect. The isometric graphics are really impressive, and the wonderfully atmospheric music is some of the best I’ve ever heard on the CPC. It will take some practice to get used to operating the bombs and working out the best way to kill the insects, but once you do, it’s quite engrossing. However, the magnitude of the task means some players may find the gameplay to be too repetitive.

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Screenshot of The Amazing Shrinking Man

The Amazing Shrinking Man

(Infogrames, 1986)

Professor Nitro has accidentally drunk one of his own concoctions and has shrunk so much that he has fallen into the rubbish bin next to his desk! Now he has to find all the pieces of paper in the bin which contain the formula, and then create an antidote in his laboratory. You have to bounce around the rubbish bin, using various objects as platforms, while avoiding falling into discarded cans and puddles of water. This proves to be a very frustrating exercise, as there are few opportunities for you to ascend or walk around, and you’ll often find yourself falling a long way back down the bin. The graphics are nice and colourful, the scrolling is very smooth indeed, and the music is catchy, but playing the game will test anyone’s patience to the limit.

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Screenshot of AMC

AMC

(Dinamic, 1989)

You’re the best marine in the Astro Marine Corps, and you’ve been sent to the planet Dendar to rescue some of your fellow marines. Dendar is host to all manner of horrible monsters and robots, but fortunately you’re armed with a huge gun that’ll sort most of them out, and you’ve got a supply of grenades too. There is also a healthy range of power-ups to collect. In short, it’s your usual sci-fi shoot-’em-up, but this one is good. The graphics are absolutely luscious, the scrolling is fast, and the explosions when you kill monsters are great. It would get a higher mark if the levels were shorter.

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Screenshot of Amélie Minuit

Amélie Minuit

(Ere Informatique, 1985)

Reviewed by Guillaume Chalard

  • Knowledge of French is required in order to play this game properly.

Amélie is a young woman who works in a skyscraper. She figures out that she has forgotten an important file and decides to return to her office. But it’s 11pm and she’s got only one hour to find it. At midnight, the building will be closed and the power turned off. There are 29 floors and 224 rooms to explore, and the lift randomly stops, wasting precious time. Amélie must find her glasses, keys, and other items to reach her goal. Now, I doubt you’ll have the patience to help her. The graphics are dull; every room looks like the previous one. Amélie looks like she’s made of matches and even at the fastest speed, the game is desperately slow. To make things even worse, you have to be exactly in front of a door to open it – and there are 336 doors to open!

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Screenshot of American Tag Team Wrestling

American Tag Team Wrestling

(Zeppelin Games, 1992)

Reviewed by Missas

American Tag Team Wrestling is a two-versus-two wrestling game. You can choose from eight different teams and fight your way to the championship. The graphics are average – not much detail on the sprites and in the background. Besides that, all the teams look the same in the ring! There is a small variety of moves; one kick, one grab, one punch, and that’s all. You can also run and execute a flying kick, but you will never hit the target. The gameplay suffers; you will probably be badly beaten by the computer, and because of the small variety of moves, you will become bored easily. The sound is almost absent, just like the grab factor. Overally, this game is light years behind WWF WrestleMania and it is a hasty job.

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Screenshot of American Turbo-King

American Turbo-King

(Mastertronic, 1989)

Drive your car around six obstacle courses while avoiding other cars, as well as the bombs that are dropped by planes and helicopters. You’ll have to memorise each course thoroughly – if you don’t, you’ll probably reach a dead end and have to reverse your car, which costs so much time that you’ll have to start again anyway. The graphics are average and while the tune is excellent, there are hardly any sound effects, and your car is totally silent. It’s quite a slow game as well and not really worth bothering with.

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