Thanks for posting. I never had an Amiga back in the day and always felt I had a somewhat poorer counterpart in the form of the Atari ST 500. After seeing your playthrough of this, I'm glad it's not one I picked up for that computer (as it looks to have had a release on it!) I kind of like the concept of flying over stuff to get things and it might not have been a bad game if it had powerups, didn't re-start the player in a sudden death location after dying & was, well, less boring to play. I'd have felt very conned if I'd brought this! A giveaway disc (public domain game) on a magazine could have just made this forgivable, so a well deserved score from you. I'm not sure if you cover Acorn Electron games, I have one in mind which I was super excited for when I saw it back in the day but which could not have been a worse let down (on the same level as Kung Fu Master for the Spectrum in fact, worse! About as enjoyable to play as an All you can eat Semolina contest). If you do, I'll happily pay the £5 and go through the process to recommend it. If not, you'll have had a lucky escape not trying to play it!
Well, I had an Amiga - but I don't think the Atari ST was a poor cousin at all. It was (and is) a great machine and was reasonably priced. The only problem was software developers trying to make games for which the ST was not designed - i.e. trying to port Amiga-designed games to the ST. Never a great strategy. And the same worked in reverse - porting ST-designed games to the Amiga also delivered poor results. But when games were designed for the ST from the outset, they were superb.
@@Midwinter2 Don't get me wrong, it was a great machine. I hugely enjoyed playing Blood Money on it & Turrican. However, I remember getting Gauntlet for it, which was a good port. Unfortunately, when there were a lot of sprites on the screen, the slowdown was dreadful. Not sure if the Amiga port had that issue? I thought the music was marginally better on the Amiga also (in general). I played Gauntlet for an entire day, assuming it had an ending. I paused it over night ready to pick it back up the next day. To my horror, the next day I found that it had completely frozen the machine. It never worked again. I blame myself largely.
@@jimmybisk Sorry to hear about the Gauntlet freeze! Yes, many things like that happened to me too. The Amiga had no Gauntlet conversion at all. And I think I know why. A game came out called "Garrison" - and it was basically identical to Gauntlet. It was so close that I don't understand why they weren't sued over it! In any case, the Gauntlet people clearly decided there was no point converting their game to the Amiga when we already had an identical game. Garrison had loads of sprites on screen, but I don't remember any slowdown. Mind you, the main character moved fairly slowly - though I think you could find pick-ups to speed him up. One of my favourite games on the Atari ST was International Karate - I loved the graphics. Sadly, it was never converted to the Amiga. The other Atari ST game I really liked was Typhoon Thompson. The graphics and animation were really nicely done.
@@Midwinter2 That's really odd because I recently watched a battle of the ports video for Gauntlet and an Amiga version was definitely featured. Unless it was a recent conversion? I do remember the name Garrison though. It's also odd that my first 8-bit computer was an Acorn Electron (32K) & I rushed to buy a game I saw in my local games shop for the computer titled Gauntlet. Was super excited taking it home, I couldn't wait to play it. So I loaded it up, only to find it was a cheap clone of Defender! Atari ST wise, I really enjoyed Wizball, although was hopeless at it, I thought it was a great concept.
@@jimmybisk Yes, you're right - a version of Gauntlet was circulated in recent years for the Amiga. However, it is, in fact, the Atari ST version, with some alterations to the code to allow it to run on the Amiga. As far as I remember, it runs worse on the Amiga, which. makes sense. You'd really have to design it from the ground up for the Amiga for it to have a chance of running smoothly. Just checked out "Gauntlet" for the Acorn. Well, it looks like a pretty decent game - but that's no consolation if it's not what you wanted! I never played Wizball, but I remember it well - it got glowing reviews in the magazines and it looks like a fun game.
why are torturing yourself.... there are real good game there.. hybris,wings of death, xenon2, swiv... or sidescrolling ones .. apydia, R-type, Silkworm, Projekt x, X-out, Z-Out,Saintdragon... and even more . but i love see you strugling and cursing ^^
They've even spelt their game name wrong on the game play screen down the left. They've put ARTIFICAL DREAMS. Says it all really.
Thanks for posting. I never had an Amiga back in the day and always felt I had a somewhat poorer counterpart in the form of the Atari ST 500. After seeing your playthrough of this, I'm glad it's not one I picked up for that computer (as it looks to have had a release on it!) I kind of like the concept of flying over stuff to get things and it might not have been a bad game if it had powerups, didn't re-start the player in a sudden death location after dying & was, well, less boring to play. I'd have felt very conned if I'd brought this! A giveaway disc (public domain game) on a magazine could have just made this forgivable, so a well deserved score from you. I'm not sure if you cover Acorn Electron games, I have one in mind which I was super excited for when I saw it back in the day but which could not have been a worse let down (on the same level as Kung Fu Master for the Spectrum in fact, worse! About as enjoyable to play as an All you can eat Semolina contest). If you do, I'll happily pay the £5 and go through the process to recommend it. If not, you'll have had a lucky escape not trying to play it!
Well, I had an Amiga - but I don't think the Atari ST was a poor cousin at all. It was (and is) a great machine and was reasonably priced. The only problem was software developers trying to make games for which the ST was not designed - i.e. trying to port Amiga-designed games to the ST. Never a great strategy. And the same worked in reverse - porting ST-designed games to the Amiga also delivered poor results.
But when games were designed for the ST from the outset, they were superb.
@@Midwinter2 Don't get me wrong, it was a great machine. I hugely enjoyed playing Blood Money on it & Turrican. However, I remember getting Gauntlet for it, which was a good port. Unfortunately, when there were a lot of sprites on the screen, the slowdown was dreadful. Not sure if the Amiga port had that issue? I thought the music was marginally better on the Amiga also (in general). I played Gauntlet for an entire day, assuming it had an ending. I paused it over night ready to pick it back up the next day. To my horror, the next day I found that it had completely frozen the machine. It never worked again. I blame myself largely.
@@jimmybisk Sorry to hear about the Gauntlet freeze! Yes, many things like that happened to me too.
The Amiga had no Gauntlet conversion at all. And I think I know why. A game came out called "Garrison" - and it was basically identical to Gauntlet. It was so close that I don't understand why they weren't sued over it! In any case, the Gauntlet people clearly decided there was no point converting their game to the Amiga when we already had an identical game.
Garrison had loads of sprites on screen, but I don't remember any slowdown. Mind you, the main character moved fairly slowly - though I think you could find pick-ups to speed him up.
One of my favourite games on the Atari ST was International Karate - I loved the graphics. Sadly, it was never converted to the Amiga.
The other Atari ST game I really liked was Typhoon Thompson. The graphics and animation were really nicely done.
@@Midwinter2 That's really odd because I recently watched a battle of the ports video for Gauntlet and an Amiga version was definitely featured. Unless it was a recent conversion? I do remember the name Garrison though. It's also odd that my first 8-bit computer was an Acorn Electron (32K) & I rushed to buy a game I saw in my local games shop for the computer titled Gauntlet. Was super excited taking it home, I couldn't wait to play it. So I loaded it up, only to find it was a cheap clone of Defender! Atari ST wise, I really enjoyed Wizball, although was hopeless at it, I thought it was a great concept.
@@jimmybisk Yes, you're right - a version of Gauntlet was circulated in recent years for the Amiga. However, it is, in fact, the Atari ST version, with some alterations to the code to allow it to run on the Amiga. As far as I remember, it runs worse on the Amiga, which. makes sense. You'd really have to design it from the ground up for the Amiga for it to have a chance of running smoothly.
Just checked out "Gauntlet" for the Acorn. Well, it looks like a pretty decent game - but that's no consolation if it's not what you wanted!
I never played Wizball, but I remember it well - it got glowing reviews in the magazines and it looks like a fun game.
Boring and that weapon noise was annoying.
why are torturing yourself.... there are real good game there.. hybris,wings of death, xenon2, swiv... or sidescrolling ones .. apydia, R-type, Silkworm, Projekt x, X-out, Z-Out,Saintdragon... and even more . but i love see you strugling and cursing ^^
A very forgettable and bland vertical shooter, but I've certainly seen much worse, especially for a semi-budget price.