Atari ST

Damocles








The sequel to the 8 BIT unclassic Mercenary.
A full 3D experience very similar to Grand Theft Auto III. You can go anywhere, do anything and have sex in the back of your car with the hookers.
Except, there are very few vehicles to steal, nothing much to do and no people (or hookers).
I'm glad the ST emulator has a fast forward key because it seemed like a new Ice Age was developing while I waited for the intro to pass.
Next, walking from the spaceship you've just landed in to the nearby base for the key to your car. The action was unintense.
The fun started when I finally got into the car due to the fact I couldn't find the keys to start it. The function buttons got it going backward so I drove blind down the nearest road. There could have been nuns ahead.
Pressing a number key suddenly brought the car back into forward motion - hurray! After testing the number keys I found impossible speeds could be attained, which is just as well because it was 10 minutes to the next house (at light speed).
A triangle shaped craft await, my heart started thumping with excitement, there was a building, inside was no key. Bastard.
This was where my game ended.
I think the idea is to stop an asteroid hurtling into Earth within 2 hours. During this 2 hours you can go anywhere, including various other planets.
Major plot mistake: You start in a space-ship. Surely it would be safer to stay in the space-ship and maybe travel away from Earth. There's no-one there anyway. They must have departed in Battlestar Galactica.

Elite
What can be said that hasn't been said already?
Elite set the benchmark for all space dogfight/trading games on the 8 Bit computers then transferred to the 16 Bit Atari ST and Amiga for full-on solid filled polygon graphics as supposed to matchstick vectors.
The Amiga probably had the edge over the ST due to its superior sound quality but the gameplay remains the same.
Lots of flying about from planet to planet trading machinery, food and furs with the occasional drugs-run when your ship had been upgraded with appropriate fire-power.
It was always fun to test your skills by opening fire on a space station as you were docking then trying to avoid collision with the launching police vipers before letting loose your arsenal of bum-hungry targeted missiles on them.









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