Happy New Year Ten Pencers!
And thanks for another great podcast.
I don't think I've played Kamikaze before. But despite its obvious flaws, and cruddy end of level graphics sequence, I really warmed to it in the end. Good to hear, as I suspected, that there were some kind of shot-counting shenanigans going on. I'll be getting to grips with these when I get the chance and hopefully racking up a top score.
Not so sure about X-Multiply though. It's one of those games with an interesting attract sequence, that I remember seeing back in the day, but never felt tempted to pump my ten pences into. A bit like Gemini Wing.
On playing for the first time, I couldn't help thinking it was a rip off of R-Type. Then I noticed it was produced by Irem, which kind of explains that. But is it cut from the same pixels? Sure, it's got some interesting features - the drifting arms powerups are fun, and I suppose the music is pretty good. However, there's something about it all that just doesn't gel. It might be the colour palette of the backgrounds. The muddy purple tones and lack of primary colour doesn't do it for me. And if we're honest about it, just about all the sprites with the exception of your ship are pretty badly drawn. In that respect it has the feeling of a supercharged Amiga game rather than an arcade classic. Remember Shadow of the Beast? Amazing and atmospheric landscapes with brilliant parallax scrolling. Well designed and convincing main character. But childishly realised baddies and tedious gameplay. For me, X-Multiply ticks that last box too. And the music, as good as it is, doesn't really mold to the game. It doesn't work.
R-Type trumps it on every front.
I've had a few goes, and posted my best effort on the amazing Arcade Sidekick app. Doubt I'll be going back to it any time soon though :-(
