Amiga Games - Outrun - Classic Commodore Amiga Game

Out Run Amiga
Ahhh now this is one the most iconic arcade games of all times. Who else can remember the thrill of sitting in the Out Run cabinet, the 3D graphics racing towards you, hydraulics lurching you in all directions and the sterio-tastic Magical Sound Shower pumping in your ears?

Out Run (by Sega) was a fantastic beat the clock arcade racing game, and a conversion to the Commodore Amiga was always on the cards.

But could such a large and graphically intensive game be converted to the Amiga?

Well, yes is could have been converted quite well in the hands of talented developers- but what we got from US Gold (and Probe software) was only Out Run in name, not in playability.

The loading screen to Out Run - the best part of the game

Out Run was released for the Amiga by US Gold in 1989 and was met with a mostly negative reception.

I'll get this out of the way first; the Spectrum 128 (or +2 and +3) versions were actually superior to the Amiga offering despite it coming out two years earlier and of course only having 8-bits of processing power and 128K of RAM to play with.

Even the AY music was better than the approximation to the arcade music we were given on our favourite 16-bit beaut, I'm getting angry all these years later (again) just thinking about it...


Crashed and burned huh Mav.....

Gameplay
This game (the original arcade game anyway) placed you in the driving seat of a Ferrari Testarossa convertible with a stunning blonde in the passenger seat (female players had to pretend it was a right-hand-drive vehicle ;-)), to race around a series of tracks at breakneck speed.

As you neared the end of a track (assuming you did not run out of time) then you would take the left or right fork to move onto the next track - each one branching into a different area. This continued until you either ran out of time or you reached the end of the whole 'race'.

What really p1ssed me off about this version is that it completely fails to capture the spirit or feel of the original Sega game - the graphics are flat, the 3D effect poor and the sense of speed.... Well there is no sense of speed.

The Amiga is capable of so much more and this version here smacks of a quick and lazy port over. We never expected it to match the arcade game perfectly, but the Amiga was capable of getting pretty close to it.

Even when it's moving you don't feel the wind in your hair

This was a major disappointment for Amiga gamers back in '89 and was yet another quick and crappy conversion of a good arcade original.

We recommend getting hold of the real Amiga hardware - but if not then download an Amiga emulator but do not bother to download this game. Alternatively you could try and play it online, but seriously, just fire it up on MAME or even play the Speccy version.

Please see our other Amiga retro game reviews - all links are listed in alphabetical order. Cheers guys.

GENRE: Arcade Game (3D Racing)
RELEASE DATE: 1989
RELEASED BY: US Gold
DEVELOPER(S): Probe Software
PRICE: £19.99 (UK)

A very poor conversion of a classic arcade game:


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Amiga Games - Operation Wolf - Classic Commodore Amiga Game

Operation Wolf Amiga
I've been a little quiet on here lately mainly due to conducting programmer interviews over on my ZX Spectrum Games site (with Mark R Jones of Ocean Software) but it's back into those classic 16-bits again with a decent conversion of a once popular arcade game, Operation Wolf.

When this came out for the Commodore Amiga (along with the ZX Spectrum, C64 and Amstrad CPC 464) late in 1988 home computer conversions of arcade games were still popular.

The original arcade game by Taito had been more popular than neon blue lighting effects in a James Camron flick - with gamers loving the pseudo 3D viewpoint and control via the force feedback cabinet mounted uzi machine gun.

Time to kick some butt

The arcade game (at the time) featured state of the art graphics (large animated enemy soldiers, helicopters, tanks, sizeable buildings with breakable windows etc) and superb sterio sound.

Couple this with the actual uzi machine gun you used to play it with and you were onto a sure fire winner. Converting such a game to a 16-bit machine was never going to be that easy - and Ocean software stepped up to the task.

It was possible to replicate the large full colour graphics on the Amiga quite well, so Ocean decided to go for a similar look - and it ended up working pretty well but just not quite as smooth as the arcade original.

The game began with you (as a double-hard crack commando with 'enemy mow down capabilities' in the realm of John Matrix) being parachuted into hostile territory to locate an enemy concentration camp and free the captives.

I eat Green Berets for Breakfast

You began the game with seven clips of ammunition and five grenades - so straight away you had to get used to short controlled bursts.

The mission was split into six sections which matched those of the arcade game.
The sections were as follows:
Communication Setup, Jungle Area, Jungle Village, Powder Magazine, The Concentration Camp and finally the Airport.

On each level the landscapes slowly panned from right to left before you in first-person perspective as looked down your gun-sights (represented by a cross-hair).

That beardy bloke doesn't stand a chance

As the game landscape scrolled before you soldiers parachuted downwards or ran into the action firing away at you, whilst helicopters, boats and tanks also arrived to make things really interesting.
Vehicles required a barrage of shots to be destroyed - but could be taken out in one go with one of your precious rocket propelled grenades. The characters from the arcade game were re-created pretty faithfully - those huge Schwarzenegger type badguys who appeared right in front of you were even included. Waaahhh!

On later levels some enemies wore kevlar jackets and had to be hit with a headshot to dispatch them. Also requiring fast reactions were the daggers and grenades lobbed at you, these could be shot out of the air to prevent them from hitting you and reducing your energy.

To the side of the playing screen was the ammo counter, a damage meter and three icons. The latter told you how many men, tanks, boats and so on had to be destroyed before the current level was cleared.

Extra ammo and grenades were available (by shooting them as they appeared on-screen) and a power up was available which gave you double rapid fire and unlimited bullets for around ten seconds. This was always good for a laugh as you mowed down huge amounts of the enemy with ease.

There were also items which would reduce your damage level by a few points - which could make all the difference in completing a level.

Apart from human targets various animals appeared (like birds and pigs) from time to time and shooting them would occasionally give you an item of food to boost your energy or extra ammunition. Just how shooting a pig yields more ammunition is anyones guess, but for some reason I never even questioned it back then!

Shooting any prisoners, villagers, nurses etc took a fair bit of your energy away - so you needed to be accurate in your shooting.

I'm the demolition maaaaaan!

The Amiga also managed to represent the cut-scenes from the arcade game pretty accurately, and all of the voice samples were replicated too.
 
All in all this was a decent enough version of the arcade game, but without that force-feedback Uzi it just wasn't the same.
 
But that's it, I am finished..... here.
 
We recommend getting hold of the real Amiga hardware - but if not then download an Amiga emulator and download Operation Wolf. Alternatively you could try and play it online.

Please see our other Amiga retro game reviews - all links are listed in alphabetical order. Cheers guys.

GENRE: Arcade Game
RELEASE DATE: 1988
RELEASED BY: Ocean Software
DEVELOPER(S): Christophe Gomez, Benoist Aron, Phillipe Chastel, Marc Djan, Jean Baudlot
PRICE: £24.95 (UK)

Sweat it out with some Classic Arcade Action:


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