Amiga Games - Panza Kick Boxing - Classic Commodore Amiga Game

Panza Kick Boxing
This is a classic game on the Commodore Amiga, that for me never quite got the recognition it deserved.

Released by the French company Loriciel in 1990, this game was met with mainly positive reviews, but for some reason never quite acheived the same level of fame as the likes of Body Blows or (the admittedly excellent arcade game) Mortal Kombat.

Still, for those that played it back in the day it must surely be up there with the best of the beat-em-up gaming genre from the 8-bit and 16-bit era. We're talking the likes of Way of the Exploding Fist, Full Contact and Barbarian.

It was also endorsed by Andre Panza (hence the name of the game) who was champion kick-boxer at the time.

One of the best beat em ups on the Amiga

What set this apart from other beat em up arcade games of the era was the customisability available to the player as well as a variety of fighters and moves to choose from.

Once a fighter was selected you were able to customise him with various moves. Each fighter could be equiped with thirteen moves picked from a total of fifty five - allowing the player to experiment with different fighting styles and techniques.

All of the moves available for selected were geniune moves from the real art making the game a geniune representation of kick-boxing appealing to fans of the real art and gamers alike.

Train your fighter to the max

You also had to train your game character; you could choose the amount of strength, stamina (resistance) and speed training (reflexes) prior to a fight with various exercises in the gym hall. This would determine how much damage you could doll out, how much punishment you could take as well as your speed around the ring.

A round-kick to the face is always a stinger

The actual arcade action in the game was well implemented too. Each fighter was very well animated and moved in a life-like manner. Punches and kicks were textbook perfect and there great in-fight moments as a fighter was doubled up from a blow to the ribs or dollops of spittle would fly from a hook to the head. Great stuff!

The aim of this classic game was to fight your way from the bottom of the rankings to the top to eventually take on and defeat the champion. With a huge variety of moves to pick from, increasing your fighters skill and superb animation this was a game that would keep you coming back for more.

All in all this was a great game that not even the referee's annoying voice could spoil!

That's a slightly camp top for a kick-boxer

We recommend getting hold of the real Amiga hardware - but if not then download an Amiga emulator and download Panza Kick Boxing. 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: 1990
RELEASED BY: Loriciel
DEVELOPER(S): Nicolas Massonnat, Marco de Flores, Michel Winogradoff
PRICE: £24.99 - UK

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Amiga Games - Pinball Dreams - Classic Commodore Amiga Game

Pinball Dreams Amiga

I was never a fan of pinball games until this came along for the Commodore Amiga.

With wonderful graphics, nice music and superb physics this classic game came straight out of the amusement arcades was (and still is) a joy to play.

Digital Illusions gave us Amiga gamers this title in 1992 and it was certainly something a little different from the mainstream, and once more the good old Amiga gave us pure arcade atmosphere in the comfort of our own homes...

There were four pinball tables within this game to play through, each with it's own flashing lights, bonuses and power-ups.

The tables were superbly designed and contained authentic clicks, blips, whirring noises and any other bells and whistles you can think of that made you feel as though you were actually on a real pinball table.

The attention to detail was fantastic. The ball moved around in a realistic manner and even the initial launching of the ball onto the table was power adjustable, you could belt it in at fult pelt if you wanted or gently ease it onto the table, it was all down to you.

With the myriads of bonuses on each table there was plenty to get your teeth into here. Letters to light up, targets to hit, sticky points which allowed you to aim the ball.... you could even tilt the table via the space bar! Too much tilting resulted in your 'turn' being revoked though.

This classic Amiga game was a masterpiece of programming and design. Each table was excellently crafted, the sound effects were spot on, the ball physics were astonishingly realistic and the differing in-game music per table kept things fresh.

It was also possible for up to eight players to take part in the game, allowing you to host your very own mini pinball tournaments which was great fun. Food, drink and pinball dreams was a great way to while away a cold evening in Carlisle I can tell ya!
If you like pinball, and even if you don't, this game is still very playable and addictive. Try it, you may even become a pinball wizard like me..... ;-)

We recommend getting hold of the real Amiga hardware - but if not then download an Amiga emulator and download Pinball Dreams. 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 (Pinball)
RELEASE DATE: 1992
RELEASED BY: 21st Century Entertainment
DEVELOPER(S): Digital Illusions
PRICE: £25.99 (UK)

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Amiga Games - Project X - Classic Commodore Amiga Game

Project X Amiga
Here we go with yet another polished arcade game inspired by that classic shoot em up that ate your 10p's, Nemesis.

The unimagitively titled Project X was releasd for the Commodore Amiga in 1992 and was developed by the mostly good, Team 17 Software.

Graphically beautiful with nice sounds effects and a decent soundtrack, this arcade game had all the ingredients to be a classic in the genre. Sadly is just fell short just a little...

In the usual arcade game fashion there were a number of levels to play through, lots of powerups to collect and three different ships for the player to choose from at the beginning of the game.

The aim of the game was to navigate each of the four levels (which scrolled from right to left) and destroy the 'boss' once you had reached the end.

All of the usual powerups were in there, increase craft speed, increase firepower (which could be guns, plasma, lazers or magma cannons), install 'side shots', homing missiles or invoke a handy 'stealth' mode.

Nice voice-overs would tell you which 'powerup' item you were on (the game used the Nemesis style of powerup selection) and then which selection you had chosen.

The voice-overs were pretty neat and I remember on the second level the computer would tell you 'beware, storm!' moments before a lightning strike would fork the sky. It was all highly polished stuff.

Despite the superbly drawn backgrounds (level two was very pretty), nice variety of powerups and crafts, the decent sound effects and cool voice over effects the game just lacked a certain something. The absence of an in-game soundtrack was noticeable by it's... absence, especially when compared to the likes of Apidya. You did get end of level 'boss' music and in-between level music though.

On top of all of that this game was insanely difficult. Now I regard myself as a pretty good arcade gamer, having completed the likes of Green Beret on the Speccy, Menace, First Samurai and Smash TV (to name a few), but I could never get past Level 3 on this one.

The real flaw to the game was the fact than when you lost a life most of your powerups which you had worked so hard to accumulate, were stripped away from your craft. On level 2 and onwards it was almost pointless to continue as your underpowered craft was hopelessly outmatched by the hordes of aliens which swarmed across the screen.

If the loss of a life had been a little more forgiving then the game would have been a lot more playable. It has all the elements in there: Great presentation, lovely backdrops, smooth scrolling, suitable arcade style sound effects and great weapons to mix and match. Some of the attention to detail was fantastic too; take level three where the lava and fire actually attracts your homing missiles, this was brilliant programming.

There was even a nice fast scrolling bonus stage (if you imagine Scramble without the enemy ships then jacked up on steroids you'll get the idea).

It's a shame that with a little tweaking it could have been a true classic Amiga game. As it stands this game is well remembered by Amiga gamers but most will have a few other shmups that they prefer.

We recommend getting hold of the real Amiga hardware - but if not then download an Amiga emulator and download Project X. 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 (shoot em up)
RELEASE DATE: 1992
RELEASED BY: Team 17
DEVELOPER(S): Andreas Tadic, Rico Holmes, Stefan Boberg, music by Allister Brimble & Bjorn Lynne
PRICE: £25.99 - UK

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Amiga Games - Paperboy - Commodore Amiga retro game

Amiga Games Paperboy
Another Commodore Amiga arcade conversion from Elite Software, who were pretty well respected for creating good quality versions of popular arcade games on home computers.

Atari had released Paperboy into the amusement arcades back in 1984, and it captured the imagination due to it's different concept and rather cool 'handlebar' controls.

Because of this it holds fond memories for quite a few retro gamers.

Elite software (who had already succesfully converted Bombjack to the Amiga) won the license and yet again managed to produce a good conversion from Arcade to home 16-bit machines.


The game involved controlling a paperboy and as you may have guessed, deliver newspapers to houses. Sounds like fun eh? Well, it was a lot more fun than a real paper-round, I can tell you!

This game had stood out as being different when it was released, and the mid-eighties BMX craze helped to increase it's popularity. The only problem with the Amiga version was when it was released. It came out in the Autumn on 1989 - but by this point the original game was a little 'old hat' and the BMX craze was on the wane.

Anyway, riding your BMX you would pedal up a scrolling street (rendered in a nice classic isometric view) and throw papers from your bike to the houses that required delivery. You would do this by hurling the paper into the residents mailbox to score points. If you missed the house delivery then the residents would not want a delivery the following day.

It was possible get your own back on these un-subscribers though. Pedalling through the diagonally scrolling landscape, points could also be gained by firing a newspaper missile through the window of a house with a darkened door (a non subscriber). Well aimed newspapers could result in broken window panes, chopped up tomb stones and ruffled dustbin lids. All pretty hilarious stuff.

Anyone with a nasty streak would enjoy zapping grannies out of their bath-chairs (accompanied by a nice ZAP! graphic) as they enjoyed the early morning air, riders could be knocked off mopeds and flower beds could be flattened. Sounds a bit like my street come to think of it.

The papers (or ammo) in your delivery bag were displayed on a panel to the side of the screen, and extra papers could be collected by cycling over the boxes of newsprint dotted around the pavements. These top-ups were usually in hard to reach places and required some cute cycling to collect them unscathed.

There was more to the game than just hurling papers around the houses though. Careful cycling was needed to negotiate a variety of obstacles including dustbins, rogue rolling tyres, garden ornaments and even fire hydrants.

Pensioners would seem to walk into your path deliberately and workmen would not hear you cycling along because they were wearing ear-plugs. Skateboarders were tough to avoid as they raced around at high speed, and exploding bombs (it was a particularly rough neighbourhood) would also crop up from time to time.

Contact with any of these obstacles resulted in a collision and the loss of one of your five lives. A scrolling message would appear informing you of what a silly Paperboy you had just been.

The game took place over each day of the week and the paper-round had to be completed before you could head up to the BMX track which was located at the end of town. For some reason targets were dotted around the track and bonus points could be collected for hitting them with a well thrown newspaper.

At the end of the day's delivery you would be shown a report on your progress:

For every paper wrongly delivered the house would cancel its order and if too many of the houses un-subscribed then you get your marching orders and it was game over. It was possible to claw subscribers back by delivering all papers on a round though.

The game did get more difficult as each days of the week went by. If you made it through the week then the game was completed - which was no mean feat.

This retro game had been highly anticipated years prior on 8-bit machines due to the popularity of the arcade version. The main drawback then and still was the lack of the 'handlebar' controls (which did detract from the game slightly).

One thing that the Amiga accomplished was matching the arcade graphics perfectly- Paperboy on the ZX Spectrum had been monochromatic. The game was playable and fun, and was a very good rendition of the original from Atari. The scrolling on the Amiga was nice and smooth too - as was to be expected. The name 'Paperboy' ensured that it was a reasonable hit.

This game is really a product of it's era - as in the mid 1980's. By 1989 more complex games had been and were being developed. Paperboy still has a degree of playability - and is fun for a little while.

We recommend getting hold of the real Amiga hardware but if not then download an Amiga emulator and download Paperboy. 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: Autumn of 1989
RELEASED BY: Elite Software
DEVELOPER(S): Martin W. Ward and Richard Frankish
PRICE: £19.99 - UK

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