Tag Archives: aliens

Total Carnage, Arcade

The spiritual successor to Smash TV (in the same way that Smash TV was the spiritual predecessor to Robotron 2084), and a brilliant overhead shooter with 360 degree blasting action.

Continue reading Total Carnage, Arcade

Alien Syndrome, Arcade

Sega‘s 1987 arcade shoot ’em up Alien Syndrome is a difficult game. Even with quicksaves I can only (be bothered to) get to the end of level two. Which must explain why many of the Alien Syndrome videos on YouTube are cheat videos… No one can be bothered to play it properly single-player.

Continue reading Alien Syndrome, Arcade

Half-Life 2, PC

Half-Life 2 was first released by Valve Corporation in 2004. It was such a giant leap forward for games in general – not just first-person shooters – that its reverberations are still being felt today.

Half-Life (one) is a brilliant game, but Half-Life 2 completely blows it out of the water.

Continue reading Half-Life 2, PC

Pastfinder, Commodore 64

David Lubar‘s relatively obscure 1984 classic, Pastfinder, is a weird vertically-scrolling shooter in which you control a spider-like craft that can crawl, shoot and jump, and you must explore a radioactive landscape picking up artefacts from a mysterious planet.

Continue reading Pastfinder, Commodore 64

Rescue On Fractalus, Commodore 64

LucasFilm Games‘ classic space shooter, Rescue On Fractalus, was first released on Atari 8-bit computers in March 1984, and this Commodore 64 version came a year later, in 1985.

Continue reading Rescue On Fractalus, Commodore 64

Dropzone, Commodore 64

Archer MacLean‘s seminal Commodore 64 shooter, Dropzone is like a cross between Defender and, erm, Defender, but with more realistic graphics. And slightly different gameplay. But the principles are pretty much the same: super-fast, super-smooth, side-scrolling shooting. Avoid touching anything – or it’s instant death.

Continue reading Dropzone, Commodore 64

Exile, Commodore 64

Jeremy Smith and Peter Irvin‘s groundbreaking Exile first came out on the BBC Model B in 1988 and was later converted to other systems. Including for the Commodore 64.

Continue reading Exile, Commodore 64

Contra III: The Alien Wars, Super Nintendo

Arguably the best instalment in the infamous Konami Contra franchise, Contra III (aka Super Probotector in Europe) is a balls-to-the-wall run-and-gun, side-scrolling shooter than can be played one or simultaneous two-player.

Continue reading Contra III: The Alien Wars, Super Nintendo