Spectrum Compilations: - Korrupted Memory: Imagine's Konami Arcade Collection

Looking back at these compilations has revealed that some fond memories are best left at that. When I spotted the Imagine compilation Konami Arcade Collection on EBay and eagerly snapped it up, I remember thinking that was a great compilation and that I spent a lot of time playing its contents when it was first released.
Unlike the similarly themed Taito Coin op Hits, however, this one doesn't quite deserve those rose-tinted spectacles...

Shao-Lin's Road
I loved the arcade machine but avoided the Spectrum version first time round thanks to a mediocre review in Crash (think it was 68% from memory). It's a multi platform beat 'em up and is actually really good and I can't quite understand why it didn't get a better score - maybe it just got lost amongst the Kung-fu games doing the rounds then. The controls are responsive and the action frantic.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Jail Break
Things soon take a turn for the worse on this comp. Again, I greatly enjoyed the original, an entertaining twist on the common space shooter genre of the time. The Spectrum version, by Andrew Glaister was particularly poor on several levels chiefly the collision detection was awful and the main character, who moved far too sluggishly. It's a shame because the graphics were ok, leaving me to churlishly suppose what legendary programmer Joffa Smith would have done with this conversion...
Hit/Miss: MISS

Green Beret
I'm not going to go on about Bert again but suffice to say at this point his constant appearance on compilations was starting to prove a bit tiresome. Still a hit though!
Hit/Miss: HIT

Yie Ar Kung Fu
Another compilation staple, YAKFu (as I like to call it) saw you playing a character called Oolong, charged with defeating various baddies in one-on-one battles. It has its detractors, but I loved it, finding the variation of enemies entertaining, even though it lacked the complexity of, say, Way of the Exploding Fist - or WOTEF as I liked to call it....
Hit/Miss: HIT

Yie Ar Kung Fu II
Its sequel, however, was rubbish.
Hit/Miss: MISS

Ping Pong
Another great game, but one I'd played to death already thanks to another compilation. The key element with Ping Pong was changing the arcade gameplay - the bat now tracked the ball automatically. Great fun, if a little limited.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Hypersports
Joffa Smiff returns, in what many consider to be the finest multi-event sports game on the Speccy. It's certainly one of the best arcade conversions with a nice varied balance of events from timing and skill events such as Archery and Skeet Shooting, to keyboard mashers like
Weight Lifting and swimming.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Nemesis
Now I know I said I liked some of the other arcade games, but Nemesis I LOVED. This was my shooter of choice in the arcades and I wince when I recall how many 10p pieces I must have stuffed feverishly into its coin slot. As a result I bought the Spectrum version before reading the Crash review, a mistake I never made again. Programmed, like Jail Break, by Konami themselves, you'd have thought they'd prepare a loving conversion. Instead we get a bastardized version with only one extra weapon available at a time, smaller levels and that old favourite flaw, awful collision detection. The game moves at a sluggish pace as well, meaning Nemesis was a huge disappointment to me.
Hit/Miss: MISS

Mikie
Another marmite game, Mikie was a Crash Smash and despite an in-built natural resistance to its charms (I wanted to shoot aliens, not collect hearts!) I found it a playable and entertaining conversion.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Jackal
I never played the arcade game, but its pitch was clearly "Commando-in-a-jeep". The Spectrum version bears very little similarity to the arcade original in every major respect: the graphics, the
gameplay, the sound and the level design are all different, and worse, making this one of the poorest Speccy arcade conversions.
Hit/Miss: MISS

Hits: 6
Misses: 4

So, on the surface of it not bad value, but the real truth is somewhat hidden by the above statistic. If you take the hits, many of them - Hypersports, Mikie, Ping Pong, Green Bert and Yie Ar Kung Fu had been around for some time and already appeared on Imagine's previous Konami compilation, Konami's Coin op Hits. The newer games were all released on Konami's own label, and ironically this was when the quality disappeared down into the basement. We can only imagine wistfully what the talents of our dearly departed Joffa would have done with Nemesis, Jail Break and Jackal.

Spectrum Compilations: All that Glitters - US Gold's The Gold Collection

Compilations only really started to appear from 1985 as publishers realised there was a gold mine in rehashing old titles together in one set for a bargain price. US Gold, after the mediocre Arcade Hall of Fame set, went to town with The Gold Collection, splashing out on an oversized black plastic box with the first of the ingot-style inlays. So did the Gold Collection live up to its name?

Beach Head
Beach Head was one of US Gold's first releases, and whilst not necessarily one of the most complex games ever, the variety of levels and superb standard of presentation certainly set it above other games of the time. I've actually always enjoyed it, from the tricky short-cut where you have to gude your fleet through a narrow channel laden with mines, to the final shoot out with the big gun.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Tapper
Never had much time for the arcade conversion Tapper: think I was more interested in shooting things! It's different I suppose, but playing it now it seems very limited and lacking in long term value.
Hit/Miss: MISS

Zaxxon
US Gold's conversion of the arcade classic was an ok job - nothing more. It was surely better than many of the poor imitations that were on the market and contained US Gold's already renowned excellent standard of presentation. As a shmup fan I liked it, but not as much as...
Hit/Miss: HIT



Blue Max
Blue Max is essentially a Zaxxon clone, with the action transposed to a World War 1 setting and the player in control of a biplane instead of a spaceship. I liked it a lot as instead of one hit dead, you had an energy bar; more playable and more realistic
Hit/Miss: HIT




Buck Rogers and the Planet of Zoom
Another shooter! This compilation really was one for action fans, and Buck Rogers, a maligned "3D" style shmup was one of my faves from back in the day. The graphics were colourful and impressive, the gameplay fast and frantic. Planet of Zoom hasn't aged well, but I still dig it out every now and then for a bit of shooting fun - flaws and all.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Spy Hunter
Again a game that has its critics - mainly the lack of a decent storyline and an old-fashioned lack of a proper ending - but this is defying the fact that Spy Hunter is huge fun. I used to play it for hours and hours, simply speeding around, ramming cars of the road and utilising the cool oil slicks before crashing off a bridge...
Hit/Miss: HIT

Hits: 5
Misses: 1 (a harsh one as well!)

Spectrum Compilations: Return Fire - Ocean's Live Ammo

It was only a matter of time before mega-publishers Ocean dipped their toes in the compilation market, and this effort from 1986 was one of their first. Boasting 5 games, Live Ammo was obviously themed around shooting games (or War-based games) and whetted their appetite for more game collections - it was soon eclipsed by the magnificent, um, Magnificent Seven. But that's another story...

Green Beret
Joffa Smith's classic run 'n' stab was rock hard but superb fun. Everything about the game oozed quality from the lovely scrolling to the perfectly balanced controls and nicely animated graphics. Green Beret IS ridiculously tough in places, but it's good fun to practice!
Hit/Miss: HIT


The Great Escape
Whilst this Denton Designs classic didn't quite fit the ethos of the compilation (you didn't get to shoot anything, but I suppose you did get shot at...), you can't really argue when it's a game of this quality. Sporting the iconic hands on barbed wire by Ocean regular Bob Wakelin (apparently not one of his favourite pieces), the game's objective was to escape the prison camp whilst continuing the routine of daily life, IE roll call, meal times and bed time. It was very atmospheric thanks to the stark black and white graphics and an engrossing piece of software.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Rambo: First Blood Part 2
This game was one of the first I played on the Speccy and I used to love it. Unusually free-roaming for the era, the player took control of Rambo in his attempt to free his colleague from the dastardly red devils. It's reasonably good fun, but extremely tough and the non-linear aspect can ironically be a bit annoying as you wander around trying to find your next objective. The graphics are very sparse (as is the sound), but Rambo just scrapes a HIT status.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Top Gun
Expectations were low for this one but Ocean delivered a decent, if limited game, that scraped a Crash Smash (and cover) with 90%. Top Gun is unsurprisingly a flight simulator with little attention paid towards the "simulator" part - it's all about shooting down the vector-graphic
enemies before they got you. To be frank, despite a decent 2-player mode, it was overrated as it lacked enough variety to really warrant a score over 70%. Still, not a bad shooter to keep you occupied for a short while.
Hit/Miss: HIT

Army Moves
Oh Dinamic, Dinamic, those lovely screen shots hid such terrors for any young Spectrum gamer! Colourful, action-packed games were their speciality and they did indeed look great in screenshots. However almost all of their games were so hideously unbalanced in gameplay that I never bothered with any of them after this. They didn't worry too much about colour clash either!
Hit/Miss: MISS

Hits: 4
Misses: 1