Sharkey's Moll is an Operation Wolf clone set in 1926 Chicago with a gangster theme. It was apparently titled originally Operation Shark before Zeppelin began to crap themselves as the game was developed, so it was changed to Sharkey's Moll instead.
At the start the game's menu screen is quite unique for a Zeppelin release, in that it has title music from Tiny Williams (Sound Images). In over 60 games listed under Zeppelin on the WoS archive, I believe only 7 of them had some form of title music, and most of them were done presumably by the author himself. So this having music from Tiny Williams, who had done Shinobi, NARC and Golden Axe beforehand, adds a bit of prestige in this game, and indeed the title music is excellent as I would have expected from Tiny, who was one of the best music composers in the 8-bit era.
But now to the game itself. And the first thing to note is this is an Operation Wolf clone, even down to copying its monochrome graphics, and making them yellow. So far it sounds like a carbon copy, which like programmer Brian Beuken states it was what Zeppelin told him to do. The graphics obviously aren't all the same though, the soldiers and tanks are replaced with gangsters and cars, and rather than grenades you have molotov cocktails to throw at your enemies.
The graphics aren't bad but it's quite hard to see at times. In Operation Wolf level 1 was yellow and it was fine though level 2 was dark green and it was hard to see. In Sharkey's Moll they have gone for a darker yellow and it's hard to see from the off. I actually think they missed a trick in not going for a black and white look, just like as if you were watching a old gangster movie, it would have made the game look a little more eyecatchy and a bit realistic.
The gameplay is as you would expect from an Operation Wolf clone, you shoot people, they shoot you back, you have your pickups which are ammo, bottles, machine gun and health crate, pretty much the same as Operation Wolf. The flaws in the game are most noticable here however. For instance, the crosshair moves much slower than in Operation Wolf, this make it so difficult to tackle so many enemies at once, by the time you hit one and go to reach another on the other side of the screen you've been hit like three times. This is incredibly annoying. The scrolling is also slower than in Operation Wolf which I think partially causes the slowness in the crosshair, because when you reach the end of the level and it stops scrolling, suddenly your crosshair speeds up.
Also, the game is slightly different in that in levels 1 and 2 you have to progress whilst not shooting the informer who appears in the closing stages of the level. This is fine at first but when you reach the end and it stops scrolling it can be a nuisance, because your informer may get in the way of a health crate you need to survive. If you do shoot the informer you have to do the whole level again.
It's not a bad clone but it's hardly a good one, it seems the game can't handle too much at one time which makes it play slowly, which makes it so difficult, a problem Operation Wolf hardly experienced. You know when they say that clones will almost always be inferior to the original? Sharkey's Moll is a good example.
