Producer: Starlight
Retail Price: £8.95
Author: Timothy Walter

Menacing aliens have entered our Universe through a rip in the space time continuum. Rhett Dexter is the only man who can stop their otherwise irrevocable dictatorship. To do that he must first gather nine of the 100 separated components of the Spatial Generator. Once these are reunited the rent in the space fabric can sealed.

Seated in his interstellar fighter, Rhett guides it horizontally and vertically, accelerating and braking, by watching his two-part split screen - enemy craft shown on the left, and his own on the right.

The fighter's position is shown by a flashing dot on the galactic compass at the top left of the screen, with the intersection of the crosshairs aligned with the distant space hole. A centrally spaced radar indicates the relative position of other craft, planets and generator components.

Armed with interchangeable weapons types, a red alert indicator warns of approaching alien, displaying their vulnerable points on a schematic at the base of the screen. Some enemies require several hits before they are destroyed, and for each one blasted points are awarded.

The fighters fuel supplies and the power of its protective shield are limited. Should fuel levels fall to zero the mission fails. But recharging and refuelling is undertaken by flying through the rotating vector squares on various planets - revealed when all enemy craft in the area have been blasted. During this stage up to four enemy ships may appear and attack, if they do Rhett must defend himself fast.

A countdown clock displays the time left before the aliens' domination of the Universe becomes inevitable. And it's a big place; any of the Universe's 256 sectors may be warped to, and searched for components, though this can only be done after refuelling or upon collection of at least one generator piece. The vital component parts are revealed on the main screen when all enemy aircraft in the sector have been eliminated.

After destruction, any pieces alien craft may have been carrying can be picked up by Rhett. When components are collected the fact is indicated at the bottom left of the screen. Only two pieces of the generator can be carried at one time, and these must be deposited at the hole before any other components can be collected. The hole consists of a nine square grid, generator parts plug the squares, when all are filled the universe is saved.

COMMENTS

Control keys: definable, up/down, left/right, fire and change weapon needed
Joystick: Kempston
Use of colour: monochromatic playing area
Graphics: slow moving vectors
Sound: uninspiring, no tunes, few spot FX
Skill levels: one, although two-player mode offers two variations
Screens: starscape

What we have here is a large amount of Dark Star and a bit of Elite all rolled into one rather boring vector graphic shoot 'em up. The fun is, of course, improved when choosing the two-player option, but I found the one player game repetitive and shallow. It must be said that the vector graphics are superbly done - very smooth, yet still quite fast. I realise that the play area has to be reduced for a two-player game, but I would like to have seen more of the enemy when playing on my own. Good to see a sound option as what noise is heard is worth turning off. I'm surprised that such a simple and monotonous game should be released at full price!
PAUL

A neat idea perhaps, but I don't think Dogfight has been implemented as well as it should have been. The basic gameplay is simple enough, although on one-player mode it isn't too compelling, and lasting appeal will be short lived as there's little variation throughout the game. The two-player mode is much more rewarding to play, because the split screen works well and the minimal use of graphics is hardly noticeable. If you have a friend to play with, it's not a bad little game but playing solo left me cold.
BEN

Dogfight looked as though it could have been a good game, but unfortunately, I thought it lacked quite a lot of playability. I enjoyed the first go, but that was just while I flew around and shot things to get a feel of the game. When you start looking for bits of the generator, though, it starts to get a bit more boring. The two-player mode makes it a bit more fun, but the graphics are still the best bit.
MIKE

Starlight
£8.99

Ha! Zap! Kapow! Another nasty eats the dust! It's the year 2187. All the scientists have suddenly discovered an anomaly in the Alpha Centauri sector! It's a very large hole - so large, in fact, that whole planets are falling into it. You're Rhett Dexter, a shuttle pilot and the sort of person who believes any old twaddle that's told to you - you know, things like fairies and such. You happened to read some obscure little prophesy that said there's going to be an invasion from another dimension! Oh no!!

Your ancestors believed so closely in this twaddle that they even had a hundred pieces of a special force field constructed, which were able to close holes like these, and they hid them out in the galaxy. However, the old ones have left, or died, or something equally unhelpful, and no-one knows whether the stories were true or just the product of a long drinking session. After a similar drinking session you decide oh what the heck, take a couple of weeks off, and go off to find these pieces. Grabbing a few of your mates for company, you steal the most supa-dupa spaceship you can find and off you go.

On my first sight of Dogfight 2187 it looked to be a cross between Top Gun and Elite. The graphics, although they're vector, are a delight to watch - when the game's loaded, f'rinstance, each alien spacecraft zooms onto the screen and spins around in all directions. This is one of the best pieces of animation I've seen on the Speccy yet, 'cos while the spaceship's doing its stuff, information is also coming through on the side. Five minutes later I was still sitting mesmerised watching the new craft come on, and this, for me, made it worth the money.

After snapping out of the trance, you then press a key for the players. There's a variety of options - one player, two player, or two players against the computer. The rough idea is to zoom into battle, kick some aliens around and pick up a piece of the shield. Usually it's as simple as that, though sometimes, at the end of a battle, you'll see an enormous blob coming towards you. This, I found, is a planet, and it'll cause a freak wormhole in space. If you fly through it, your strength and shields go up.

Your control panel is chock full of interesting gadgetmewotzits, including a compass, the number of pieces you've collected (to make a force field you need nine pieces, but you can only carry two at a time), your fuel and shield indicator, screen describing the ship in your sights, a clock (you only have thirty minutes to accomplish your mission) and a radar.

Dogfight is large to say the least - two hundred and fifty six screens in all, each a sector, and with countless baddies to vaporise. Although there are a hundred pieces to pick up, you don't need all of these, so this makes the game a bit easier. Miles better than Top Gun, and the graphics (dare I say it) are better than Elite. If you're into a good shoot 'em up, this is the one for you!

Label: Starlight
Author: "Tim"
Price: £8.95
Joystick: Kempston
Memory: 48K/128K
Reviewer: Jim Douglas

It's the 22nd century again and there's a hole in the universe and all kinds of undesirables are making use of this unguarded entrance and flooding in without paying their SI toll or something. It's also Dogfight 2187 from Starlight.

Rhett Dexter, border patrolman, it is your mission, should you choose to accept it, to block the gap in space-time continuum and prevent any more illegal aliens from gaining access to our universe. Mrs T would be proud of him.

Right. That's the plot out of the way. The gameplay - as well as the usual one and two- player options offers a mode where two players can play against the computer. Unusual and could be great fun.

Rather like some of the motor racing games the screen is split in half (almost) and each player gets to look out of one window on the outside world.

When you actually get going, it emerges that Dogfight 2187 is a 3D game with not a great deal of originality. As you fly around (which is a little tough to get used to as the up and down commands seem to have been reversed) lots of geometrical alien things will zoom out of the inky depths of space and attack you. The little scanner at the bottom of the screen will give you an illustration of the alien head-on and a marker will indicate a weak point on its surface, giving you an idea of which point to aim for with your laserfire.

Apart from destroying the aliens that have already slipped through the hole, your task is to stop any more from making their way in. The best way to do this is by collecting the nine pieces of the Spatial Generator which will generate some space material and magically patch up the hole. Some of the pieces of the Spatial Generator are on board enemy aircraft and can be only obtained by blowing up the alien and then scooping up all the bits and pieces of machinery.

Thankfully any nine of the hundred pieces which have been strewn around the play area can be used.

Once you've found a bit of machine, you've got to fly to the hole and drop it off which will cause one ninth of the grid at the bottom of the screen to disappear, thus signifying the hole's decreasing size.

The gameplay is fast if not entirely furious. There isn't much of an impression of damage being inflicted by the aliens, as they fire rather weedy laser lines at you, and you fire big bolts of fire.

The problem with games of this sort is that, since they rely on superb speed or intricate problems, the graphics are essentially not particularly interesting to look at. While Dogfight gets pretty close to attaining the speed, it certainly doesn't make it in the intricacy stakes. In fact, it gets a little tedious after a while, the only real difference in the game as you progress being that the aliens become marginally more angry and commonplace.

It's certainly well worth a look and the two-player plus computer play option is novel.

MACHINES: CBM 64/Spectrum/Amstrad
SUPPLIER: Starlight Software
PRICE: £8.99 (Spectrum)/£9.99 (CBM 64)
VERSION TESTED: Spectrum

Now this is the mission. It is 2187 and your name is Rhett Dexter (sorry about that). An anomaly has appeared in the Alpha Centuri sector, a hole through which come invasion craft from another dimension. The only way to close the hole is with nine of the one hundred pieces of the warp field generator hidden by the old ones throughout the universe. You steal a new interstellar fighter and take off for the stars...

Basically, Dogfight 2187 is another space shoot-'em-up. At each screen the player has to shoot down all the "invasion craft" in the sector, which gains him one piece of generator. In some sectors he also gets the chance to refuel in the "rotating vector graphic squares" of a nearby planet. He can then warp into the next sector to take on the next set of invaders, eventually coming to the sector containing the hole, which he plugs with his piece of generator and goes back for more. All this is run by a thirty-minute real-time clock, which is the time he has to complete the mission.

The graphics are disappointing, the enemy fighters being only shown in wire-frame, and the planets as a series of concentric squares. Anyone who is not a very fast shot will also find themselves running out of fuel and ammunition long before they can find a planet. The instruction booklet (in four languages) is no help at all in discovering how to prevent this.

The big appeal of the game is that it offers two side-by-side cockpit displays, and can be played three-handed: by one player against the computer, two players against each other, or two players against the computer.

Spectrum, Commodore, Amstrad
Publisher: Starlight Software

The 2187 in the title refers to the year in which this game takes place and not necessarily to the fact that there have been 2187 other vector graphics shoot-'em-up games before this one. They can't all be winners, and Dogfight 2187 has both good and bad points to distinguish it from the rest of the field. A potential good point was the promise of sound effects by Tony Crowther, though on the Spectrum version sent for review these were understandably less than spectacular, sounding more like a budgie breaking wind.

Undeterred by this, hero Rhett Dexter must comb the galaxy (sounds quite a hairy job) to find the 100 pieces of a warp field generator to make Alpha Centauri safe for all eternity. For reasons burled somewhere in the page of preamble, the generator has been scattered about the place by a group called the Old Ones, which must be Rik and Nell and the gang with added bus passes.

Not that any of this tosh matters, because what you must do is fly through space blasting everything that's hostile and collecting the jettisoned cargo so you can move from one section of the galaxy to another.

Dogfight 2187 differs a little in having one or two player modes. In two player mode you can either battle against each other or join forces against the micro. The top section of the screen is split in half, showing the view from each player's ship, and below this is the usual range of instruments and flashing lights which, if you're like me, you'll ignore for a while until forced to read the manual to find out why you keep getting killed or running out of fuel. In my case this was because I was shooting down the rotating squares where you can both refuel and replenish your defence shields.

A neat feature of the control panel is the large centre square which identifies the craft you've got in your sights and gives you something to aim for by pointing out the weak spots in its armour. This has to be more for show than effect though in a game of fast-moving vector graphics when those strange swirling shapes come at you at high speed. Speed is one thing this game does have, the action being fast and only slowing up just occasionally when the screen fills with enemy craft faster than you can blast them. And if the ordinary speed isn't enough then there's a fast-play option as well.

Not quite in the Elite or Starglider class, and I've a feeling it might not have the staying power of those; still, it's got a good two-player option and offers a reasonable fast blast.