Mucky lot aren't they, humans? Billowing out loadsa yukky pollution all over the place. Well, 'environment friendly' is obviously an unknown quantity in this world (whoever heard of a green robot anyway). Mark Caswell dons his gas mask and takes a trip into the future...

Mirrorsoft
£10.99

Since the start of the Industrial Revolution in the 1700s mankind has been destroying its planet, and by the year 2067 there's not a lot left. This is where this is set: in a world very different to ours for is it?) - Earth is dying and only the privileged few will be saved.

The lucky survivors flee to the hills and leave the cities in the care of Wolverine robots. Scientists reckon the pollution will disappear in a decade or two, with the Wolverines coping till then. But a band of strange robots, known as the Scavengers, take over New York and erect a huge domed building: The Furnace, which begins to create even more pollution (chain smoking robots?). As the only surviving Wolverine, damaged and suffering from a lack of memory, you must locate and destroy The Furnace to save New York

GO FOR IT, WOLFIE!

The three level game starts with a trip through the old New York Subway to the otherwise sealed off Furnace. This first part is viewed side on, and is a horizontally scrolling shoot-'em-up with the Wolverine up against many weird and wonderful creatures. Wolfie ain't too hot in the weapon stakes, but as you thunder along the dank subway tunnels, weapon power-ups can be found. Contact with the Scavengers or their bullets depletes your energy bar, but there are power pick-ups along the way.

Level two takes you to the streets of New York where Woffie has to find the components to rebuild his onboard computer. The required bits and bobs are scattered around, so extensive searching is needed. When all parts are assembled you must find the scientist, known only as Tank to get him to restore your memory. All the action in this part is viewed head-on, with the streets coming towards you as you move.

The final level is set in The Furnace, and it's a horizontally scrolling shoot-'em up again. Luckily, the return of your memory means your full weapons systems come back on line. Can you defeat the Scavengers and save the world?

SOUNDS GOOD BUT…

After a few games I was ready to throw the Speccy out of the nearest window! Level one is so tough I suspect most people will be tempted to give up very soon after sitting down to play Robozone.

Graphically the game is OK: both the main sprite and the attackers are large (but rather crudely drawn). The backdrops on level one we a bit samey and, as it's so difficult, a subway wall is all you'll see for a while. A bit too tricky to be heartily recommended.

MARK [50%]

Robozone is strange. The storyline's great, and the graphics and sound are packed with atmosphere and detail. The only trouble is you can't get anywhere! You run around the different subway corridors on level one, shooting all the nasty insects and robots and collecting the power ups. Then suddenly it dawns on you - you're back where you started with nothing to show for it! The animation on the main character is excellent and very reminiscent of the ED-209 from Robocop and as a basic shoot-'em-up Robozone is fine. Completing a level is a matter of mapping out exactly where to go and moving up and down the tunnels until you find the exit. If you're a shoot-'em-up fan and have the patience to map this may be for you. The game just needs to be more immediately playable.
NICK [65%]

Image Works
£10.99 cass
Reviewer: James Leach

It's all our fault! We never should have started the Industrial Revolution! Now it's the year 2067, horrible fumes are belching out of all the factories and into everybody's lungs, and all the people in charge have built City Ships, sailed them out to sea and are now living in luxury bobbing up and down on the beautiful briny! What a swizz!

Of course, the common people have been left in the city to fend for themselves, and everything's pretty unpleasant. Not just litter-in-the-streets unpleasant, but buildings-falling-down-around-your-ears unpleasant. Not exactly what you'd call 'home sweet home'. Thank god they've got the Wolverine to look after them...

CRIKEY! THEY SOUND A BIT SCARY!

Actually, they're not. In fact, they're just like ED 209 droids in Robocop - two legs, an armoured shelland a massive great machine gun. The one difference is that the Wolverine are nice robots! They're also big and fast, and you control one of them. It wanders around the different levels of the wrecked subway (that's the Underground to us), protecting New York (and some of the nicer poor people) by fighting lots of (bad) people, mutant birds and giant beetles. They're all in mono, but they're a decent size and move well.

Your main opponents are a bunch of wicked spindly robots called Scavengers who want to destroy everything. They're pretty easy to get rid of but (but! But!) they come at you in their thousands. The basic idea is that you travel around looking for the central dome where all these nasties are coming from. You move between levels by leaping or dropping through big holes smashed in the floor, and then, erm, get blocked by loads of dead-ends. This is pretty frustrating, so it might be an idea to make a map of the whole thing. (And when you do, send it into Linda at Tipshop. Ta! Ed)

There are little boxes the ED 209 (sorry, Wolverine) can squat down on to replenish his energy - only watch out for the pesky mutants who swarm around them, making your life a pain in the bot! Ahem. (Luckily there's a autofire on the gun, so you just keep your thumb down and give them what for!)

OOOH, IT'S SO EXCITING!

Robozone's certainly dead atmospheric (and rather depressing because of it). There are loads of nice little touches like broken junk all over the place and polluted acid-rain dripping from the ceiling (which knocks off your energy if it touches you) and, as action-packed shoot-'em-ups go, it works well. You don't get a second's peace, as there are literally trillions of things to shoot up and collect (so you'll be jolly thankful for the increased weapon power you get later on).

What's annoying is that the screen doesn't seem to be wide enough to see what's coming (there could be anything in those horrid underlevels). I suppose this means that it's an exciting game, but I was a bit cautious about wandering off too far! (Pansy. Ed)

If you fancy yourself as a bit of a violent caretaker then this isn't bad at all (although it would have been nice to have a choice of weapons and some more varied mutants to blast). It's not easy by any means. You have to put in a fair few hours to master it, so the fact you don't always get bunged back to the beginning when you lose your lives is quite a welcome touch.

Label: Image Works/Mirrorsoft
Memory: 48K/128K
Price: 11.99 Tape
Reviewer: Alan Dykes

Whirr click, target acquired and weapons locked; TERMINATE!

Robozone is a bleak future world where mankind has made like a banana and spilt (oh no, Big Al becoming a hippy! - ED), driven from the over-populated cities of planet Earth by toxic waste and pollution. Not all were rich enough or intelligent enough to escape hough. Protecting the cities until the chosen ones can return are though robot squaddies known as 'Wolverines'. With bodies of steel and minds of pure silicon, the Wolverines have until recently, only had to deal with marauding bands of mutant humans, abandoned in the ruins by their governments, but now a newer, much more dangerous threat has emerged.... the Pollutant Scavengers.

Pollutants come in many forms, all shaped like insects but varying from easy to kill bumble bee nasties to die hard stick insect storm troopers, the common denominator being that they are all nasty and are all trying to take control of the city.

The year is 2067 and the Robozone is New York - and it is in the long decayed subways of this once magnificent city that our Wolverine's mission begins, fighting his way through the maze of tunnels and passages, collecting power ups and weapon upgrades until he finds a way up onto the mean streets above.

Once streetside in New York the Wolverine's task is to find parts for a super computer he once possessed but which was destroyed in battle. In order to defeat the Scavengers he needs this device, known as the Oracle. Having pieced this together he must then go to the final task of destroying the Pollutants headquarters; the Furnace. This is what they've been hiding all along, a gigantic factory in what used to be Time Square, designed to seriously pollute the whole world, destroying all human life and leaving the planet to the Scavengers.

The first level with it's horizontally and vertically scrolling action is superbly animated, your Wolverine looks and acts like a Star Wars scout walker and is going to please a lot of people. The second level street scenes have a forward looking aspect which is less attractive, however the action returns in the final level. Close to its glorious beginning the finale is quite a shoot up. Although the levels are large it's a pity there are only three, but if you're into good looking graphic action Robozone is certainly worth a try.

GARTH:
Maybe they should've just made a game out of the first level which is excellent. But instead, in the name of variety, there is a second level that I find weak and tacky in comparison to the excellent graphics and animation of the other two levels.