Producer: Gargoyle Games
Memory Required: 48K
Retail Price: £5.95
Language: Machine code
Author: Roy Carter, Greg Follis

Gargoyle Games is a new company situated in Birmingham, and Ad Astra (To the Stars!) is their first game. It's quite a debut too.

This is an arcade space combat game which features very large graphics, all depicted in a very solid three dimensions with perspective. There are 20 segments, with each segment being made up of seven phases. At the start of each phase and after a lost life, large planetoid-shaped asteroids hurtle from the depths of space at the player's ship. These cannot be shot but must be dodged. As the last of these is vanishing under your ship (hopefully), alien craft appear as dots in the distance and then swoop down on you firing bolts. Five different types of aliens attack in eight different formations, firing two types of laser bolts at you.

This is followed by a large mine layer, which crosses the screen, loosing streams of rotating mines. These should be blown up as soon as possible because if they blow up themselves they fire off bolts at you, which come across the screen, making two directions filled with flying weaponry. Then come the spinning saucers, also firing at you. These need to be hit several times before they really blow up.

The last phase is a Way Station. Before the sixth phase starts, a security code appears for the next Way Station, and as the station appears, the player must input the correct code. An incorrect entry results in loss of a life. A correct entry results in a welcome message and an extra life.

The screen display is full of different coloured stars. Your ship is a large V-shaped craft which is able to move all over the screen, and is equipped with rapid fire laser bolts.

COMMENTS

Control keys: Alternate keys bottom row left/right, second row=down, third row=up, four corner keys will fire alternatively the cursors may be used
Joystick: Kempston, ZX 2, AGF, Protek
Keyboard play: responsive
Use of colour: very good
Graphics: generally excellent, with effective sense of perspective
Sound: average
Skill levels: progressive difficulty
Lives: 6
Features: one- or two-player game.

The first thing to hit you in the eye with this game is the stunning graphics. The 3D effect is quite strong, especially on the asteroids, which not only come from the distance to sweep hugely past you, but are shaded as well. The rapid fire from your ship makes a fireworks display if you fire and move rapidly about the screen. The graphics move very smoothly and very fast, which is just as well, because all the craft, yours and the aliens, are very big. Dodging planetoids, aliens and laser bolts can be done using the perspective. You can nip upwards and sail over the top of something. This all takes quite a bit of practice. With its superb graphics, speed and mass of alien weaponry, Ad Astra is a difficult and addictive game to play.

The 3D graphics are extremely well detailed - the moons especially so, with shading, craters and even a rotational effect as they roll towards you. Your ship is very manouvrable and fires really well. The explosions are particularly good: large, detailed and effective. They reminded me of cartoon film animation. It's addictive because you want to get through the next stage to see what they will throw at you next.

The rotating moons move towards you at increasing speeds depending on what stage you have reached in the game. These are very well animated. Aliens appear in the distance and zoom in on you, but not very smoothly, as they basically go through two stages, dots, then full sized, moving down the screen. On the second screen, however, the yellow rotating aliens move very well towards you. Moving on to the third screen, the graphics are slightly more basic; the large minelayers are quite simple, though nicely drawn, but the rotating mines work well. Exceptionally addictive at first, but after a couple of hours play this wears off.

Your job is to guard and maintain the shipping lanes between the far flung Way Stations that mark the frontiers of Terran colonised space.

Johnathan: Control of this game is easy enough, but success is rather difficult because the play is quite fast. The idea isn't original, but this one takes a different angle. HIT

Nigel: Choice of colour is just about right, and the graphics need no improvement. But the speed is a bit of a killer at times. MISS

Mike: An excellent game, with equally excellent graphics - particularly the perspective view of the space craft and the shots. Although it's a variation on a familiar theme, the game is well-presented, well-executed, and very professional. HIT

Memory: 48K
Price: £5.95
Joystick: Kempston, Cursor type, Interface II

Before you groan and shout "Not another space wars game", wait a moment. Ad Astra is a little out of the ordinary. Gargoyle Games clearly has put plenty of thought into this nightmare of inter-stellar mayhem. You are piloting a patrol craft through deep space, on the look-out for pirates and hostile aliens. That sounds familiar enough but the accompanying graphics put the first Gargoyle offering into a class of its own.

For a start, the pictures are very big. The game opens with a series of planets between which you must weave to reach open space; as they hurtle towards you they seem to fill the screen.

The 3-D effects extend even to your laser fire, which curls and splutters about the screen as you hurtle from side to side. The action is fast and furious and you can pilot your craft in any of eight directions.

At first, the sheer size of your ship is a problem. It seems impossible to avoid being trapped in the corner by a hail of missiles.

Ad Astra is a very welcome addition to the plethora of space games and on the strength of this Gargoyle is clearly a team to watch.

MACHINE: Spectrum
SUPPLIER: Gargoyle
PRICE: £5.95

Ad Astra will really scorch the keyboard off your Spectrum.

There's nothing new here to speak of. Your spaceship flies through space, encounters aliens, battle ensues. You know the plot backwards.

What is special about Ad Astra is the quality of the graphics and the speed of the action.

If you've ever seen the arcade games Galaga or Gyruss, then you'll know what I mean by a super fast shoot-'em-up.

Ad Astra is similar to Gyruss in that the ship moves through a slightly curving plane as it dodges the oncoming planets and takes pot shots at the aliens.

The first attack wave features some very impressive planets which spin towards you revealing the details of the craters when they are at close range. You can't shoot these but have to dodge in and out of them - no easy task in the bulky Deep Space Patrol.

This is one of those games where you want to get onto the next wave, then the next and the next to see how long you can survive and to see how much you can see.

Another nice touch is the laser fire which has an authentic trajectory pursuing a razor-sharp line until it disappears into deepest space.

Just one gripe: the alien laser fire was difficult to spot amongst the distant stars - no game for the short-sighted this.

This game deserves to do well, if you want a plain and simple space shoot-'em-up for your Spectrum, you won't find anything better than Ad Astra.

DEEP SPACE

MAKER: Gargoyle Games
MACHINE: Spectrum 48K
FORMAT: cassette
PRICE: £5.95

Frantic interstellar shoot 'em up distinguished by some superb large scale cartoon graphics. Ad Astra, or, 'To The Stars' is the dashing motto of the Deep Space Patrol, and as a new recruit it's your dubious honour to patrol the shipping lanes between the distant Way Stations that mark the borderlines of Terran space. Needless to say these shipping lanes literally crawl with hostile Xtros. There's the Pirate battle cruisers and their speedy droid scouts to contend with, the mammoth mine-layers of Mongo (or whatever) and interminable clouds of lethal space debris to avoid. It's a good job there's a joysticks option as my digits just couldn't take the pace. Space debris precedes each wave. Huge cratered globes spin towards you with dazzling smoothness. You can only hold your breath and dodge as they fly past - only to rocket straight into the eager maw of the alien force. The animation throughout is superb and I was particularly impressed by the mammoth mine-layers. (Even if they caught me every time.) Still it's almost worth it for the mega-blast that ensues. I've yet to make a Way Station but I'm sure that when I get there it'll look grand. Of course such animation has its price. The action takes place over a static background and to sparse musical accompaniment. Still it's cheap for what you get. Space Cadets should enlist immediately!

MACHINE: Spectrum 48K
CONTROL: Keys, Kemp, Sinc, Crsr
FROM: Gargoyle, £5.95

The first impression of this program is stunning. Your spaceship sits there against a starry backdrop. Suddenly a huge. round, cratered asteroid hurtles toward you, followed immediately by three or four others.

The 3D effect as they roll toward you is superb. You actually see their cratered-surfaces rotating.

These asteroids are indestructible. You simply have to get out of the way by using left-right, up-down controls, or a joystick.

After the asteroids, the real action starts with two types of spaceship homing in, guns blazing. The 3D effect here is less impressive, but you will have your work cut out to stay alive. You have to dart rapidly all over the screen to avoid the spreading missiles.

Meanwhile you maintain a rapid fire-rate, sending laser bursts shooting into the distance in a beautifully realistic manner.

Failure here results in the destruction of your craft in an extremely spectacular explosion. Success will eventually lead to another attack of asteroids followed by a new wave of aliens. This second wave is not convincingly 3D at all, looking more like a set of nasties out of Arcadia.

One frustration with this game is that after losing each of your five lives, you must return to dodging the asteroids again. Although they're spectacular to look at, they're quite easy to dodge and you'd much prefer to spend your time dealing with the real action. As it is, the pace of the game is constantly interrupted.

So, hard to know how to rate Ad Astra. On the one hand some of the graphics are as good as you've ever seen on a Spectrum. On the other hand parts of the game don't work quite as well as they really ought to.

Spectrum 48K
Shoot-'em-up
£6.95
Gargoyle Games

This game looks better than it actually is - the graphics are very good but the scenario is an old one. Blow up the alien hoardes and survive the asteroids. At least the game is in perspective and this raises it above the standard shoot-'em-up fare.