Code Masters
£2.99

Pad your small plane full of explosives and set off on a do-or-die mission to rescue the VIP hostages. The only way get them out of their fortified prison is to dive-bomb the place in true kamikaze style.

You take off from your HQ and have to clear the skies of enemy aircraft (biplanes, jets, paratroopers and even space ships!) on your way to prison. A well aimed bullet is all you have to blow these suckers away and looking at the speed some of them go, it's a toughie.

Playing Kamikaze is easier said than done. Your first few attempts at VIP rescue will probably be spent crashing into your HQ building, as there isn't much room on the runway. Though the necessary tactics don't take too long to learn and after a couple of missions you'll be successfully rescuing the prisoners.

However, it's annoying the way other planes collide with you at high speeds. They just belt in from a side, then - kaboom! - you're dead. Kamikaze is a fun game but pretty frustrating, too.

BARGAIN BASEMENT

RICH PELLEY goes dizzy over the latest batch of Codies games and JON PILLAR has quite a bit of trouble getting a word in edgeways.

CodeMasters
£2.99
Reviewer: Rich Pelley

I don't know who it was who said "This is just one of those games which is slickly programmed, but at the end of the day regrettably just too simple and repetitive." but whoever it was should receive a hearty round of congratulations (and perhaps even a pay rise) because that's exactly what's wrong with Kamikaze. It's a simple horizontally-scrolling shoot-'em-up with you in a plane attempting to complete (and I quote, again) "An incredible do-or-die mission to rescue top-level military hostages from a fortified enemy base". This is done by taking off in your (rather puny) plane, flying horizontally along and killing the enemies. Rather than attacking huge waves of baddies, here you have to sort of pick them off one at a time. If you don't kill one then the chances are it'll probably kill you. There are lots of buildings which you fly over, and so, to avoid crashing, most of the gameplay takes place in the top quarter of the screen.

Luckily there is a point to all this - the game is divided up into missions. Simply (although that's probably not quite the right word) all you have to do is to find the plane carrying the dynamite, shoot it and catch the explosive before it hits the ground. Then dive down into the enemy HQ (a castle on the first level for some reason), and this will explode letting the hostages free. At least, that's what's supposed to happen according to the instructions, but I never got that far even though I played it for ages. It's a bit hard, you see, and in that frustrating sort of way which deters you from wanting to play it for very long.