Predator 2

The Good
Predator 2 is a 2D shooter that is similar along the lines of T2: The Arcade Game. You play Lt. Mike Harrington as he shoots bad guys that appear on screen, and collects any ammunition and weapons that he comes across. Your life bar depletes every time you get wounded. If this bar is empty, you are forced to kill one of your credits if you decide that you want to continue. Weapons include machine guns and rocket launchers. The rocket launchers are very useful for destroying everything on screen at once. The game teaches you not to be trigger-happy, as innocent civilians appear on screen. If you shoot at them, your police badge gets destroyed..

The screen only scrolls right, so that you can get a good look at how good the buildings look. You start the game battling the streets of LA. Banks and other businesses that line the street look good. A group of enemies look difference, to indicate how dangerous they are. The civilians don't look the same, and they differ on each level of the game. Even your character's silhouette is well drawn.

The game can be violent at times. One example is in the last level, you can see the Predator ripping apart an FBI agent with his bare hands if the agent walks near him. This means that the game is aimed at mature audiences, and therefore not suitable for kids. On this last level, I was glad that I dealt with the Predator, perhaps not in the same way that you have to deal with him in the last game.

The Amiga version of this game lets you control with the mouse, this I like very much. It gives you a good chance of quickly disposing your enemies. If I were to control the game with keyboard, then things would be slow, and there is the likely chance that you will lose heaps of life.

One thing that I like is the pumping soundtrack that you can hear while you play. Unlike the C64 version, the music changes after every level. One of the best bits is the music in the last stage.

The Bad
Unfortunately, being a superior port that the Amiga version is, you can only choose to have music or sound effects, and not both. This is rather poor, considering how the C64 version uses both music and sound effects. I felt that the game would be greatly enhanced if the Amiga version used both.

The Bottom Line
Predator 2 is a 2D shooter in which you have to kill bad guys that appear on screen and shoot at you, but you have to avoid shooting innocent people as well. There are four levels of this. The first level is longer than the rest. The game has violent scenes in it involving the Predator himself. For this reason, the game is most suitable for mature audiences.