Star Raiders

The Good
For a game released in the late 70s, this is an absolutely mindblowing piece of work, particularly for something that fits into an 8K ROM cartridge! It has also stood the test of time very well.

The graphics were impressive for the time, and given the technical limitations of the hardware on which it runs, are still impressive today. The framerate is incredible, only when there are explosions on screen do you get a chance to take a breath, the rest of the time everything is moving so fast you really have to keep your wits about you.

The sound also suits this title well, and while there isn't that much to hear, what there is suits the mood perfectly. There is no music, but that wouldn't suit the serious tone of this title. What there is is what is needed - the sound of your photon torpedos firing, the sound of your ion drive pushing you through space, the sound of your hyperdrive warping you to a new sector for yet more frantic action, the sound of alarms going off as you enter a sector containing enemy craft, and of course, the satisfying sound of an enemy craft exploding!

I love how everything happens in real time - you snooze, you will lose, from the moment you start the game the Zylon craft are on the attack, trying to sorround and then destroy your precious star bases, which it is your task to defend.

The tactical element is fantastic too - do you risk disabling your shields when you think you won't need them to conserve energy? How will you attack the enemy Zylon craft?

The Bad
There is very little I don't like about this game. About the only room for improvement as far as I am concerned was the difficulty curve - choose NOVICE and it's far too easy, yet PILOT, WARRIOR & COMMANDER are much tougher and even those who can easily complete a NOVICE mission will probably struggle to get better then a ROOKIE rating in any skill level higher then novice - if they finish at all!

The Bottom Line
The original and best 3D space shooter, defend your star bases, destroy the invading zylon attack fleet, and do it quickly, because the clock is ticking!