Frantic

The Good
Imagine was not a game company that I grew accustomed with, and it didn’t survive for very long. They had a strict policy of releasing only a handful of games at a time, and they mainly produced nothing but crap. (The only exceptions being the excellent Arcadia, which I reviewed in April this year; and B.C. Bill.) Frantic is yet another shoot’em-up from Imagine, but there is a twist to the usual game mechanics.

The game involves the player falling downwards toward the planet Spectrum. Using their equipped laser and anti-grav pack, they need to blast aliens that appear on your viewing screen before they have a chance to fire at you. The aliens are represented as white dots on radars on the side and bottom of the screen. Zooming around in outer space uses fuel, and if the fuel gauge is empty, the game is over.

The cover for the game looks impressive. Besides the huge Imagine logo, the illustration of the game resembles a one-page comic strip where the protagonist looks tense, but he is trying to calm himself after spotting a group of aliens. On the opposite side, a brief description explains the objective of the game.

The Bad
Unfortunately, Frantic is the example of the “nothing but crap” I mentioned earlier. The loading screen is unattractive, given that there are no illustrations and only contains purple text on a white background. Game-wise, the sound effects are annoying as well, I found it difficult to destroy any aliens given they zoom past the screen quickly and I found that your useless lasers are slow to react. But the major gripe I have are those fucking white flashes that occur every five seconds, making the game unsuitable for people who suffer from seizures. Seems to be a thing with Imagine back in the day.

The Bottom Line
Not much to say about this game, really. It's the usual blast-the-aliens style game, but with a twist, and that's all. Annoying sound effects and boring gameplay. If you suffer from epilepsy, stay away from this game.