Xenophobe


Title		Xenophobe
Game Type	Shoot-em-up
Players		1 or 2
Compatibility	A500/1000/2000
Publisher	Microplay software
HD installable	No
Submission	Glen Thomson

Review
   Xenophobe ... one who has a deathly fear of anything alien. Xenophobe
is a crazy arcade action game that must have been inspired by the movie
"Aliens".  The main aliens in this game look similar to the ones in the
movie.  This game is a port of the stand-up arcade version by bally
manufacturing in 1987.  The game was ported to several other systems
including atari st, ibm pc, c64 disk & cass, spectrum disk & cass, amstrad
disk & cass.
   Xenophobe is a split-screen room scrolling game, which scrolls either
horizontially or vertically (in the case of elevators). One room is on the
screen at one time and as your player reaches the edge of the screen, a
new room appears with your player placed in the appropriate position.
   The object of the game is to exterminate all the hostile alien life
forms that are thought to be infesting the different space stations and
moon bases.  Secondly, each player must collect the various forms of
hardware that have been left on the bases. Your reward... points!  In
order to accomplish your task, you can choose 1 player from a selection of
9 different exterminators to battle the aliens.  Each exterminator is
detailed in the manual but other than just looking different, they don't
seem to posses special skills.
   There are several different weapons that can be found in the game.  Each
weapon has its strengths and weaknesses.  The phaser is a single shot
weapon which is only effective against small targets but its virtually
indestructible.  The laser pistol has the longest range and has a high
stability but it is not very powerful.  The lightning rifle has decent
power but its range is shorter and it is less stable.  The smoke gun is
the most powerful but has very little range and is highly unstable.  Bombs
can be collected and used as hand grenades but be careful, because they
can rebound off the walls.
   There are several different types of aliens but the ones that you will
encounter most are the critters, rollerbabies, and snotterpillars.  The
critters latch onto the exterminator with it's legs and sucks your health
down.  It has to be removed by wiggling the joystick back and forth to
throw him off.  The critters are low to the ground and you must press down
on the joystick even when you are in a crouch in order to shoot him. The
rollerbabies are like vicious turtles but they can roll into a ball and
bowl you over. When in this form, your weapons are useless against it.
Very annoying.  The snotterpillar is a large alien that requires a lot
of punishment to destroy.  It can leap on you to knock you down or it can
spit nasties at you which also knock you down.  Along with the aliens
encountered in the game, each base has its own defense system which can
hinder you unless you have the correct ID.
   There are 4 possible outcomes for your efforts.  If you don't
exterminate the required number of aliens within the time limit, the
aliens will overrun the base and the base will self destruct after you
return to the mother ship.  The exterminator can order a fast destruct to
prevent it from being overrun by aliens after the exterminator returns to
the mother ship.  The exterminator clears the base and then returns to the
mothership. The aliens kill the exterminator.  With the exception of the
last scenario, the game always continues onto the next level until all of
your heath points have been exhausted.
   The graphics, gameplay and sound are very good.  The graphics are
virtually identical to the original stand-up version.  The sound tracks
are incredible for its time. The developers were so proud of the sound,
that an audio cassette was included with the game which had the 1st level
music on it.  I was addicted to the stand-up version before I bought the
Amiga version.  It is a wicked multiplayer split screen arcade game. The
only thing that really annoys me is when a rollerbaby bowls you over just
as you are about to leave the room.  Its a little unfair but I guess most
arcade games do "dish out" a few cheap shots.  This is a classic arcade
game, but don't expect anything special by today's standards.
   I must mention a few notes on degrading.  I have been able to degrade
the system with tude in order to get it to work on my 1200 but not
consistently.  I had to disable the 060, enable 1.3 kickstart, OCS,
512chip, nocache.  This only worked 1 out of ever 10 times that I tried it
because most of the time it fails after you have to swap disks.  I am not
sure why it works sometimes.  Your best bet is to run it on a system which
it is designed for.



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