d both days. However, the system that captured most of
my attention was the MB Vectrex. I'd read about this machine and seen a few videos on YouTube, so was interested to see one in action. I have recently
been playing a lot of Fortress of Narzod on the C64, and port of the Vectrex title and have been very impressed. However, to see it running on the Vectrex blew me away. The display is like nothing I've seen before. Bright, glowing lines, extremely smooth graphics and great sounds. Even without the colour overlays, this system impresses. And yes, I was on it a lot. And yes, I want one for my collection. And yes, Xmas is just around the corner... hmmm....

The way the graphics are drawn still amazes me. On the C64 version of Narzod when you move your ship forwards, the graphic is replaced by smaller and smaller versions to mimic the look of it moving away from you. On the Vectrex, it actually shrinks as it moves away, extremely smoothly with no flicker or redraw. And when your ship explodes, instead of changing to an explosion graphic, your ship actually blows into 3 pieces that are then moving and rotating independently of each other. Sounds simple, but it really does make all the difference.

A lot of the machines on display had modern devices attached to them to enable loading of games from SD or CF cards. I have one of these for my C64 (1541U+) and Spectrums (DivIDE) but was surprised to see they were also available for cartridge based systems from the Atari 2600 and the Nintendo 64! Needless to say, I'm now on the lookout for these devices for the machines I have in my
own collection! Did I mention Xmas is round the corner?

On the Sunday, due to popular request, Shaun dragged in his Commodore 128D
with the SuperCPU, FD4000 drive and a copy of Metal Dust. This setup stole the show with a small crowd gathered around ooohing and ahhhing in all the right places. Sorry Nigel, but Metal Dust is a bloody good game ;-)

A big shout out must go to the guys from the Retro Computer Museum for supplying the machines and support for the whole event, it's all the behind
the scenes work that made this such a great event. Also their policy of "hands on" makes a big difference. What's the use of showing these machines if people aren't allowed to "experience" them? None really, I'm sure you'll all agree. For more information, please visit retrocomputermuseum.co.uk/index.php
where you can learn about their great work. Go on and donate funds or
equipment while you're there. Everyone will appreciate it ;-)

Again, thanks to Chris Snowden and Shaun Bebbington for organising the event and to all the great people I met over the weekend, Hiya! To those that didn't come, shame on you all, you missed a great weekend.

Pete Badrick.


*************************************
REVIEW: ALIEN BASH 2
Flimsoft's Premier Relase
By Commodore Free
*************************************

This is the long awaited version of Flimsoft's initial release finally arrived for me to review, after playing the preview many times available here http://csdb.dk/getinternalfile.php/107986/alien_bash_2_prw.prg

I was so keen to get this application up and running, how would it fare to the preview now it was a finalised finished version. You are under attack from aliens, they mean to kill you! Can you help defend your planet; you must work hard to save yourself and your planet from the relentless attack waves.

Loading up then.

I was sent the Tap file and a PRG, the tape version just has a scrolling message as the border flashes and a loading screen a small LOADING progress
bar shows how long you need to wait but as you can see it's some time before the screen appears!

Then the game loads, the PRG once copied to a real machine just ran the game, of course the final releases will be professionally packaged and released on Tape and disk and as a digital download. You eventually see the title screen.

Without more options I pressed the fire button and was then launched straight into the game. The game play is varied on different levels with different attacking waves, on level 1 for example you see aliens advancing towards the bottom of the screen; if they hit the screen or you then you lose a life! The aliens seem to advance at random some slowly; some are quicker and there lies
a problem if you have 2 moving at the same speed on opposite sides of the screen you can only hit on and the other will then kill you. Hitting an alien reduces the alien counter in the bottom of the screen this shows how many aliens are left, if you die you are regenerated back to life and the counter continues from where you exited the game.

After loading the game I was initially disappointed as the preview had what I thought was a really good music track; the final release has changed it for what I feel is an inferior piece of Sid music, each level has a different
track though. However the graphics have been much improved from the preview
and on level 1 the aliens have more detail, and the animation of them have
also been improved quite dramatically. The background is quite sparse and is completely static a sort of colour bar landscape(although it does slightly
vary between levels)the ship at the bottom moves only left and right and of course fires all controlled by the joystick.

On each screen you can see the number of lives left, the remaining aliens left to kill and the level number. The game is very difficult! and I can just about get to level 2 before dying, when you move to level 2 your ship is placed in the screen centre and you need to move quickly or at this location you will last seconds before you die. As a first release from Flimsoft the game is certainly showing potential and looks and indeed feels very polished, personally I would have liked the game to be given an easy, medium and hard option or even a more sedate start. No doubt someone will finish the game without losing a life, but personally I found it far too hard.

Level 2 sees different aliens this time they are some form of ships and they move side to side these actually shoot down to you as well. So each level has different music track and attack waves to vary the game play. This is definitely one for the lads night in, I am told the more you play the easier
it gets; however I didn't find this, and had to resort to cheating to get the screen shots. After level 4 you have a guardian to kill out

SCORES

Graphics: 7/10
Sound: 5/10
Gameplay: 6/10 just to hard strangely it does have a hook
Overall: 7/10

Not a bad start from Flimsoft's launching career into publishing, I am sat
here criticizing it but I keep going back over and over again! It is addictive even though it is to hard. The digital download is £1:99 so it won't break the bank and you will be supporting another new developer for the Commodore scene, Flimsoft have other productions in the pipeline and if they match or better this quality then the excitement will be uncontainable

Flimsoft website http://www.flimsoft.co.uk/home.html

Flimsoft demo on YouTube www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOYMzXrcLQ4


*************************************
REVIEW: SPACE LORDS
By Commodore Free
*************************************

(c) 2012 P1X3L.net

An action-packed party game in space
for up to 4 players.

Code: ALeX
Graphics: Retrofan
Music: Taxim

Four Space Lords battle for supremacy in their galaxy. Everyone has a space station on the edge of the great spiral nebula. In order to protect their own stations the lords try to move their shields to reflect the glowing plasma balls which they hurl against each other. If the station is hit despite resistance individual segments will burn until it eventually provides no protection for the Lord. If a Space Lord is then hit by a plasma ball which
got through the station he loses a life. The game runs until single lord remains, who thus receives the golden crown of the galaxy.

Released by Retro Gamer CD (RGCD)
http:/
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