Game of the Season Summer 1999

Dropzone by Archer Maclean / US Gold

Wow! What a great game this is, I remember hearing about it years ago, Zzap! used to rave about it but I never actually played it until I was putting up the Zzap! review of it on my pages. It's a very fast paced and difficult game! It's heavily based on Defender, even down to the rader on the bottom of the screen but it's faster and more polished. Don't just take my word for it, see what Zzap! said about the game in their review of it. See below for game instructions.

Screen Shots

The death sequence, something you see a lot!

Instructions

Blast all the baddies (and there's a lot of them) to get to the next level, while insuring that you save your men at the bottom of the screen, you have to pick them up and transport them back to base (Which can be seen by the white cross on the bottom of the rader). For more info see the Zzap! review of the game.

Playing the Game

You can control your jetpac type character by the joystick in port 2 (or equivalent keys on your PC)

UP = Blast upwards
DOWN = Go down towards the planet's surface
LEFT = Turn and fly left
RIGHT = Turn and fly right
FIRE = Fires out a stream of lasers
SHIFT = Cloak yourself for a limited period
Space = Bomb the whole screen

Now, get the game here

Update : Archer's company website is here and he is currently working on a Game Boy Advance version of Dropzone, as well as Dropzone 2. "DZ 2 is in the planning and is going to be a monster 3D spielberg effort, dwarfing the original." as said by the man himself.