Blazing Thunder

STORY / GAMEPLAY
The story takes place somewhere in the future where you find yourself in the middle of a tank battle. There are no outstanding features to the game really. Your main goal is to just control your tank around the levels shooting anything that moves, until you reach the end of the level where a large enemy vehicle awaits (a tank, a chopper etc). The further you advance, the better weapons and power-ups you'll collect. Along your way you must also avoid enemy minefields! The game is quite playable but hard enough to last. It's surely fun for a while but it's not as addictive as Ikari Warriors but that doesn't stop Blazing Thunder from being a great little shooter.

GRAPHICS / SOUND
The CPC version has pretty good graphics, nicely drawn stages with a variety of enemies and colorful backgrounds, much like the aforementioned Ikari Warriors. The sprites move fast in all eight directions while the screen scrolls quite smooth. An only drawback would be the small gameplay area (much like the ZX Spectrum version). The sound is basic, with several sound effects such as cannon/machine gun firing and explosions (but unfortunately no in-game music).