Kung-Fu Master

STORY / GAMEPLAY
In Kung Fu Master you control Keiji Thomas, a young martial artist whose mission is to find and rescue his love interest Sylvia, kidnapped by an evil man called Mr. X! His girlfriend is kept inside the last floor of a temple and Thomas must reach the top floor alive. Your mission is to fight your way through five side-scrolling floors, swarmed by enemies, using your punches and kicks. The villains vary from young Kung-Fu students to masters, so this mission will not be a walk in the park. Some enemies throw weapons like knives at you but you can kick them in the air and send them back to their holder. Each floor features a few deadly spots like deadly exploding pots dropping as you walk (not to mention the dragons that appear and spit fire at you or some snakes that roam around, ready to strike. At the end of each floor (just before you get into the elevator - for the CPC version and stairs for the C64) you are called to confront a big boss. On the top floor is Mr. X himself and he really is very powerful.
Kung-Fu Master is a great action beat 'em up game but it also has a very high level of difficulty as you progress. The enemy sprites can sometimes overcrowd the screen (coming continuously from your left and right along with the exploding pots that drop from the ceiling. This deadly combination makes your life rather short...and the game very frustrating!

GRAPHICS / SOUND
The game runs on the 48k and 128k ZX models. Although the visuals are colorful enough for a Spectrum game (but with less details compared to the CPC and C64 versions), it loses points in gameplay due to its quite slow action.
The sound, on the other hand, is quite good and the 128k Spectrum includes in-game music along with a bunch of basic sound effects.