Robocop

STORY / GAMEPLAY
Patrolman Murphy was the 32nd cop to be gunned down in Detroit since Security Concepts Inc. took charge of the Detroit Police Department. It was the opportunity for OCP to present their plans for a safer city. So the OCP took destroyed Murphy and transformed him into a deadly killing machine with a reinforced titanium body and other robotic body parts! Though the scientists erased Murphy's memory, they could not completely wipe it out, so Robocop sets out to track down the gang that killed him and terminate them. Your mission is to save innocent Detroit citizens from the evil plans of OCP to conquer the city and the baddies are not happy with it, so you must fight hard even against your own creators. The enemies attack in groups, riding motorbikes, yielding chainsaws, shotguns and grenades. Robocop has limited ammunition supply but you can get extra ammo as you progress by smashing ammo crates. There are also some special bullets with enhanced features scattered around. At the end of each level you'll have to destroy a big boss (like the ED209) and you're also given the opportunity to earn a few bonus points by either taking out mockup targets or trying your luck in a photo-quiz sequence where Robocop must identify and fix the photo of a particular criminal!

GRAPHICS / SOUND
Although the graphics are nice in all 8bit platforms, the Commodore 64/128 version looks better, with more detailed backgrounds in all stages. Again, I do prefer the Amstrad's color palette but still the C64 version has some nice color picks. Robocop and his enemies are detailed and well animated and the action is a bit faster compared to Commodore's 8bit counterparts due to the support of hardware scrolling (that's missing from the ZX and CPC systems). The sound does not support sampled speech at the game's intro found on the 128k CPC models but the intro music is just awesome. The in-game tune is pretty good as well and superior to the CPC, ZX versions while there are no sound FX (as in all 8bit versions).