Blood Money is a famous horizontal and vertical scrolling shooter, initially released for the Amiga (OCS) systems in 1989 and later ported to the Atari ST and the PC (DOS) computers. Blood Money was also ported quite successfully for the 8bit Commodore64. Though its great graphics and sound, the game was also memorable for its high level of difficulty!
Review
STORY / GAMEPLAY Blood Money is the official sequel to 'Menace', a poor arcade shooter with ugly graphics and extremely crappy gameplay. Fortunately, Blood Money beats its predecessor in every aspect. The game's world is divided into 4 different planets and there are 4 different ways to fight. The first world is made of metal and you fly through it with a helicopter. The second one is a large sea world where you sail through with a submarine. The third one is a frozen world, where you pass through wearing a spacesuit and the last one is a volcanic world of fire where you fly using jetpacks. The whole weaponry you use can be upgraded through stations found in various places along the levels. In order to buy new goodies you must first collect coins after killing your enemies and spend the cash wisely. Enemies vary in every world, from small insects to even giant dragons. The game can also be played in a 2-players mode. Although a classic and famous shooter, Blood Money was never able to be one of the best shooters of the home computers era due to its high difficulty level and lack of innovation!
GRAPHICS / SOUND The graphics on the C64 version are good with only some of the larger objects / sprites a bit pixelized compared to the more powerful 16bit versions. This is probably due to the memory limitations of the 8bit Commodore computer. The sprites's animation and the background scrolling are quite smooth and the game scrolls both horizontally and vertically while the perspective is almost identical to Irem's R-Type game. The sound on the Commodore 64 is great and you have the option to choose either music or sound effects during gameplay. The intro and the in-game scores are awesome, thanks to the great Commodore's SID chip.
GAMEPLAY SAMPLE VIDEO On our video below you may watch the Commodore 64/128, Atari ST and Amiga OCS versions of the game.
Screenshots
Sound samples
Intro music:
In-game sound:
Gameplay sample
Amiga (original version)
Hardware information
Commodore 64/128/Plus4
CPU: C64 MOS Technology 6510 1.02MHz (NTSC version), 0.985MHz (PAL version) / C128-D MOS 8502 2MHz, Zilog Z80A 4MHz MEMORY: 64 KB or 128 KB RAM Expandable to 320-640 KB / 20KB ROM GRAPHICS: VIC II 16 colors, 320x200 (2 unique colors in each 8x8 pixel block), 160x200 (3 unique colors + 1 common color in each 4x8 block), 8 hardware sprites, Smooth scrolling SOUND: MOS Technology 6581/8580 SID, 3-channel synthesizer with programmable ADSR envelope, 8 octaves