ZX Spectrum 0-20 / 81

They Stole a Million is a strategy game about planning robberies, made in 1986 by the British studio Tigress Marketing and published under the 39 Steps label of Ariolasoft. The player is the boss: you hire a crew of specialists in locks, explosives and getaway driving, buy the plans of the chosen building, and then write out the whole job on a map... 15

Starquake is a 1985 action platformer written single-handedly by Stephen J. Crow and published by the British label Bubble Bus Software for the ZX Spectrum. The player controls BLOB, an artificial being sent into the unstable interior of a planet to gather nine core elements before it detonates. The world spans 512 screens linked by teleport booths,... 17

Movie is a 1986 isometric arcade adventure by Duško Dimitrijević, released under the Imagine Software label. Private detective Jack Marlow has to lift an incriminating tape from the headquarters of mob boss Bugs Malloy, helped by a woman named Tanya whose identical twin Vanya is working for the mob. Beyond the isometric action the game offers conversations... 6

Phantom Club is an isometric arcade adventure from Ocean Software, programmed by the Serbian coder Duško Dimitrijević, author of the earlier hit Movie. The player takes the part of Plutus, the lowest-ranked member of a brotherhood of superheroes taken over by the villain Zarg, and has to work his way up to the highest rank of Ipsissimus by completing... 14

Magicland Dizzy (Dizzy IV) is the fourth main adventure starring the egg-shaped hero Dizzy, published by Codemasters in 1990. The evil wizard Zaks returns from the dead and traps six Yolkfolk in a world full of fairy-tale references — Dizzy must free them all and finally destroy Zaks for good... 25

Magicland Dizzy (Dizzy IV) is the fourth main adventure starring the egg-shaped hero Dizzy, published by Codemasters in 1990. The evil wizard Zaks returns from the dead and traps six Yolkfolk in a world full of fairy-tale references — Dizzy must free them all and finally destroy Zaks for good... 317

Fantasy World Dizzy is an platform action - adventure for ZX Spectrum designed by the Oliver Twins with music by David Whittaker. The game is considered the third in the Dizzy series and was developed under the name Dizzy III. Fantasy World Dizzy featured many elements which later became standard for the series, such as having three lives, an improved... 136

F.I.F.O. (1989) is a Slovak Breakout clone for the ZX Spectrum by Jozef Paučo & Pavel Albert (aka Jopa), released by Klub FIFO as a promotional game for the magazine of the same name. Based on the British title Traz, with new levels, lasers and magnets... 43

Ocean's version of RoboCop for 8-bit machines loosely adapts the Data East arcade game, with stages inspired by those from the coin-op, but also entirely new gameplay elements. New challenges from the arcade include hostage scenarios: in these, seen from a first-person perspective, a criminal holds an innocent person. Moving crosshairs and firing precisely,... 1718

Terramex (Cosmic Relief: Prof. Renegade to the Rescue in US) is an action platform adventure game developed by Teque Software and released in 1987 for home computers. The goal is to find Professor Eistrain (Eyestrain - `eye strain`) in his secret laboratory. The professor predicted that a meteor was moving towards Earth and its course was threatened... 364

Star Dragon is an action space shooter with vertical scrolling, released by Ultrasoft in 1990 for ZX Spectrum home computers. The author of the game is the Czech programmer Patrik Rak together with the graphic artist Milan Matoušek, the music for AY was created by František Fuka. The player controls a Star Dragon fighter flying through space and his... 142

Dragon Breed (Doragon Burīdo) is a horizontally scrolling shooter video game produced by Irem and released in arcades in 1989. It runs on M72 and M81 hardware. Activision released home computer ports in 1990. The player controls King Kayus, who rides a large dragon named Bahamoot. Bahamoot is immune to enemy attacks, capable of blocking most projectiles... 143

Sharkey’s 3D Pool is an 1st person pool game, one of the first that introduces full 3D perspective, developed by Aardwark Software and distributed by Firebird/Microplay software in 1989 for home computers. The game featuring a fully-rotating table and variable viewpoint allowing for much more realistic shot-playing than the traditional top-down game... 276

Titanic is an scuba-diving action game developed by Spanish software house Topo Soft in 1988 for 8-bit home computers ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC and MXS. The game was later ported on PC DOS with two extra stages, VGA graphics and AdLib sounds. Titanic is an exploration game which is divided into two parts. In the first part, you must find the Titanic... 313

Star Wars is a first-person rail shooter designed by Mike Hally and released in arcades by Atari, Inc. in 1983. It uses 3D color vector graphics to simulate the assault on the Death Star from the 1977 film Star Wars. Assuming the role of Luke Skywalker (Red Five), the player pilots an X-wing fighter from a first-person perspective. The player does... 796

Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Trainer is a computer aircraft simulation game developed by Edward (Ned) Lerner and published by Electronic Arts in 1987. It was originally released as Chuck Yeager's Advanced Flight Simulator but due to a legal dispute with Microsoft over the term "Flight Simulator," the game was pulled from shelves and renamed. Chuck... 195

Ajax (A Jax or A-Jax) is a vertically scrolling shooter released in arcades by Konami in December 1987. Similar to Contra and its "Gryzor", there was a European release of the game called Typhoon, which is the name used for Imagine Software's ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, and Commodore 64 ports. The players control a "Tom Tiger" helicopter (in the 2D stage)... 395

Gunboat is a combat simulator of Patrol Boat Riverine (PBR). The game starts out in Vietnam during the Vietnam War. When the player earns a second lieutenant's bar, the game moves on to battle the drug kingpins of Colombia. After making the grade of lieutenant commander, the player begins patrolling the Panama Canal Zone. Game is using a mix of sprites... 248

Batman (also known as Batman: The Movie) is an action platformer developed and published by Ocean Software based on the 1989 film of the same name. The game consists of five levels based on events from the movie. Each stage has a time limit and a health gauge (represented by Batman's face turning into the Joker's), with Batman losing a life if he runs... 1870

Batman is a 1986 3D isometric action-adventure game by Ocean Software for the Amstrad CPC, MSX, ZX Spectrum and the first Batman game developed. The object of the game is to rescue Robin by collecting the seven parts of the Batcraft hovercraft that are scattered around the Batcave. The gameplay takes place in a 3D isometric universe, which programmer... 2578