Time Runner
Time Runner, developed and published by Red Rat Software in 1989.
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Player's Review
"TIME RUNNER - THE FURTHER ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN CRUMBLE
Zoom into the Time Gate and blast your way through meteorite-strewn Interspace on a desperate search across unknown worlds. Meet malevolent monsters in The Castle of Terror! Shiver at the horrible inhabitants of the Dungeons of Doom! Tangle with mutant creatures that swarm through the Lost Jungles of Zandarg! Outwit attacking aliens on the Moonworld of Plutos. These are just some of the menaces you will have to overcome in this all-new arcade action adventure with the courageous hero of Crumble's Crisis and Space Lobsters!!!"
A little known Labrinth style platformer that looks like it might be fun in the screenshots but you will soon find frustrating after leaving the first room. You goal is to guide your time traveller across the levels visiting each room and collecting anything in there and moving on. The important items are the shards, eggs and Tweezles. Collect the keys, unlock the doors and go through the time gate to the next level, simples!
Except everything in the game is out to kill you. It's not enough to avoid the enemies (they cant be killed), the walls, and other objects will also stop you as well as floors with no carpets. This requires some carful jetpacking in tight corridors with only one or two pixels between you, the walls and moving enemies. If you run into a monster, you lose energy...fast. This can be replenished by collecting food. Hitting the walls or bar floor, bushed, stair rails, many any other objects and lets not forget random background appearances of enemies coming out of the walls which all zapp you causing you re-enter the room from where you came in usually without losing energy. This is it's way of being fair I suppose.
There are some forks in the rooms allowing for slightly different routes through the levels, maybe one safer than the other and you don't have other pressures placed upon you like limited jet pack fuel or time but with that said, don't stay in a room too long as it will fill with cosmic rays sending you back to the door you entered. You don't need to collect every eggs, shard or even Teezle but best to do so as you don't want to find out at the gate you missed something. (Four Teezles on level one, five on two and six on three) Shards can give you a speed boost, invulnerability for a shoot time or can be bad reversing your controls or maybe nothing at all.
Collision detection is mostly fair but still not much room for error. If the first level was as difficult as it got, then the game might be passable. But level two steps up the frustration with grass, vines, trees and some really tight spaces to manoeuvre through. level three steps it up yet again with bendy rocky caverns which really test your dexterity.
Overall, a very frustrating with not much fun to be had unless you really like unfair challenges. If you a super fan of Airwolf on the C64 then this game is for you. One level would have been enough but you have to survive three. It's hardly the best looking Amiga game no doubt working within the Atari ST limits although there is some added speech I guess. Red Rat made few games and the title music here is familiar to anyone that has played Lombard RAC Rally.
Fun note: The opening room has a picture of Pob above the fireplace which was a children's tv programme in the UK on Channel four. Pob lives inside the tv and gains you attention by backing on the screen. What it's connection is with the game, I do not know.
00:00:00 Title Music
00:01:22 Time Zone 1
00:21:00 Travel
00:22:27 Time Zone 2
00:45:00 Travel
00:47:38 Time Zone 3
Zoom into the Time Gate and blast your way through meteorite-strewn Interspace on a desperate search across unknown worlds. Meet malevolent monsters in The Castle of Terror! Shiver at the horrible inhabitants of the Dungeons of Doom! Tangle with mutant creatures that swarm through the Lost Jungles of Zandarg! Outwit attacking aliens on the Moonworld of Plutos. These are just some of the menaces you will have to overcome in this all-new arcade action adventure with the courageous hero of Crumble's Crisis and Space Lobsters!!!"
A little known Labrinth style platformer that looks like it might be fun in the screenshots but you will soon find frustrating after leaving the first room. You goal is to guide your time traveller across the levels visiting each room and collecting anything in there and moving on. The important items are the shards, eggs and Tweezles. Collect the keys, unlock the doors and go through the time gate to the next level, simples!
Except everything in the game is out to kill you. It's not enough to avoid the enemies (they cant be killed), the walls, and other objects will also stop you as well as floors with no carpets. This requires some carful jetpacking in tight corridors with only one or two pixels between you, the walls and moving enemies. If you run into a monster, you lose energy...fast. This can be replenished by collecting food. Hitting the walls or bar floor, bushed, stair rails, many any other objects and lets not forget random background appearances of enemies coming out of the walls which all zapp you causing you re-enter the room from where you came in usually without losing energy. This is it's way of being fair I suppose.
There are some forks in the rooms allowing for slightly different routes through the levels, maybe one safer than the other and you don't have other pressures placed upon you like limited jet pack fuel or time but with that said, don't stay in a room too long as it will fill with cosmic rays sending you back to the door you entered. You don't need to collect every eggs, shard or even Teezle but best to do so as you don't want to find out at the gate you missed something. (Four Teezles on level one, five on two and six on three) Shards can give you a speed boost, invulnerability for a shoot time or can be bad reversing your controls or maybe nothing at all.
Collision detection is mostly fair but still not much room for error. If the first level was as difficult as it got, then the game might be passable. But level two steps up the frustration with grass, vines, trees and some really tight spaces to manoeuvre through. level three steps it up yet again with bendy rocky caverns which really test your dexterity.
Overall, a very frustrating with not much fun to be had unless you really like unfair challenges. If you a super fan of Airwolf on the C64 then this game is for you. One level would have been enough but you have to survive three. It's hardly the best looking Amiga game no doubt working within the Atari ST limits although there is some added speech I guess. Red Rat made few games and the title music here is familiar to anyone that has played Lombard RAC Rally.
Fun note: The opening room has a picture of Pob above the fireplace which was a children's tv programme in the UK on Channel four. Pob lives inside the tv and gains you attention by backing on the screen. What it's connection is with the game, I do not know.
00:00:00 Title Music
00:01:22 Time Zone 1
00:21:00 Travel
00:22:27 Time Zone 2
00:45:00 Travel
00:47:38 Time Zone 3
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