Planet X is a peaceful place, until from outer space the evil Reptilons arrive. They force the Earth scientists stationed there to create huge war robots to be used to destroy Earth. Enter the heroes of the game — two members of an interplanetary SWAT team attempt a four pronged mission: rescue the hostages, destroy the robots, destroy the Reptilons and finally rescue the lovely Professor Sarah Bellum (Sarah Bellum? Ho ho).
Take your pick of Jake or Duke and go for it! The planet is split into factories, and each one is split into levels. Each level is reached by either a ladder or by activating an escalator. Your first concern is to rescue the hostages, these are bikini clad females, so you don’t feel too bad about being thrown into the middle of the fray. Of course, the enemy forces are going to attack you, but with your ray gun and smart bombs killing the myriad robots is a cinch. Each time you’re hit your energy goes down: raid the lockers which contain food and bombs. Ray power can be boosted by collecting the crystals dropped by robots.
The Reptilons take all your skill (and a good chunk of luck) to defeat. Can you do it? Play and find out ’cos it really is worth the effort. The sprites are monochrome, but they contain many of the arcade version’s humorous touches. The best being the way your character clings to the side of the platform if he falls over. One slight niggle is the low number of playing credits: two aren’t really enough to get you very far in the first few games (especially with two players). Despite that, this game (I refuse to repeat the title because I’ve run out of breath) is fun to play; in fact it’s a birrova Smash!
