In the late 80’s there was nothing better than watching violent action films starring Arnie. Especially when you were 7 or 8 years old. Scenes where Arnie emptied a machine gun into bad guys looked cool and it was fun to run around the playground emulating this, complete with sound effects. It was clean, healthy fun…honest!
Another way to emulate the Austrian Oak was by playing Gryzor on the Spectrum. This was a hard as nails, run and gun which tested your reflexes to the limits as you wasted enemies. The Ocean programmers involved – Paul Owens, Mark R Jones and David Whittaker gave no respite to home computer users as wave after wave of bad guys came at you.
The opening sequence set the scene for this all action blockbuster. You sprint through a wooded area and begin to pepper the bad guys with bullets. Power ups appear and you frantically shoot them to reveal their contents. With your gun suitably levelled up you approach a bridge. As you cross it, the bridge blows up. Eventually you arrive at the enemy base where, after you destroy the defenses you run inside.
Here the gameplay style changes and you wreck havoc within the walls from an over the shoulder perspective spreading devastation until you come to the first boss.
The boss battles can be intense and require multiple stages of destruction in order to defeat. The gameplay and overall quality is an accurate transposition of the arcade original crammed into your humble Speccy. This title was a true triumph for Ocean Software.
Gryzor takes moments from classic action / sci-fi movies of the era and crafts a heady mix of pulse pounding blasting. NES owners will know this game as either Contra or Probotector but for us in the UK it was always Gryzor!
8-Bit / 16-Bit Heaven : 