Badlands - Rerelease
Copyright/Publisher: Tengen/Domark, Programmed By: Steven Collins, Music By:
Matt Furniss, Release Year: 1990, Genre: Racing Sports, Number Of Players: 1 or 2

As they say in the Caribbean, it's always time for racing tiny cars. (Bad grammar, James. Are you trying to write in dialect or something? - Dave). And they should know. At least, they should if they've ever seen Badlands.

The idea is simple. You race three other computer- (or human-) controlled cars around a track the whole of which is visible on-screen the whole time.

Beating the other cars earns you little golden spanners and cash (hooray). These can be spent on better tyres, acceleration, turbos and so on.

If you're rubbish and can't get the spanners by driving well, you can also pick them up on various parts of the circuit - if you can get to them first, that is.

And now the bit I really like. You can buy weapons too. Front and rear homing missiles, a powerful cannon and mines. In fact, most things a modern car shouldn't really be without. (What about the swimming pool, the television and the chauffeur? - Lisa).

And it's not bad to play, either. As with all driving games featuring little sprites of cars like this, it's incredibly frustrating cos they tend to bounce off things and end up going the wrong way.

But when you get the hang of it (in about one game in five) you really whizz round like a, erm, small coloured whizzing thing.

I can't really be bothered to explain it much more. Just think of it like Iven Stewart's Super Off-Road Racer (except on a sort of road with opening and closing gates, jumps and other things in the way). If you liked that, you'll like this.


INTRO SCREEN

FRAME RATE 70%
Small sprites and golden spanners combine to produce quite a good game which is comparable to those Abbey Crunch biscuits found at hundreds of foodstuff retail outlets in Salisbury alone.

Badlands is like those weird dreams you have, where little vehicles race around a single-screen circuit. I once dreamt I was incredibly wealthy too. (Funny, that. I once dreamt I was poor and common - Lisa.)