| Review: Rescue on Fractalus | By Kikstart |
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Background on the game In a time more distant, games were a simpler matter than today. The most popular platform in today’s gaming is also one of the most complex. Today IBM PC descendents can have many different configurations. Differing sound cards, video cards, memory, processors, even bus architectures. Today’s games need entire teams of personnel: Programmers, multimedia specialists, storywriters, marketers, 3D modelers, network specialists, beta testers, etc. In the early 80’s, a single individual could strike it rich with one game. But a game creator was often called to be a programmer first, and secondly, an artist and a musician. He/she also had to have a sense of creating gameplay or storylines. There were VERY few individuals who could single-handedly code a game with great graphics and sound, unique and interesting gameplay, as well as providing an interesting ‘plot’. There were some individuals who created a hit their first try: Shigiru Myomoto and ‘Donkey Kong’ for instance. The ‘team’ concept of creating a game used to be rare. One could easily point to the ‘Rescue on Fractalus’ project as one of the first team-produced video games. Computers were seemingly simple compared to today’s non-standards. For instance, if one were to purchase an Atari 800, there would be 48K of RAM, two cartridge slots, a full sized keyboard (with REAL keys), and a obligatory TV hookup. If you developed a game for the Atari 800, you could be pretty certain that it would run on EVERY Atari 800 without fail. The problem then wasn’t compatibility; it was making a popular, enjoyable video game. LucasFilm Games did just that with ‘Rescue’. For years after, ‘Rescue’ was a yardstick to compare other 3D games against. Graphically, it was superior to anything ever seen before on the Atari, and actually on ANY other computer system of its day. A first-person 3D game of this magnitude was not seen again until 1993’s DOOM for the PC.
Pilots fighting a battle on Fractalus’ surface against the ‘Jaggi’s’ are stranded and in need of rescue. Resistance on the ground was greater than expected, and many pilots are waiting in their wrecked hulls. The atmosphere of Fractalus is acidic in nature – the pilots can’t live on the surface for long. Your mission is to rescue these pilots as soon as possible, while dodging enemy fire. Many mountain peaks have gun emplacements. The guns lock onto power sources. It takes them a few seconds to get lock, and if you wiggle around enough you can avoid lock indefinitely. However, the surface of Fractalus is VERY mountainous. You’ll find yourself flying in and around huge rock formations while using your scanner to locate pilots. All the while, you must keep your eyes open for gun turrets. Your rescue ship has a single laser cannon, and it can be employed to take out the guns, but it doesn’t fire at a high rate of speed. Shots have to be placed carefully and at the same time, care must be taken to avoid slamming into a mountain, or allowing a gun to lock on to you. Rescuing the Pilots In the floppy version of the game, a cool animation would play while the game was loading. It showed the mothership from the outside, and ships taking off to the planet below. It was a very nice touch, and a technological feat. Up until this game, loading from the floppy meant the computer was busy – you usually were faced with a black screen. When the game starts you off, you are ejected from a launch tube to the planet surface. Again, this was breathtaking in its scope. The launch tube was just a simple color cycle, but when you got out into space and descended towards the planet it was beautiful. Once you get below the clouds (fog), you begin to see the mountain surfaces. Moving the joystick left and right banks the ship, while pulling toward and away from you raises and lowers the nose for altitude.
Hitting the ‘L’ key lands the craft. If a pilot is near, he will emerge from him wrecked ship, and run towards yours. You must be sure to also lower your shields ‘S’ or the pilot won’t leave his ship. The shields can FRY him if they are turned on in while he is running toward you – more on this ‘feature’ later. Hit the Power key ‘P’ to conserve power. In addition, the P key also makes you undetectable to the guns. The pilot will run to your ship, and disappear underneath it. After a while, you then hear a ‘knock’ at your airlock. Push the ‘A’ key to open the door for him. You’ll hear the pilot step inside and then it’s time to power up and move on to the next pilot. You may leave the level after a set amount of pilots are rescued. The mothership will return and you can hit the ‘B’ key to activate the Boosters. This will pull you out of orbit, and back to the mothership for refueling and/or level change. The challenge is to do all of this without running out of fuel or getting blasted to bits. There are a few other surprises in the game at higher levels. Neat stuff There are a few things about this game that I will never forget. One is the sound it makes when a gun locks on and fires at you. You hear this loud, “WHONK!”, and the ship visibly shudders. Another cool thing at the higher levels is trying to dodge between tons of gun emplacements. You have to get good at not letting anything lock on to you, and at the same time, you have to have VERY well placed shots to take out the guns. I’ve had many an enjoyable hour flying in an around mountains while taking potshots at the guns. At later levels you will see a new enemy appear as well - the saucer. They are very fast, and hard to lock onto but must be dealt with quickly to avoid certain death. Rating What can I say? I chose this game to review because it is one of my all time favorites. I certainly don’t give all games this kind of praise, but there is very little to complain about. This is cream and sugar above the Nutrasweet. Graphics: 10/10 - A groundbreaker. Only Koronis Rift comes close to this. Sound: 9/10 - Some effects were weak, most were great. Gameplay: 10/10 - A lot of first-person games made today would do well to have half as much gameplay! Longevity: 7/10 - To be honest, there’s only so much alien hunting and rescuing you can do before a break is needed. Total Average: 9.0 out of 10! Highs: Good graphics, gameplay, storyline Lows: Eventually gets impossible. The guns simply can’t be dodged beyond a certain level (but it’s fun to TRY!) You’ll need an Atari computer with at least 48K of RAM to play. There was an ‘XE’ version of this game on cartridge. This should also work in the 400/800 series. This game was released in similar format on the 5200 SuperSystem. SPOILERS (WARNING: Do NOT read if you don’t want to know) LucasFilm Games had some VERY nice touches in their games. Some were intentionally part of the game; some were ‘Easter Eggs’ waiting to be found. The manual included with ‘Rescue’ was good enough to get started, but didn’t offer much help on a few surprises. Here’s a BIG surprise that happens somewhere around level 10. At some point in the game, you will go to rescue a pilot. When the pilot comes out, instead of having an Orange helmet, it’s GREEN. When he comes up to your ship, he suddenly pulls off his helmet and is revealed as an ALIEN – bug eyes and all! If left alone, he will pound his fists on your viewscreen until he finally breaks through the window. The acid atmosphere dissolves the scene and it’s GAME OVER! I still remember the day when my brother and I managed to get this far in the game. Both of us literally jumped out of our chairs! When we calmed down enough to understand what happened we were just stunned. I had NEVER played a game with this kind of surprise element before. It was the single coolest experience I had ever had with a game. Later on, you’ll get a surprise again, when a pilot appears with an Orange helmet, but is STILL an alien! The only defense is to keep your finger on the ‘S’ button to fry the sucker. Another cool (but cruel) thing to do is strand the pilot. You do this by simply not letting him in the airlock. His knocking is insistent at first but gradually fades in intensity until you hear a ‘thud’ sound (the pilot passes out). Eventually, the pilot dies exposed to the acid atmosphere, but what’s cool is that the knocks are of a different frequency and timing for each pilot. It’s that attention to little details like this that made this game worthwhile. Here’s an Easter Egg: When you go to rescue a pilot, open the airlock before he approaches the ship. If he is an alien, you’ll hear a lot of banging around (he’s loose in the ship!), the compass will spin wildly, and the ship will be near uncontrollable. Eventually, you slam into a mountainside and it’s GAME OVER. I couldn’t stop laughing the first time this happened, however, I DID find a way to escape certain doom! If you do this when you have booster ability, take off and hit the ‘B’ key. If you do it in time, the alien will be killed on board the ship and you’ll be allowed to land normally. If not.. Well… Maybe when the planet’s terraformed and colonized, the crater you make will be named in your honor! |
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