Game Review: Rapid Fire (Commodore 64, Mastertronic)

Rapid Fire certainly has lent plenty of inspiration from films and arcade machines. The front of the inlay has a character very akin to Sylvester Stallone in Rambo, and although not instantly recognisable, is inspired by the hard-to-find arcade game Special Forces (in itself a blatant lift of Kung Fu Master but with guns.) The plot details that there is an abandoned warehouse which has now been taken over by a gang of criminals as their headquarters. Acting on a tip off, the police have noted an array of computerised equipment, installed by a former games programmer with the prospect of money to help suspend security systems of the major banks. What they did not count on was you as the undercover cop putting a halt to proceedings. So, you will need to destroy the warehouse, you need to find the master level of the building and destroy the master power electrode. But on the way there are computers to be deactivated, and plenty of criminals to kill, including men, roof snipers, grenades, and missiles.

Warehouse Rock

The game loads and the title screen will show, with a basic looking logo for Rapid Fire, and a gun shooting random bullets across the screen. The music, well if you can call it that, appears to be various random sequences of a lead line that just plays and attempts to sound tuneful. This is also audible in game without an option to turn it off, so do bear that in mind. Once you press fire, you enter the first level, and start scrolling left to right. At first there are just unarmed men to shoot, and these can be taken out easily enough. If you do happen to get trapped, pressing up and fire will jump up and also release the grip that they have on you, albeit with the loss of blood. Your energy meter is shown by a blood bag and each time you get hit, it reduces, but can also increase the more you do not get hit, which is a nice feature.

You also have to be careful not to shoot too much either, as the gun temperature displays in the bottom centre of the screen. If the temperature is too high because you have shot too quickly, the temperature goes from white to yellow to red and once too high, you cannot shoot until the temperature lowers. So, there is a case of learning when to shoot accurately and to keep that all important temperature down. Later in the first level you get some green grenades, which can come at you at two heights – you can duck and shoot left and right to get the low-down ones, and the ones at head height can be shot normally. They can come at you pretty quickly though, and you may need to stop instead of scroll right. As you also have a time limit to contend with, you had better not hang around.

Computer World

At the end of levels one, two, four and five, you will need to destroy the computer. This is shown by a small tower to the far right, and the plasma vent for the computer can only be shot at when the vent is active and coloured red. Often this will not be the case and you will need to avoid the computer firing at you and any enemies that may come along, but in some cases, you might hit it first shot. Once you have completed a level, you get a bonus for any time remaining and then it is on to the next level, and you will keep going until you reach the final level and to the master computer to destroy, should you get there.

The second level introduces another type of enemy, the missile. This appears more like a flame of fire. You need to duck under the high-flying missiles and jump over the smaller missiles. This is where having to press up and fire to jump can prove to be awkward. It does not always work first go, and inevitably the random timing of the enemies means that you could be ducking under a missile at the same time as one to jump over arrives – and you would need to decide which one will cause the least reduction to your blood level. The design potentially could have been improved here which may have helped the longevity and be a little less frustrating.

Gutter Sniper

The third level introduces the sniper, which runs along the top of the level you are on. They can shoot diagonally at you and this does mean a loss of blood, unless you shoot them first. To do that you need to point the joystick diagonally up left or up right, and then fire, and that will aim the bullet to shoot them. The snipers are also worth a cool 5,000 points each, compared to 1,000 for the unarmed men and 500 each for the missiles dodged or grenades shot, so those can really build up your high score as well. As the unarmed men and other enemies can appear on screen, this can end up being quite frenetic the more you progress into the game.  There is one final homing type missile from level five onwards that looks more like a grey fish being aimed towards you, even with similar swimming motion as it moves and homes in on you.

Inevitably, as you try to progress, there is one bugbear which will frustrate. If you do lose all your blood and lose one of you lives, you are sent back to the start of the level, no matter how far you managed to get, meaning you have to do the whole level. This can be annoying, especially if you did get really far and almost to the end computer to destroy, and with the randomised nature of the enemies, especially the grenades and missiles, this can mean that you may end up losing a couple of lives very quickly. Even a respawn point say half way through the level if you got further than that would have been preferable so at least you could feel like you do make progress. Otherwise, you may need to result to some form of cheating such as an infinite energy POKE.

Graphics and Sound

The graphics in Rapid Fire are fairly basic, with simple backdrops with some pipes and a blue floor representing the floors of the warehouse. Your main character looks more like a bald-headed hard man in a camouflage outfit, and the other enemies are at least reasonably defined and are recognisable, albeit with limited animation. The sound effects are reasonable, but the music, if I can call it that, is dreadful. It feels like some random sequences put together in order to resemble a tune, and the fact it is so small in terms of memory footprint says that not that much thought went into it. It is a shame as a better tune would have helped things enormously here.

Final Thoughts

Whilst Rapid Fire does not appear to be pleasing on the eyes or the ears, what is underneath all that is a reasonably playable run and gun shooter, with hazards to get past, enemies to shoot, and a sense of progression as you head through the six levels. The awkward control for jumping, especially to avoid the missiles, does mean that you can lose too much blood energy when you do not wish to, with the final straw being sent back to the start of the level that you are on. Despite this, there is still a game in there with a good high score challenge and a one more go factor, possibly until you do manage to complete all six levels. You will have some fun trying at least.

* * *

You know what we think but why not share your thoughts on this game! Let us know what you think of it in the comments below, or add your own score using the slider in the summary box at the top of the review!

Please follow and like us: