Game Review: Fighting Warrior (ZX Spectrum, Mastertronic)

Loading Screen and Menu

The loading screen has flashing yellow and red squares around the outside whilst the screen is otherwise, and a monster and the Fighting Warrior in a large yellow square.  Keyboard and joystick options are also displayed.

Once the game has loaded, the yellow square becomes animated with the monster and Fighting Warrior doing combat against each other. If you stay on the menu screen for a short amount of time, you will go into a demonstration mode.

Graphics

The detail of the characters in the game aren’t bad and there are a variety of enemies.  The animation is reasonable throughout Fighting Warrior.  An example being, when you duck to avoid an arrow, there are two frames to lowering down to the floor.  When you die, you fall onto the ground and disappear into dust, a rather good effect.

Most of the time, the background remains still but as you move over a short distance, the background starts to slowly scrolls right (or left if you retreat backwards).  Also, a mention here is that although the ground and background details such as trees, pyramids and Sphinx’s (yes, plural!), the sun always stays in the same location which is well thought out and realistic.

What I also liked was that when you strike your opponent successfully, you see a green crash style effect and if you get hit, its red.  Getting hit by an arrow resulted in the screen flashing different colours for a second or so.

Sound Effects

There is no music, and the sound effects are of swords.  There is a reasonable whacking type noise when you hit your opponent or get struck yourself.

An opportunity I feel which could have slightly enhanced the game would have been to have added a ping type noise if when you strike a vase or get a sound when hit by an arrow.

Playability

Although the game is playable, it certainly isn’t one of the faster of games you’ll ever play.  The controls aren’t too responsive and at times, I did find the arrows hitting me even when there seemed to be plenty of time to avoid them.

There are three attacking moves, to either strike at the head, stomach area or lower legs/vases.  Your warrior can also jump up slightly and crouch down too.  You could on most occasions just hold down the same keys to attack your opponent, but I guess what spurs you on is to see who you’ll be up against as you progress further along into the desert.

Some characters you face seem to have slightly different fighting methods.  Some you need to get closer too (where I found the stomach attack more useful) and the further distance ones seemed more effective with the head strike.  Performing that move pauses you for a second or two before making the move so timing is of the essence here.

Striking downwards to hit a vase can take a slight bit of practice and hitting them quickly can sometimes kill of your opponent instantly (as stated in the instruction inlay card.)

You have one life, and this is based on how much you have.  Naturally getting hit reduces this but it can be replenished by hitting the vases in the right place.

Statuses

Along the bottom of the screen, you will see some red arrows.  No, not the excellent fighter display pilots (as they’d look out of place in the desert!)  Anyway, these represent your energy and how many hits you can sustain.  Your enemy also has the same displayed on the right-hand side of the screen too.

Apart from your energy, also shown is your current score, hi-score  and next score to beat.

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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!

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