Game Review: Starace (Commodore 64, Mastertronic)

Starace appears to be one of many early examples where the artwork does not match up with the name.  Indeed, the cassette and the game itself say Star Race, whereas the inlay artwork shows Starace as one word, minus an R too.   In terms of the plot, the planet Alpha One is dying, so the humanoids need to find a new planet.  The Space Federation send out their Space Fighters to ensure that as well as patrolling the Solar System, a path is cleared through space for a safe passage to another planet.  This happens across five galaxies, or zones, as the game mentions when playing.

Attention All Planets of the Space Federation – We Have Assumed Control

The game loads with some instructions in Commodore 64 BASIC text about your mission, and each of the five challenges you have, one in each zone.  There is then some more fast loading before the game immediately starts on the first level, so you may wish to leave it to return to the title screen, which is reasonable and does have a high score to aim at.  In fact, when checking the memory of the game, it is in fact written mainly in the BASIC language with some machine code added in parts.   You then can get an idea of what you are letting yourself in for as you start the game with the first zone being an avoid them sort of game.

You must effectively steer your space ship so that you do not collide with any of the three enemy craft – and you cannot fire at them either.  It is a case of working out their routine of moving towards you and keeping moving so that you avoid them as much as you can so that you can survive.  Last for a period, normally until your score reaches 249 points – and always seemed to be this case no matter what – and it is on to the next zone.

Zonal Marking

The second zone has asteroids and fireballs coming down the screen at your space ship.  Starting in the middle of the screen here is a big no-no and that is a design flaw, so move to the bottom as soon as you can and then avoid them.  You can shoot from your ship, but what is the use if you cannot shoot anything?   Once you get the hang of avoiding, and the score reaches 449 points (yes, the same every time) then it is the next stage.  If you do collide and lose a life, you must do the whole stage again.   In the third zone, the mother ship present in the top right of the first two levels comes to life, and shoots a tractor beam.  Stay within the beam and your ship heads up the screen and then meet with the mothership.  In theory, once you get the hang of it, not too difficult.

In Space, No One Can Hear You Scream

The fourth zone ramps up the difficulty to somewhat ridiculous levels.  The first three once you get the hang of them are easy, but this one proves very difficult.  The alien mother ship has started to open fire on you with rounds of three massive bullets to avoid whilst attempting to land shots on the mother ship.  You need to hit it twenty times to complete the level, and often you will get several hits on before being cornered by bullets coming at you.  The bad news is that if you do lose a life, the hit counter rests, making it a very frustrating experience.  You will lose patience with this after a while and this is where most of you will get before switching off the computer.

If you do destroy that mother ship, the final zone involves you attempting to dodge some large asteroids and land on the surface gently.  Once done, you then need to fly away, dodging anything in sight, so you can then activate the planet’s security systems on exit. Needless to say, with a limited amount of fuel to slow your descent, this does become quite difficult also.  If you do complete the final zone, it is back to the first zone to discover another planet and do it all again.

Graphics and Sound

The graphics in Starace are functional, with some reasonably drawn space ships on the first zone, as well as asteroids and fireballs for the second.  Expanded sprites are used for the mother ships in zones three and four, and the bullets in zone four, and do suffer somewhat because of that, with an occasional starfield backdrop.  The final zone actually looks good, but you will hardly see it.  There are some very limited sound effects and a tune that loops after around four seconds and it is just a few notes ad infinitum that will make you reach for the volume control.

Final Thoughts

Starace does sound like a challenge at first, and the instructions lead you to believe that there are five zones of arcade action.  Unfortunately, once you start playing you realise that it is not a very good game.  The first two zones are very dull and repetitive avoid them scenarios, and whilst the third with the tractor beam is good enough, the insane difficulty of the fourth zone means that the game becomes wall denter territory before you see the final zone, if you survive that far.  Had more thought gone into the overall playability, I would have forgiven it despite its age, but even back then, a release of this standard was unacceptable.

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