Monday, October 22, 2012

Games that remind me of my childhood Number 12 : Kikstart 2 (Commodore 64)

Sorry once again for the lack of updates recently.  This has been down to a few things - namely being ill, and spending too much time playing Resident Evil 6 and Doom 3 BFG Edition on my Playstation 3.
 
Anyway...  the next game that reminds me of my childhood is....
 
 
Kikstart 2 was another classic game released by Mastertronic in 1987 for a pocket money-friendly £1.99.  It is a sequel to the game Kikstart, which itself was based (but not endorsed) by the cult BBC television series Kickstart.


Like the TV show, the game follows the sport of motorcycle trials and the aim of the game is to ride a motor bike over various obstacles, accelerating, braking, and hopping over them.  Obstacles include ramps, gates, brick walls, logs, water, springs, picnic tables and many other things (including telephone boxes!).


The game also features a fantastic two player mode.  Now, I am not particularly a fan of multi-player games, but me and my friends would spend hours playing this against each other.


There are 24 courses included within the game,  but one of the cool features in Kikstart 2 (compared to the original game) is a fun, and very easy to use level editor which enables the player to generate their own twisted courses to play.  You can then save them to tape or disk, allowing you to share them with your friends, or keep them for yourselves.



Little bit of trivia, but the game was written by legendary programmer Shaun Southern, who wrote many of my favourite Commodore Plus 4 and C64 games under the “Mr Chip Software” name.  He would later become Magnetic Fields with Andrew Morris and would release the amazingly popular "Lotus" games on the Amiga and other 16 bit computers/consoles. 
 
Fantastic!