Transplant (Amiga) - A Playguide and Review - by LemonAmiga.com
50Transplant is a 360 degree shooter, released as Amiga freeware in 1992. It features a host of enemies, smooth scrolling, and a selection of upgrades. Veterans of this game give is high marks, so Lemon Amiga decided to give this one a spin.
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Production Notes:
Recorded: 8th August 2022
Narrated: 9th September 2022
This review started because Thrashie wrote on the Joan of Arc review - "Great job at keeping the Amiga nostalgia alive. You prolly have your next games lined up already.. but just in case here are some for consideration, Nuclear War, Jumping Jackson, Transplant, Wings." I considered Nuclear war, and Jumping Jackson we already played in the competition many years ago. MsMadLemon already covered that game better than I can. For Wings, John4p in the competition was playing Wings from end-to-end on his channel. But looking at the high scores for Transplant made me want to check it out. Not only was it a 360 degree shooter - which I like to include at least one example of per series. But also a PD game; a genre which I'd forgotten to add to the series games list. So it covered both bases.
The footage was recorded on the day I first played it. I had a warmup try, where it was clear after a few levels that the game was very easy, so I aborted my run and started it again, this time with the recorder running. I made it to level 46, and then gave up. After a break, there was an urge to play further. So I typed in the password from the end of my recorded footage, and carried on. But I didn't start the recorder again until level 66. I recorded levels 66 to 71, and then paused the recorder, and resumed again from level 90.
Although this goes on for 45mins, I think I forgot to mention how the scoring works. The levels seem to give a score set by the programmer, but if you take a long time, the score goes down. I put the Robocop clip in because I say "Stay out of trouble". This was one of the last games to be added to the list, and also narrated, apart from Ghouls N Ghosts, which I narrated this week. So it is fitting that it should appear last.
Danscore:
Shoot 'em Ups usually come in three or four different varieties. This being an over head shooter reminds me of Asteroids and Super Stardust. But in this game, the ship is fixed, and the whole universe rotates around it seamlessly. The aim is to shoot everything, and gradually survive your way towards the next big upgrade. The upgrades do make a difference, although quite small in terms of impact, and those also get expensive. Later in the game you have to save up for a long time for the weapons to progress, and having done so, there is never a feeling of domination or invincibility. The cost of everything goes up as your buy them, so each extra life you buy and them burn through will cost you more next time. The frame rate is impressive for an A500 game, and this was not compatible with AGA or ECS until it was recently patched. As a homebrew blaster, it not quite up to the levels of Deluxe Galaga, but I'd say it's 80% of the way there. As a free PD game I'd give this perhaps 8/10. It felt more fun than Better Dead Than Alien, and more addictive than Amneos, and some similar full price commercial efforts.