| Cybersphere Psycon Software, 1996 | |||||||||||||||
| User rating: No rating | DOS Freeware (former shareware) | No screenshot yet | |||||||||||||
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Cybersphere is simply the best "ball and paddle" game I've ever played. It's like Arkanoid, but with better graphics, music, and sound. There are some new power-ups, as well as gems to collect for bonus points, and the gameplay is unusually fun. One of the power-ups temporarily places a guard rail at the bottom of the level. Each level has a different background and walls. Even the guard rail has many different appearances. Naturally, multi-ball is also available. There's very little empty space in the game, which seems to make it easier to keep the ball in play, eliminating the frustration factor common to most games of this genre. Angled corners and edges help to virtually eliminate the problem of hitting that one last block, which is the scourge of the genre. To keep it challenging, some levels have invisible blocks that only become visible after being hit. There are 5 sectors with various numbers of levels and 10 bonus stages in this game, with only one sector containing three levels and two bonus stages in the demo version.
Author Clay Hellman has generously released this game as freeware.
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| Cybersphere Plus Psycon Software, 1997 | |||||||||||||||
| User rating: No rating | DOS Freeware (former shareware) | No screenshot yet | |||||||||||||
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Cybersphere Plus is the sequel to Cybersphere, with all new levels and identical gameplay. The graphics, music, and level design remain excellent. There are 5 sectors with various numbers of levels and 10 bonus stages in this game, with only one sector containing three levels and two bonus stages in the demo version.
Author Clay Hellman has generously released this game as freeware.
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| Electranoid Pixel Painters, 1994 | |||||||||||||||
| User rating: No rating | DOS Shareware (partial game) | Screenshot | |||||||||||||
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Electranoid is like an enhanced version of Arkanoid. There are one-hit, multi-hit and unbreakable bricks, and the usual assortment of power-ups, such as being able to catch the ball, split the ball in three, or fire lasers, as well as missiles which can destroy an entire column of bricks. What makes Electranoid unique is that there are two kinds of enemies that dramatically alter the gameplay. Menacers come in six varieties, and release balls of their own. Those balls each have a different effect, such as making the paddle hard to see, turning regular bricks into multi-hit bricks, or turning them into bricks that can only be destroyed with the ball from a red Menacer. You can keep Menacer balls in play, but if you drop your regular ball, you lose a life. There are also four kinds of Destroyers, who release balls that will destroy your paddle. There are 100 levels in the registered version.
I have found no ordering information for this game.
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| Moraff's Blast I MoraffWare, 1991 | |||||||||||||||
| User rating: No rating | DOS Shareware (partial game) | No screenshot yet | |||||||||||||
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A ball and paddle game with three gameplay modes: Brick Walls, Falling Walls, and The Blast Adventure. All three modes can be played by one player, two players, one human and the computer, or just the computer. In two player mode, each player's paddle can move within just over half of the screen. The player with the lower score goes on top of the other paddle in the overlap at the center. The paddles can be controlled by keyboard, mouse, or joystick. Brick Walls is basically the classic Breakout game, where every block must be destroyed to clear the screen. Single colored blocks take one hit, while striped blocks take two. Blocks at the top of the screen increase the ball's speed, while lower blocks slow the ball down. When the screen is cleared, a new set of blocks appear, and the game cycles forever. Falling walls is essentially the same, except that blocks descend every few hits, adding new rows that are one or two blocks thick, with gaps of one or two blocks between them. If they get too low they disappear, but the lower the blocks are to the ground, the less reaction time you have. The real story is The Blast Adventure. Instead of scoring points, your goal is to complete each level by hitting the tunnel to the next level. There are blocks that allow you to catch the ball or lose that ability, make the paddle larger or smaller, speed the ball up or slow it down, split the ball into four balls, 1-Ups, vertically striped blocks that take two hits, and horizontally striped balls that take many hits. There are 21 screens in the adventure. Registered users received Moraff's Blast II, which has 140 new screens. Moraff's Blast I v1.5 Shareware (100k) I have found no ordering information for this game, and it is not listed on Moraff's website.
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| Moraff's Super Blast I MoraffWare, 1991 | |||||||||||||||
| User rating: No rating | DOS Shareware (partial game) | No screenshot yet | |||||||||||||
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A ball and paddle game with three gameplay modes: Brick Walls, Falling Walls, and Super Blast. All three modes can be played by one player, two players, one human and the computer, or just the computer. The paddles can be controlled by keyboard, mouse, or joystick. Brick Walls and Falling Walls are the same as in Moraff's Blast. The real story is Super Blast. Instead of scoring points, your goal is to complete each level by hitting the tunnel to the next level. In addition to the blocks from Blast (catch, stop catch, bigger paddle, shrink paddle, speed ball, slow ball, split into four balls, one up, vertically striped blocks that take two hits, horizontally striped balls that take many hits), there are now one way blocks that the ball can only pass through while going up or down, blocks that create new blocks, blocks that move when hit, blocks that split the ball into eight balls, and 2-Ups. The game is broken into difficulty levels. The shareware version has Easy Super Blast and Medium Super Blast, which have 17 screens each. Registered users originally received Moraff's Super Blast II, which has 200 new screens, and later received Moraff's Super Blast III, which has 350 new screens. Moraff's Super Blast I v1.7 Shareware (64k) I have found no ordering information for this game, and it is not listed on Moraff's website.
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