Astaroth

STORY / GAMEPLAY
In a complex of catacombs located deep below the ground, Astaroth The Angel of Death rules over a fetid underworld domain and now she is free to satisfy her evil plans! A man named Ozymandias(!) decides to enter Astaroth's lair to defeat the beautiful goddess! Ozymandias walks into a complex of interconnected screens, moving in all 8 possible directions. He can jump and duck in order to avoid enemies like flying bats and harpies. You have five lives to start with and your energy depletes easily when you even touch an enemy. Your powers vary from floating up to higher grounds to throwing fireballs and havingg night vision (helpful in dark rooms). All three powers can be accessed and activated via your inventory (one at a time). OK the game does not offer any unique gameplay since it's a simple search and collect game, marginally spiced up by the addition of progressive mind powers. Back to its days a lot of people bought this game only for its gorgeous cover box! Overall, Astaroth is a fairly frustrating game to play, but redeems itself by its superb music.

GRAPHICS / SOUND
Technically the Atari ST is almost identical to the Amiga version in terms of graphics (probably the Amiga is a ST port). The graphics are well detailed with up to 36 colors on screen, though it's hard to see the difference between the backgrounds and the objects you can pick up like colorful mosaics and statues found on the background walls. The sprites move fairly well without any serious glitches. Note that all areas change in flip-screen so the whole game lacks scrolling. The sound on the ST is great, featuring sound effects along with the wonderful music composed by Jochen Hippel (note that the Amiga version does not have sound effects (!!!) but is has this awesome tune in much higher sampling quality than the ST).