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This time round on the pod the Ten Pence Arcade<\/a> guys have put forth Pleiad(e)s.\u00a0 The marquee spells the game as Pleiades but the main screen spells the game as Pleiads.\u00a0 Go figure…\u00a0 Developed by Tehkan in 1981 and licensed to Centuri, it’s the spiritual successor \/ sequel to Phoenix.\u00a0 A 2-D vertical shooter, with lovely sprites, loud bleepy noises, and nasty bad guys.\u00a0 Oh and birds.\u00a0 Big birds. Big birds with kamikaze tendencies.\u00a0 In fact all the bad guys revel in smashing into you at high velocity until you raise your arms to the sky helplessly screaming “Pleiads.\u00a0 Nooooooooooooo!”<\/p>\n Over on Twin Galaxies the record on MAME is currently 135,790 and held by Richard Sion Lewis and according to my copy of Official Twin Galaxies Video Game & Pinball Book of World Records, the high score is 1,164,900 and achieved by Patrick Orr, 23rd August 1982 at Galaxy Video Games in Charlotte, NC. Which quite frankly, after spending a couple of weeks with this game, is bonkers so kudos to Patrick.\u00a0 Despite playing a lot of Phoenix in my youth I’d never actually come across Pleaids until I had chance to play on an actual cab (supplied by Retro Games Party<\/a>\u00a0no lees) at Play Expo in Manchester.\u00a0 Under the expert tutelage of Ten Pence Arcade’s Shaun “in your face” Holley I got to grips with it.\u00a0 Well.\u00a0 I managed a semi decent score after a few goes and that’s what it’s all about right?<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 4890 – <\/strong>The game consists of four screens of space battle shenanigans.<\/p>\n Phase I – Destroy All Attacking\u00a0Aliens from Ground Base<\/strong><\/p>\n On the first screen, controlling a ship not dissimilar to Phoenix’s ship from left to right and armed with a single shot,\u00a0 you have to fend off waves of oncoming martians.\u00a0 \u00a0At first they appear to resemble an olympic gold medal.\u00a0 Perhaps the inspiration is 80s classic man fragrance Yardley Gold?\u00a0 Shoot them in this incarnation and you score 30 points.\u00a0 However, give these martians an inch and they’ll take a mile. When reaching the bottom of the screen they’ll transform to walking martians and lay down a wall of defence which you’ll have to shoot to clear but oddly they can shoot you through them.\u00a0 What martian magic is this?\u00a0 Destroy the walking martians and you’ll score 80 for each of them.\u00a0 But wait!\u00a0 The martians have one more intergalactic trick up their sleeve and they also transform to a flashing blob which one assumes to be a UFO but it actually looks like play doh.\u00a0 When in UFO form the movement is faster and less predictable then in other forms but take them down and you’ll be rewarded with 150 points per blobby thing.\u00a0 Clear all 16 enemies to progress to the second screen.<\/p>\n Phase II – Protect Spacecraft By Destroying Attacking Space Monsters With Rocket Fire.\u00a0 Space Monsters Must Be Hit In The Center To Be Destroyed.<\/strong><\/p>\n We take flight into space!\u00a0 The second screen harks back to the bird enemies from Phoenix.\u00a0 Eight large bird shaped monstrous ships whip from side to side and frequently swoop in to destroy you.\u00a0 It’s almost as if they know the ship you’re piloting only has a 1 litre engine and can be outpaced by a shop mobility scooter.\u00a0 \u00a0To destroy the birds you have to aim dead center in their birdy faces and earn 50 points per bird.\u00a0 However, you can also limit their movement by taking the wings out to ensure they can only move in a straight line towards the bottom of the screen.\u00a0 20 points for each wing you hit.\u00a0 Kill the bird with one wing aflame and it’s 100 points or both wings 400 points.\u00a0 As you reduce the number of enemies the remaining members increase in speed and erraticness.\u00a0 \u00a0This is the most frustrating level out of the four as no amount of dodging can move your ship out of the way quick enough.\u00a0 It’s simply not quick enough and often you’re relying on luck rather than skill.\u00a0 Clear them away though and phase 3 beckons.<\/p>\n Phase III – Destroy Space Battle Ship and Cosmic Enemies With Rapid Rocket Fire<\/strong><\/p>\n Phase III is another nod to Phoenix, in particular the final mother ship stage.\u00a0 Unlike Phoenix this mothership this doesn’t slowly move down the screen.\u00a0 It’s remains at the top of the screen, opening up it’s fiery flaps, whilst martians descend upon you once more.\u00a0 To maximise the scoring on this level, when the ship opens it’s flaps you can also destroy the flames or what one assumes to be thrusters.\u00a0 Each thruster destroyed increases the end of level score.\u00a0 To progress to Phase IV you can either clear all 16 martians or destroy all five burners.<\/p>\n Phase IV – Return to Earth Through Landing Corridor.\u00a0 Maneuver Around Other Spaceships To Avoid Destruction.\u00a0 Clearing Bonus Flags Adds Points To Score<\/strong><\/p>\n Phase IV really steps the drama and intensity.\u00a0 Morse code for SOS rings aloud and the message\u00a0SOS, SOS, SOS, AT ONCE RETURN TO EARTH demands we take immediate action.\u00a0 Hang on a second….\u00a0 Earth?\u00a0 Since when have we been able to view Saturn and the Milky Way from Earth?\u00a0 Perhaps we relocate Earth in the future a few rungs down the solar system.\u00a0 However, it’s back to the action.\u00a0 The distress signal obviously requires a rapid return to Earth but we don’t actually get that.\u00a0 What we get is a bonkers slow float with terrible controls return to terra firma.\u00a0 I can only think that the designers are wanting you to think that it’s out of control because it’s certainly handles that way.\u00a0 You’re aim is to skillfully negotiate the tricky path through stationary space ships (are they on the floor or are they hovering waiting to land and as you’re the hero you get preferential treatment?) towards a landing target cum crossfire thing.\u00a0 But beware, In space no one can hear you scream “RUBBISH COLLISION DETECTION!” as you collide with a ship time and time again.\u00a0 For extra bonus points you can collect flags but the combination of dodgy handling and the cruel random positioning of them just makes it not worth the bother.\u00a0 Succesfully land your ship and your ship and you’re back to the first screen all ready to go again.<\/p>\n 11620 – <\/strong>My final go on the actual cab at Play Expo and I complete one loop round after realising you cannot shoot the ships on Phase 4 and that hitting the lights that resemble a fair ground burger van is not good for you health.<\/p>\n 18460 –\u00a0<\/strong>Back at home on my MAME setup and comparing to the cab, it seems a little off. The sounds are defiantly not kosher but my accuracy is way off mark and it seems far harder somehow.\u00a0 Either that or I’m simply rubbish at it.<\/p>\n 19470 – <\/strong>Taking the time to clear the thrusters on Phase III is certainly the way to go to maximise the points.\u00a0 \u00a0Ensure that you whittle down the martains to a final one and take the thrusters own whilst keeping it at arms (or tentacled sucker) length.\u00a0 Easier said than done with their kamikaze tendencies mind you.<\/p>\n 23620 –\u00a0<\/strong>And with the Sunday 5pm cut off looming I achieve my own personal goal of surpassing the 20k mark.\u00a0 A country mile off the world record and I honestly don’t seem me ever getting anywhere near it!<\/p>\n I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my time with Pleiad(e)s. Yes, I shouted at it while clawing at my face after being ram raided by the enemies again.\u00a0 And again.\u00a0 And again.\u00a0 I’ve lost count the number of times I’ve stuck two fingers up at the screen and unleashed a string of expletives at the thing but you know what,\u00a0 this is early 80s arcade shooter in a nutshell.\u00a0 Hard, bonkers, frantic, and very unfair. We old bods wouldn’t change a thing though.\u00a0 Lovely stuff.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" THE CHALLENGE AWAITS YOU… SCRAMBLE FOR THE RIGHTEOUS WAR This time round on the pod the Ten Pence Arcade guys have put forth Pleiad(e)s.\u00a0 The marquee spells the game as Pleiades but the main screen spells the game as Pleiads.\u00a0 Go figure…\u00a0 Developed by Tehkan in 1981 and licensed to Centuri, it’s the spiritual successor … Continue reading “MAME WR Attempt No. 18 – Pleiad(e)s”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[9,12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1028"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1028"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1028\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1045,"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1028\/revisions\/1045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sull.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"http:\/\/sull.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/1181242151651.png\")
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