So there I was nursing my crippled B-17 home on a wing and a prayer; smoke pouring from the two starboard engines; my wounded copilot slipping ever deeper into shock; and the cliffs of Dover just barely visible on the horizon. Suddenly, the ball turret gunner screams into my headset, "Bandit at six o'clock low, she's closing fast and ..."
"Boyle," my vertically-challenged editor slapped a package in front of me. "Here's this month's review subject. Quit fiddling around and get back to work."
With a sigh of resignation I pushed the stick to the right, immediately sending my faithful aircraft into a spin which was quickly terminated by the cold, hard waters of the English Channel. Oh the sacrifices we make for our readers ...
This month's review subject is a game called Operation: Inner Space, published by Software Dynamics of Calgary, Alberta, Canada. These are the same folks who brought you the much bemedaled After Dark for Windows.
The press release that came attached to the single 3.5 floppy boldly proclaimed this product to be "the most fun a user can have in the Windows environment..." and "the perfect game for both home and office." The cover letter took these claims a step further by stating uncategorically that we would find this game "to be the best game ever made for Windows users... ." The first-rate packaging and game manual literally dripped refinement and class. It was quite clear that these folks had spent a great deal of time and money developing them. The instructions contained therein were clearly written and logically presented, thus completing the overall feeling that I was about to embark on a truly unique gaming experience.
Wow! Rest assured that your humble reviewer wasted little time before installing this one and diving in.
After playing the game for the better part of three days now, I think it can be safely said that who ever designed it must have liked Asteroids... a lot!
According to the documentation, the basic plot of the game is that your computer "has been invaded and all the programs set loose to feed on your systems' resources." Your mission "is to go inside your computer and capture or destroy all icons before facing the final challenge." The world of Inner Space "is dynamically generated from your hard disk as you play."
What this all boils down to in reality is that you fly around a 'Stroids-type environment (You know, a dark vacuum complete with stars and black holes! How did they get inside my computer? Why is the background not a generic motherboard of some sort?), in a 'Stroids-type ship, dodging 'Stroids-type rocks while attempting to avoid 'Stroids-type villains. Your mission is to capture the floating icons which, as promised, represent those in any given directory on your hard drive.
In all fairness, it must be stated that Operation: Inner Space takes the basic simplicity of traditional asteroids and adds a ton of colorful, ingenious sophistication. The player's ship can be any one of a hundred designs, each with its own unique weapon systems. At any time during play (including that ever so brief period between the moment your craft catches fire and when it actually explodes), one can call upon the services of a space "ambulance" which will give one the chance to cash in captured icons for repairs, fuel and/or additional armaments. It's quite possible that the alien ship showing up on your small radar screen is friendly or an Enforcer (policeman), so it's sometimes wise to think before shooting (quite a novelty in arcade-type games.) Failing to do so will result in a quick trip to the hall of justice. (A word to the wise: Never touch an enforcer's Doughnut!)
In addition to the basic, go out and search for icons game, there are half a dozen other arenas a player can visit including several race games, an Inner Demon to face, one-on-one duels to the death with villains and a customized ship construction factory.
The sound effects are among the best I've heard, the graphics are outstandingly clean and gameplay is highly intuitive.
Overall, Operation: Inner Space is a terrific game which I will no doubt play again. Is it "the best game ever made for Windows users... ?" Well that all depends, of course, on the user. It is probably the finest game of its type ever created for the Windows environment. However, there's still a nagging feeling in the back of my brain that this product could have very easily been entitled "Asteroids 95."
