Mission 3000 A.D. (Bit Corp. / Taiwan Cooper)

Entry posted by DoctorSpuds June 13, 2018

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Now... Here's a weird one. This game as far as I can tell is not a bootleg or a slightly modified version of an already existing game this game is original. This game was originally put out by Bit Corporation over in Europe, and some way or another it made it's way over to America. I'm lucky enough to own a slightly rare NTSC Taiwan Cooper bootleg of Mission 3000 A.D., but I know reproduction carts were sold not too long ago. Nevertheless this game remains an enigma, nobody really knows who programmed it for Bit Corp, and very little information exists about Bit Corporation itself. But what about the game? Is it good? Is it bad? just what is this game?

Graphics are sub par for the 2600. All the character and enemy sprites are a single color each and have no frames of animation. The pixels that the sprites are made up of are rectangular which leads to everything seeming squished or just looking rather weird. But the game redeems itself somewhat with a rather cool parallax scrolling star-field in the background, while it doesn't follow your movements exactly, it's still very nice to look at. There is also a mini-map at the bottom of the screen which shows your location and the location of the enemy bases which you need to destroy with prejudice. This map is the only way you're going to find your way around this game.

Sounds? There's barely any... There is a couple of bleeps when you start the level, the same bleep when you shoot your gun, the same bleep when you shoot an enemy, and a nice meaty explosion when you destroy an enemy base. That's it! Four sounds. Four! and three of them are the same sound just beeping multiple times faster or slower. Bad sounds.

This game plays a lot like Bosconian, Draconian, or Sinistar. You're looking top-down on your ship while flying around space dodging enemies and blowing up enemy bases, that's it. The formula sounds simple, but the programmers still somehow managed to screw it up! The main issue is the erratic nature of the enemies movements, and how their movements do not sync up with your own. The enemy ships are near impossible to avoid since as well as being super jittery and erratic they also move at about twice the speed of your ship. The fun in Draconian is had by playing strategically fighting or fleeing, in Mission 3000 you just end up throwing you limp body at the enemy until it's either game over or you beat the level. Sometimes you'll have a good streak going, on to level 7 and beyond, but other times you'll be massacred on level one and it's game over for you, that's probably why the programmers gave you six lives to begin with.

Only get this game if you're a curious collector looking for an obscure game to show your friends... Otherwise this game isn't worth the time. While I don't regret buying OR playing this game -it really is quite advanced for the system- it simply doesn't hold up to any of the competition. Pass...

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CaptainBreakout 3,945

Posted June 14, 2018

Thanks for the review of this obscure game. Glad this is available since this game is obscure and info on it is scarce.

This game is on my shelf. Why? I got a small pile of games from a Venezuelan a few years ago. Mostly I was excited about an NTSC Snail vs Squirrel, but he had a few others such as this one, and they were all pretty cheap so I'm went for it since I was already paying for shipping.

Your review is really accurate. I like to think of this game as a contemporary port or clone of Bosconian, and yeah it's mostly horrible but some fun can be had with sheer perseverance.

Hopefully I'll be able to show a guest what an extremely competent port of Bosconian can look like on the VCS (Draconian) versus Mission 3000AD. For that opportunity, plus its weird origins and rarity, it stays on my shelf.