HSC11 Round 22: "U & V" Vanguard & Universal Hero

[+therealbountybob]

U - Universal Hero & Bonus Game Upward

V - Vanguard

 

Vanguard - Possibly the best Horzontal shooter for the 8-bit Atari Vanguard (yes I know DropZone, Defender, Tale of Beta Lyrae, Aquatron...) but seriously it's a supeb game 10/10. Play using repeat fire ([Option/F4] keep fire pressed for autofire ) and remember you're playing for high score so learn to milk out those points especially with the shield and in the rainbow zones. Restart the game from the beginning each time. Once you complete the first round the game speeds up and improves no end. Extra life at 10K. No pause key!

 

WARNING: at the end of your go it continues so you can miss seeing your score

Hints: Let go of fire to move faster up/down to avoid the shots. You can dock with the little creatures on the 'bleak' stage for a lift and healthy bonus too

Bonus Points: highest score for first round, plus 2000 for each life remaining. Highest level (tunnel) reached.

 

Universal Hero - play the patched version which allows the computer code to be entered [*1*].

Keys: S to Start, Cursor Keys to select one of the 9 storage spaces (red cursor in top right box),

P for Pick-up or drop item

U use item - anywhere in the correct room (it beeps)

D for Inventory (three pages of 3 items), also use for a pause.

Space to clear messages. Esc=abort

Map the game as you go, there are not too many rooms, seems quite nice really.

Scoring: Based on # of puzzles solved; post what you did plus any other progress.

If you use a guide/walkthrough to play you will still score some bonus points - let me know when you post.

Bonus Game:

Upward looks interesting and there is an Editor for anyone wanting some bonus points by creating something fun. This time the games says "Patched for PAL systems by Fandal" revenge of the NTSC players!! [*2*]

Score is show at end of go.

Scoring: tbc

If anyone is familiar with these games please post some more info

 

 

Downloads / Info Fandal / Atarimania / etc

Vanguard XEX / Info

There is a version of Vanguard from AAG that may have something improved somewhere so play that too or instead - I will be playing this one to see if I can spot anything

Universal Hero [*1*] my copy has "repaired by AB software" on the title screen / Info Video

Upward [*2*] / Info Video

Upward Editor ATR

Round Now Ends Tuesday 16th December 10am Uk time, so plenty of time here

HAVE FUN - JOIN IN - PLAY ATARI

Edited December 11, 2014 by therealbountybob
Revised everything!

[roadrunner]

Vanguard, we allowed to use continues?


The powerup music in Vanguard is a song by Queen from the Flash Gordon soundtrack.
The soundtrack woulda been better off if they left out the movie dialogue.
Football Fight is a cool song too.

[roadrunner]

Does Universal Hero use the keyboard and a controller? It looks like key P is pickup.

[McKong]

Vangard 33160

[+therealbountybob]

Vanguard, we allowed to use continues?

 

The powerup music in Vanguard is a song by Queen from the Flash Gordon soundtrack.

The soundtrack woulda been better off if they left out the movie dialogue.

Football Fight is a cool song too.

 

Now what did I say in bold about STARTING FROM THE BEGINNING EACH GO

I like that album and it's about time I listed to it again, my old F.G. tape is ropey so I bought it on CD too

Does Universal Hero use the keyboard and a controller? It looks like key P is pickup.

 

I can't find any proper instructions... S start D inventory please post as you find things guys

 

Vangard 33160

Looking forward to this battle

[McKong]

Now what did I say in bold about STARTING FROM THE BEGINNING EACH GO

I like that album and it's about time I listed to it again, my old F.G. tape is ropey so I bought it on CD too

I can't find any proper instructions... S start D inventory please post as you find things guys

 

Looking forward to this battle

 

When I started UH earlier on Altirra I was prompted to choose the keys for

 

Left & Right Cursor move

Describe

Use

Pick Up

Abort

 

There were no default keys on the screen where you make the selections

[8BIT 1337]

Doesn't look like either "U" game has scoring so note your progress when posting.

 

 

I actually got a score in Upward - 70. It shows up after the game is over, and your high score flashes on the attract screen. Sorry about the photo of an emulated version - it wouldn't let me save a screenshot and I haven't had a chance to play anything on my real Atari just yet. As you can possibly tell I forgot to switch to NTSC but won't submit any more emulator scores on PAL (and of course I'll play this until I beat 70).

 

I quite like Upward.

 

Edited December 3, 2014 by therealbountybob

[8BIT 1337]

I guessed Universal Hero might have been ported from somewhere else when I saw that it was a UK cassette game from Mastertronic. Sure enough it came from the Spectrum:

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Hero

 

I'll come clean - I went from that link to the World of Spectrum link. It has a link that says 'English Instructions' so of course I opened it ... and it's basically a walk through of how to beat the game. Oh yeah, and it mentions that the controls are customizable but doesn't say how to do that (or what the default controls actually are) LOL.

 

So anyway, I am withdrawing from that competition, since in theory I could get to the end pretty easily.

 

I did keep searching and haven't found out what the controls are. If I do find them I will post them. There are some great scans of reviews of the game from back when it was released though.

Edited December 2, 2014 by 8BIT 1337

[Sikor]

The powerup music in Vanguard is a song by Queen from the Flash Gordon soundtrack.

 

[8BIT 1337]

Random fun fact: the name of the bat in Upward is "Skyler."

 

The game appeared in A.N.A.L.O.G. #59.

 

Pressing select changes the speed of the bat (3 levels worth) and pressing option changes his accuracy (also 3 levels worth). Max out your STR or AIR guages and you, as we all would have guessed but haven't ever had that happen yet, die.

 

I've gotten to 80 but that's as far as I've gotten. The article didn't mention how the scoring worked, but it did say that the * beside your score means it is a new high score. I think scoring is dependent on how high you get and how much str/air you have left when you ultimately plunge into the lava. But I could be wrong.

[roadrunner]

The Hero Film Version.
Check out the uploaders channel, they have alot of great Queen stuff.
Demo's, extended versions, solo stuff, live stuff....etc.

[roadrunner]

Upward 80

Edited December 2, 2014 by roadrunner

[McKong]

Universal Hero seems like it could take a while to play.

Got through to the 2nd building and spent a lot of time collecting stuff, used a few things but not sure how much more I had to do

[+therealbountybob]

Universal Hero seems like it could take a while to play.

Got through to the 2nd building and spent a lot of time collecting stuff, used a few things but not sure how much more I had to do

I've just played the games. I think it looks ok though so we'll see how we go. I'll update the first post with more info / scoring etc.

 

Upward 80

Universal Hero: Collected 5 items. Used 0 items.

 

Vanguard 38,610

BE CAREFUL ON YOUR LAST LIFE AS VANGUARD WILL CONTINUE AT THE END OF GO IF YOU ARE BUSY BLASTING AWAY AND IT DOESN'T SHOW THE HIGH SCORE!

 

FIRST POST UPDATED WITH SCORING MORE INFO AND SCORING FOR THIS ROUND

Edited December 3, 2014 by therealbountybob

[roadrunner]

Vanguard 8,930

[McKong]

Universal hero

 

There's a lot of items!

 

1st building. Found 11 items used 10

2nd building. Found 12 items used 8. Then got stuck!

[8BIT 1337]

New high score for Upward: 257.

 

I got to the top finally and about half way up again before dying. After I finished the first round my score was 117, which leads me to believe that points are doubled in the second round (as I went about 60 points worth of distance but got an extra 120 points on top of my finished the level score). Skyler moves faster too.

 

I *really* enjoy this game, but it's time to move on to Vanguard next and just come back to this for a break when needed. I'm pretty sure I can climb up again, there's just one finicky jump that if you overjump you hit the ceiling and I don't quite have the exact pixel placement down pat for that jump yet.

 

[+therealbountybob]

New high score for Upward: 257.

 

I got to the top finally and about half way up again before dying. After I finished the first round my score was 117, which leads me to believe that points are doubled in the second round (as I went about 60 points worth of distance but got an extra 120 points on top of my finished the level score). Skyler moves faster too.

 

I *really* enjoy this game, but it's time to move on to Vanguard next and just come back to this for a break when needed. I'm pretty sure I can climb up again, there's just one finicky jump that if you overjump you hit the ceiling and I don't quite have the exact pixel placement down pat for that jump yet.

So updward might automatically progress through the 9 difficulty combos? When you started another game was it back on the initial level/speed? If so just play on the default everyone

 

Yes give me a new Vanguard target score

[+therealbountybob]

Spent a while being the Universal Hero - we'll make it progress so that's puzzles solved for scoring purposes (some require multiple items), press U to use an item anywhere in the correct room - it beeps.

 

I did the mainframe computers and the Atari screens and destroyed the rubble so that's 3 puzzles - I did seem to open a wall to get the crude oil too but not sure how! Need to figure out how to get past that water spray thing and get more air too

Try not to post spoilers when posting guys

 

I couldn't wait to play Vanguard but the AAG version locked up, I had 4 lives and reached 49,030 tried again but didn't get this far again, typical!

Tunnel 1 bonus challenge 46,700 with 4 lives remaining

[McKong]

Got a lot further on Universal hero, too many problems solved to list! Escaped from the 2nd building. Found 12 items on the 3rd mission, lost track of how many I used.

[+therealbountybob]

Got a lot further on Universal hero, too many problems solved to list! Escaped from the 2nd building. Found 12 items on the 3rd mission, lost track of how many I used.

Safe to say you are in the lead Is the first 'building/level' the starting block of 9x4? rooms then you get the space craft to take you to a 2nd area or do you move between areas throughout. Hope this makes sense

 

 

The Vangard Tunnel 1 bonus will be Score + 2,000xlives remaining....

So my score was 46,700, plus 4 livesx2,000=8,000 Total 54,700

[Mrs. McKong]

Wrong account!

Edited December 5, 2014 by Mrs. McKong

[McKong]

Yeah I'm counting the end of the 1st building as when you get into the spaceship

[+therealbountybob]

-

Yeah I'm counting the end of the 1st building as when you get into the spaceship

Ahh I've just got to the 2nd building. Uni-Hero is a nice relaxing game, some of the baddies are a bit annoying but you can usually work a way round them. Anyone struggling just press U over each item in any room where there looks to be something. The first complex was not too challenging. I had a bunch of stuff on the 2nd one but walked into something nasty.

 

Anyone (natch) know how many 'levels' there are?

If anyone wants to play the game through using a walk-through that is ok for some bonus points too

 

Vanguard 70,060 think I need to dig out a better stick as I seem to be very rusty, boy is the 2nd Tunnel stripe zone fast!

Upward finished the first level - I was getting a bit frustrated but once you figure out each jump/drop place the game looks like it is the same on each level. 162 at the end of first and 222 final score.

[CapitanClassic]

Anyone know if Vanguard supports keyboard and joystick control like Crossfire? The arcade allowed you to shoot and move in different directions simultaneously, and this version seems to fire a shot forward first (even when I am desperately trying to fire up/down). This has got me killed hundreds of times in the Rainbow zone.