Playing Doctor Doom's Revenge (C64)

Entry posted by Cybergoth April 3, 2011

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Hi there!

The Amazing Spider-Man and Captain America in Doctor Doom's Revenge:

That definitely is by far the longest title of a game I've been "Playing..." so far! :lolblue:

Ah well, after seeing games based on DC Comics like Batman and Superman, it's been about time that finally a brave developer (Paragon Software) made a game based on Marvel Comics. Not that Captain America or Spider-Man would be real favorites of mine - I've always been much more into the X-Men. At least, with Dr. Doom the two have one of the coolest Marvel villains overall to fight against, even when he actually is the arch nemesis of the Fantastic Four. Well, Spider-Man was in the Fantastic Four once, and I'm sure Cap & the Avengers fought against Dr. Doom a couple of times also.

The game is a massive 4 disk side multi-load monster, framed into a couple of (surprise, surprise...) comic strip panels that connect a series of action sequences together by telling some confusing story. Of course with so much disk space they could fit a lot of graphics into the game, giving it a respectable look overall. Most action sequences are one-on-one fighting scenes, but there's also a handful of screens with rather easy to beat mini games. The fighting scenes are quite easy as well, but what makes the game challenging is that both characters have to make it through the entire game on one health bar, that gets never refiled

When fighting both heroes play similar, with some unique moves based on their superpowers. Cap will use his shield to dodge or throw it for an attack, while Spidey can fire his net a limited number of times. The controls aren't too responsive though and some moves seem to be harder to trigger than they should. That being said, the fights are still very easy, especially once you figured a tactic that works against your current enemy.

I assume most of the negative feedback the game got back in the day was due to the long loading times, which were of course reduced a lot by using an emulator. So it was a fun one hour ride until I beat the game: