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Meebzork 5-18-83
This is the early "shooting" version of Meebzork that was
abandoned in favor of the action/adventure version (which was also sadly
never released). Unlike the adventure version the shooting version
only conists of one level, but this level is much more involved. While
this version is much more aligned with the 5200's arcade style of games,
it just doesn't cut the mustard...
The title screen presents you with several options including difficulty,
level, option, and demo mode. Difficulty (Beginner, Intermediate,
or Advanced), affects the number of lives you start out with and the overall
difficulty of the game. Option lets you select Auto fire mode or
Manual fire (Auto fire is recommended). Demo puts the game into
a short demonstration mode, which shows the basics of how the game is
played. And Difficulty is the wave number you want to start out
on (1-16). As you start the game you'll notice a status bar at the
bottom of the screen. This status bar at the bottom of the screen
displays the amount of energy you have left, the number of lives remaining,
the number of Shield Units (SU) you currently have, and the amount of
time you've been playing.
You are the Meebzork. A yellowish creature whose mission is to
prevent the flying Gorgons from eroding away the life of your planet with
their deadly poison. However this isn't just any planet, it's divided
up into 64 rotating bands which contain the planet's life essence. Each
band starts out a lush green color, but every time a Gorgons poison shot
hits the planet the band will change color from green to brown to blue
to red and finally to black. Each color represents the health of
the planet, which worsens as it absorbs more Gorgon poison. To heal
the planet, Meebzork can use one of his (its?) shield units to return
a band to a healthier state. However when a band changes to black
that band is considered dead and cannot be healed. To make matters
worse, Meebzork can fall into the holes created by black bands and must
use his flying ability to escape.
However Meebzork isn't defenseless. Meebzork is
capable of shooting energy pulses which can actually absorb the life
energy of the Gorgons (killing them in the process). This energy
can be use to power Meebzork's flying ability which allows him to move
quickly around the planet and escape black holes. The flying power
is also useful for getting out of the way of the "The Ball"(tm).
The Ball hangs out in the background slowly pacing back forth,
just waiting for the right time to strike. When The Ball is ready
to strike you will hear a brief warning sound, this is your chance to
get the hell out of the way. The Ball will then burst forward from the
background and fly at Meebzork, and if it hits him he'll loose a life.
The problem is there's a glitch in this prototype which causes
The Ball to take away one life for every second it touches you instead
of just one life period. This tends to make games very short unless
you're quick (and get the hell out of the way).
Each wave contains 20 Gorgons. Once you've destroyed
all 20, the wave ends and Meebzork must face another even deadlier
group of Gorgons. The end of wave bonus is determined by multiplying
the number of waves completed times the number of lives remaining
times 100. For every three waves Meebzork completes he'll get
one new life, and every four waves all the planet's bands are restored
to green. Meebzork also gains one shield unit for every five
Gorgons he destroys.
While this version of Meebzork isn't a bad game, it
isn't a great game either. The main problem is that the game
gets old fast and the difficulty grows too quickly. The Ball
is an interesting antagonist, but doesn't add enough variety to the
game. Basically once you've seen the first level, you've seen
all the levels (they just get a little faster). The playtesters
must have had the same thoughts since Meebzork was completely redesigned
in an attempt to give it more long-term playability...
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