EXCELSOR (1986) [Players] Cassette Writer: Keith 'Howlin' Mad' Harvey Producer: Richard Paul Jones (Text from Rear of Cassette label): Equipped only with your Excelsor Jetpack, you must rescue the human 'Soul Stars' trapped and hung suspended in space by an alien force.

REVIEW by AtariGrub

In the year 2136 molecular transportation has become a reality, with the ability to beam a person to another part of the planet in seconds. Unfortunately, aliens with advanced technology have set about intercepting those using the new transportation system and have been separating the souls from the bodies and sealing them in pure Nexus energy as Soul Stars. It's your job as one of the last surviving humans to retrieve the Soul Stars and fight off the alien invaders!

You start the game with 5 lives, a jetpack, laser gun and 8 Soul Stars to collect before you can transport to the next level. Each colourful screen is littered with stationary mines, which will kill you upon contact and it's not long after your character beams into the level that three Aliens materialise, one on each of the three-tiered platforms. Luckily they can only move in a horizontal direction and are easily killed with a single shot from your laser gun. Unfortunately, every time you successfully shoot an alien another quickly replaces it and collecting the Soul Stars quickly becomes your number one priority. The problem is each Soul Star appears in a random point on the screen and occasionally this will be in a rather tricky position, such as in between two mines! However, upon losing a life the Soul Star will disappear and reappear in another (hopefully more accessible) location.

The control of your spaceman is quite intuitive, with fire button to shoot, left and right for horizontal movement and pushing forward on the joystick to rocket up to the sky. The tricky part is descending which is achieved by releasing the forward movement on the joystick, at which point your spaceman will very rapidly fall to the ground. Some skill here is required if you are trying to collecting a Soul Star which is hovering above a mine.

After all Souls are saved on a level, your spaceman will transport to the next level with faster aliens and an increasing number of Soul Stars to collect (up to 20, by which point the levels will alternate between 10 and 20 to pickup). Added challenges are the Nexus Pulsars and vertical energy beams. The pulsars are indestructible and must be avoided, however they are worth 100 points per successful shot. The vertical energy beams are no harm to your spaceman, but act as a barrier and will reflect any of your lasers that come into contact with it. Any of your returning fire will not harm you if contact is made, but can in fact be used to your advantage when aliens are just materialising.

Overall, quite a fun shoot 'em up / collect 'em up, and a game which starts off on fairly easy ground, before slowly becoming harder. The key to becoming good at this game is in mastering the ascent/descent of your spaceman. Once you have become 'one' with your jetpack, you'll find yourself coming back to this game every so often for another bout of alien blasting and Soul searching entertainment!

"There's a Starman waiting in the sky..." (7/10)

GAME TIPS

The aliens will follow you wherever you go, but are slower than your spaceman, so try to lead them to one side of the screen, before quickly moving over to the other side to collect a Soul Star.

	- Round 1			- Round 9
	- Round 2			- Round 10
	- Round 3			- Round 11
	- Round 4			- Round 12
	- Round 5			- Round 13
	- Round 6			- Round 14
	- Round 7			- Round 15
	- Round 8			- Round 16

CLICK HERE to Download an Unlimited Lives file for use in the Atari 800Win Emulator.

Further Information:

A sort-of sequel was released under the title STRATOSPHERE in 1987 programmed again by Keith Harvey, who was also behind Players BUBBLE TROUBLE.

The Constellation and their Stars
(Information on every constellation and star, along Milky Way photos)
www.astro.wisc.edu/~dolan/constellations/constellations.html