Reviews

I've got fond memories of playing this Defender clone on my, then new, 16K Spectrum back in 1982 but it's not aged very gracefully.

Most of the features of the original game are in there, although a couple of things missing are Baiters and the ability to inadvertently shoot the humans you're protecting. However, the game is let down by rudimentary graphics; there's a fair amount of flicker, jerky scrolling and everything moves in exact character squares.

So, unless you've got particularly rose-tinted retro-spectacles it's not really worth the effort. Invasion of The Body Snatchas and Guardian II both offer far superior conversions of the arcade original too.

It's another Defender game and one mentioned by The Dean in his Guardian II review so I thought I'd have a go at it, and well it's just as mixed as Guardian II really. On one hand the pace is just about right and thus it can be played properly, on the other hand however the collision detection seems iffy to me, plus the keys are a bit rubbish with no joystick control to my knowledge. So in essence technically Guardian II is by far and away the better game, though Orbiter does play a tiny bit better but all accounts both titles are a tad disappointing.

1982 Silversoft (UK)
by Andrew Glaister

It is always nice to know our reviews are being read even in my questionable English :). About the game, YOR reviewed both this and Guardian II based on a review of my own, where I mentioned the qualities of Orbiter over Guardian II. Well, I agree with YOR, GII is better than Orbiter (not by far though), but the point I was trying to make is that while Orbiter was released in 1982, Guardian II was in 1990, and between both games, so much better Defender inspired games have emerged, from Penetrator to R-Type, these are way better than Guardian II. I'm not sure why this game was written but if it's a tribute to Defender it's an OK one other than that it doesn't make much sense to me.