Catalogue No. - T-7015G

There was once a time when Core were one of the best British software houses around. That was back in the days of the Amiga and Mega CD. Classics such as Wolfchild, Jaguar XJ220, and Thunder Hawk all made Core look like one of the big boys in the world of game making. Unfortunately, standards started to drop.  More and more crap began to pour from the studio. Their last great game was Thunder Hawk II on the Saturn which was sadly followed up by the poor Shell Shock.

Now we have Blam!, Machine Head, another one of these first person shooters that has you controlling some ship. A.M.O.K. is the best choice of these games but how is Blam! Machine Head? Well, the intro is dull as were many of the CG intros from the mid 90's. Death and destruction is taking over the world AGAIN! But this time it's in the form of a virus. The character that you play was working on an antidote to the virus that needed someone brave enough to spread it around. Along comes your co-scientist who bashes you on the head knocking you out. You wake up to find yourself strapped in to the machine against your will.  Looks like you're the unlucky soul that will spread the antidote around the virus infested world.

Anyway, the game is basically a first person shooter. Textures are grainy as hell but at least the polygons don't pop up all over the place. Frame rate is also quite steady. I can't say I noticed it drop below 30fps even once. The main gripe though is like many of these games, it's just chaotic. You have attacks coming from bloody everywhere with not one single clue as to who fired them. Yep, the view from your cock pit is pretty restricted making life quite difficult. There is an outside view but even that doesn't let you see what hit you most of the time. To add to the confusion you've also got the overly complicated controls that I'm sure could have been simplified.

Overall Blam! Machine Head is a pretty average title that some may enjoy or more likely, may not.