Atari ST exclusive games

This thread is a continuation of the original Exclusive Atari ST games that were never ported to the Amiga thread which I created last year. That original thread contains a list of all Atari ST exclusive games that were never released on the Amiga and I will be continuing to update that list as I discover more.

The idea of this thread is to explore each of these ST exclusive games in some more detail. Looking at each in turn to see if they are any good, and worth playing.

What exclusive Atari ST games from the list I've linked to above do you know of and have played?

It is great to explore and play some of them and see the ST games we never get to play on the Amiga.

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http://www.mobygames.com/game/rana-rama

Rana Rama was the first game I every played on my Atari ST when it arrived in 1987, because it was included with the system.

It was also released on the 8-bit systems (Spectrum, C64 and CPC) but the ST was the only 16-bit version.

You controlled a Wizard's apprentice called Mervyn, who had tried to cast a spell to make him irresistible to women. However the spell backfired and he was turned into a frog!

The game is a top down dungeon adventure, with real time combat which uses runes you collect during the game to cast spells and defeat the enemies you encounter in each room.

The objective is to find and defeat 96 wizards who have invaded the dungeon. When you encounter one of them you enter a mini game with the word RANARAMA randomly rearranged, and you are given a set time to arrange it back in the correct order by swapping the letters in pairs. Achieving this before the time runs out earns you up to four new runes which boost your abilities and power.

I really enjoyed this game at the time and graphically it was a huge leap from my old Amstrad CPC464.

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http://www.mobygames.com/game/cpc/gauntlet

Based on the Arcade game, Gauntlet is a top down multiplayer hack and slash dungeon arcade game. The original arcade game allowed up to 4 players simultaneously, and the Atari ST version also allowed this by using a special parallel port joystick adapter to provide the additional 2 joystick ports needed.

The ST version of Gauntlet was very close to the Arcade original, and I played this a lot on the ST at the time. It was also released on nearly every 8-bit system you could think of, and I also owned it for the Amstrad CPU before the Atari version and that was pretty good too.

Gauntlet II was however also released for the Amiga in 1987 so that was something. However ST owners did get to enjoy the first one for 2 years prior to this.

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http://www.mobygames.com/game/atari-st/midi-maze

Now this Atari ST exclusive game was really cool back in 1987 when it was first released, and it is possibly the first every multiplayer first person shooter on any home platform.

It allowed up to 16 players to compete simultaneously by linking up to 16 Atari STs together using a special adapter which daisy chained the STs together via their MIDI ports. Quite a cool use for the STs built in MIDI ports.

I used to play this game at a local video games gaming shop, which was setup with rows of STs and Amigas and you could go in and use the machines and play any of the games they had in the shop at the time. And they had 16 STs linked up for some proper full 16 player Midi-Maze tournaments.

The game is first personal perspective, using 90 degree angle filled polygon mazes to move around in. All players are represented on screen as smily pacman like faces and you all move around the maze trying to shoot each other with a basic gun. It was a great multiplayer experience at the time as nothing else like it existed.