Now that Creatures is finally sorted and has been added to the BZ retro store (disk version now available, tape version coming soon!) it means I can move onto the next Psytronik project - which will be The Last Amazon! And there have been some very interesting things happening with this release recently.
Firstly, some back-story about the game. The Last Amazon game was originally produced back in 1993 by Alf Yngve for the Psytronik label. The game came with a cool intro sequence (complete with a stunning Matt Gray-esque tune composed by Tonka) and even a sequel game - called (unsuprisingly), The Last Amazon 2. Unfortunately, all the planned enhancements for the game didn't happen at the time and in the end the unfinished game was given away on the Commodore Zone covermount. It was a shame the game wasn't properly released as I really loved the two Last Amazon games - Alf had done a superb job creating the jungle setting for the first game (along with a more urbanised setting for the sequel) and he also created some stunning artwork for both the Last Amazon games featuring a very eye-catching heroine (who I always thought who I thought could be the "Lara Croft for C64 fans"). Here's a pic of the superb colour artwork Alf produced for the first Last Amazon game (which is available as a yummy poster or on a trendy T-Shirt from Alfs very own CheeseyCake Shop - pluggity plug!)
And so that was that was the end of The Last Amazon we thought ... But then in 2008 Psytronik Software was reborn!! The unreleased Last Amazon games have now been dusted off and I'm very happy to announce that the games will feature special power-ups installed by Shaun Coleman - who did a great job enhancing his own SEUCK game Laser Hawk.
Shaun has already added weapon power-ups to the first Last Amazon game. The screenshots below show how the weaponry progresses from a fairly weedy gun, to a shotgun, machine gun, right up to a laser blaster! That should give those baddies what for!
The Last Amazon starts her adventre with a weedy pistol.
Pa-bam! Eat shotgun shells you jeep-driving mutha!
Dagga-dagga-dagga! Die! Oh, there's nobody left to kill here!
Pcheoww! Zzap! The Last Amazon unleashes LASER-DEATH!And there will also be some new graphical effects in the game including an animated river! Check out the piccy below:
Alf also found some more Last Amazon promo artwork he produced way back in 1990 and I was so impressed with the picture I decided to use it as the main cover art for the new Psytronik release of the game. Here's an early preview of the tape inlay cover:-
And that's not all! In the past couple of weeks Alf has been dabbling with Jon Wells' Sideways SEUCK editor. I sent Alf the sprites and background graphics from the first Last Amazon game and guess what he went and did ... ? He has created a brand new sideways scrolling Special Edition version of The Last Amazon game! That means there are now THREE Last Amazon titles which means I can release THE LAST AMAZON TRILOGY!
I was so excited to see the new sideways scrolling Last Amazon game that it inspired me to start work on the graphics for the front-end of the game. The front-ends for all the Last Amazon games will be produced by Richard Bayliss (he of Sub Hunter fame). Richard has also produced some great music for the games (done once again in Matt Gray style). Here's a very early preview of the front-end for the brand-new sideways-scrolling Last Amazon Special Edition!
I'm a big fan of the original System 3 releases for the C64 and the logo for the game was inspired by the System 3 game Tusker (in fact, I "borrowed" a couple of elements from the Tusker graphics - omm!) I absolutely loved the music Matt Gray produced for Tusker - which is why I'm really pleased the game music has been done in a similar style (both Tonka and Richard Bayliss have done a superb job with the music). I'm really looking forward to seeing the final version of this release even though there's still quite a lot of work still to be done on them.
The Last Amazon Trilogy will be available on tape and disk for the Commodore 64 later this year (exact release date TBC).
