Netherworld

e5150 2018-05-12
(6/10)
I remember this as an ok game. No special graphics or sound but at least it had smooth scrolling and was playable and that was already something because the bar was pretty low at the time.
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-Monk- 2016-10-21
Netherworld - the case of a wasted name.

The name conjures up all kinds of interesting and exciting, 'beyond this world'-type imagery. It's by definition an 'otherworldly' place - somewhere between 'never' and 'ether', it almost seems.

Jukka tried his best to make it interesting; he created skillfully-made graphics, asked Jori to make some kind of impressive, sample-based music for the title screen, used some 'copper colorslides' (not that the C64 has a copper), parallax-scrolling starfield in the title, and his producer even used his face on the cover (without his consent), together with some very other-worldly imagery indeed!
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-Monk- 2016-10-21
He calculated that if he uses bits and pieces of other games, he can create a 'unique' game experience that still has a bit of a nostalgic scent. So, he took a bit of 'Boulder Dash', a hint of 'Hunter's Moon', added a tight time limit, a quirky sprite a la Quedex, some 'spacey' sound effects and some 'addon icons' from All Shoot'em Ups, and voila; the game soup was ready.

While in my opinion, the gameplay remained quite shallow and unforgiving, and got bored with it very quickly..

(all of Jukka's games are like that - they feel like inferior clones of some superior games, or hollow mixtures made out of bits from better, soulful games - maybe he used his brain too much, and not enough his spirit or heart (i.e. 'inspiration'))

.. I always thought it was a valiant effort with an interestingly suitable title song (also kind of simplisticly hollow, just a short aural experiment, showing off samples, and doing it very well, but not offering much more - heck, there aren't even ANY chords in that song, not even as arpeggios - compare that to how it SHOULD be done with Rob Hubbard's "Skate or Die" title music (and use a real C64 and a PAL disc version to get it to play at slower, much more enjoyable speed) - "Skate or Die" title song has chords, plus nice SID-instrus, plus heavy guitar, plus great SID-drums).
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-Monk- 2016-10-21
I figured, it's not much, but it's an interesting effort, with slightly pleasant graphics and space theme that reminds me of better games, like Wizball (now THAT's a brilliant game in all ways that a game can be!)

But this Amiga conversion is so typical of the crap they cranked out back then. Wizball's Amiga version, Impossible Mission II's Amiga version, like so many others, are complete trash compared to the original. At least with Wizball, the original is a brilliant gem, with this game, the original is not that much to begin with, so it SHOULD'VE been easy to improve it. Instead, they made it worse in all ways possible.

The graphics were screwed by two things; bringing the C64 graphics to higher resolution without actually redrawing them properly to fit that higher resolution, but instead, making them look more fuzzy, and the background. Oh mi gosh, the background.

It's of course tempting to 'show off' the colors of the machine that has more of them, but this was the WRONG way to do that. Black background provokes imagination, and conjures feelings of SPACE and INFINITY. A crappy colorslide just reminds you of the color limitations, AND that you are playing some crappy conversion of a not-that-great computer game instead of immersing yourself in another (Nether)world
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-Monk- 2016-10-21
The title music was totally raped - even though the original song wasn't a masterpiece example of compositional and musical expertise (the structure is pityfully simple and repetitive, and the song is way too short). It's like taking some powerful, energetic song (not that the original.. Etc.) and playing it with xylophone to some reggae beat. It's bound to lose a lot of energy, flow and impact. Doing this in a slower tempo, just makes it worse.

It's almost like taking a powerful and emotional speech and then making someone say the same words without any emotional impact, as if doing table reading for someone else (*coughImpossibleMissionIIAmigaVersioncough*), excuse me. I had a bit of a cough.

Poor Amiga. Why was it cursed with these ATROCIOUS ports, I will never understand. Maybe it's greed, maybe it's impotence of coders, maybe it's something more sinister.

But just do yourself a favor and play the C64 versions of Wizball, Boulder Dash, Skate or Die and Hunter's Moon - you'll come back feeling much better, more satisfied, and without ANY urge to play 'Netherworld' whatsoever.
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stooart 2011-01-13
(4/10)
Nice on the C64 but fails on the Amiga as it was capable of so much more. Just far too half baked to be any good.
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ReTroViRuS 2010-12-18
(2/10)
I bought this from the bargain bin in the mid-nineties. I gave up on it two minutes in and never played it again. Two minutes, that was the maximum amount of time I was willing to spent on its depressingly broken gameplay and sickly green graphics.
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Predseda 2008-11-25
(3/10)
BAD game. But has really disturbing box, I simply had to have it.
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Arkhan 2008-07-12
I have this game and it wont load past the title screen. I dont know why not. Maybe its because my instructions are in German.

after sitting for 20 minutes hoping it would start so I didnt have to hear the terrible theme song, I gave up.
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Eltar 2006-11-17
(3/10)
Nothing specific? I kept launching this game for it's music sake. Truly excellent tune.
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Sakura_Star1 2006-03-25
(3/10)
Good name,for a bad game. Yep,you read it. I play this game on my Amiga Classix 4 colection,and I didn't like it. The intro. With the head is cool,but,it's seams that it has no fun around this Netherworld

3 out of 10
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Eiji 2005-11-03
(3/10)
What the hell is that?

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