Thundering into the unknown at breakneck speed, are you agile enough to negotiate the perils? Roll left and right to avoid the cracks but be careful not to fall off the edge of the path as you go.

Every once in a while it's nice to get a game that is a bit different from the norm. Trailblazer is one such game. At first glance it looks like a sort of racing game but just playing it once will make you realise it has so much more to offer. Play it a few more times and you'll be hooked!

The general idea is that you are some sort of metal ball rolling happily along a fast moving conveyor belt in space. The conveyor belt thing is basically made up of multi-coloured squares and holes. You play the game looking in from directly behind your ball and the track is moving towards you. The game is split into levels with a time limit per level. The faster you complete a level the more time you have in the next!

As your ball rolls along the track, different things will happen as you roll over different coloured squares. Some squares are good, some are bad and some can be good or bad depending on the situation.... Firstly there are the grey and brown squares, which do nothing good nor harmful to your ball. Then there are the red and green squares... the red ones slow you down and the green ones give you a quick burst of speed. Purple squares are a real pain in the arse because they stop you in your tracks so you have to avoid them like the plague! Blue squares make you jump really high, white squares activate a speed-warp which lasts about 5 seconds or until you hit a purple square or fall down a hole (these white squares are few and far between - so make the most of them!). Finally there are the dreaded Cyan squares which reverse your left and right controls!

At the start of each level you have 6 jumps which you can use to avoid holes and nasty squares. At the end of every 3rd level you get a bonus game, in which you watch a ball follow a certain path on the squares and you have to memorise and repeat it. This is pretty cool and can give you more time in the following levels.

At the end of the day, like most racing games, getting good at the game comes from memorising the tracks. There's a one player game, a two-player head to head and a time-trial game. Like I already said, play it a few times and you'll be addicted... it's great fun, especially in 2-player mode. Just remember......BEWARE THE CYAN ZONE!!! :-)

Submitted by James Burrows (26 October 2000)

Other "Games of the Week!"

Home