Ork

An ugly critter with a gun

Ork is a scrolling platform shooter by Psygnosis involving an angry-looking dude with a big gun. Yep sounds good to me already, but Psygnosis has never been a favourite company of mine - it's obvious where their preference lay. Thankfully, they did make a few decent Atari ST games so I'm hoping this is one of them.

We are Ku-Kabul, a wannabe space captain who needlessly has to suffer a series of tests that take place on an alien-infested world. After a nice intro, with images in that famous Psygnosis-style and nice (albeit fuzzy STfm) title music, Ork bears its soul for all to see. It's gorgeous with well-defined graphics that smoothly scroll in all four directions whilst accompanied by colourful backgrounds. The sound effects are made up of crunchy samples that certainly add a punch of attitude as you run around on your alien killing spree.

Time to take 5 to view a pretty nice screenshot of this shooter...

I'm not sure they made the best use of the standard palette as everything is similar.
At least they compensated for that by adding a colourful background.

An original copy?

I'm reminded a little of Shadow Of The Beast and Leander with (hmm) maybe a slice of Killing Gameshow too. This is probably because of the visuals and gameplay style that consists of solving puzzles and killing lots of baddies. Thankfully, we are supplied with a cool laser cannon and a jet booster to defend ourselves.

The puzzles aren't overbearing and the required tasks are pretty easy. Progression to the next level won't be allowed until solved because each has a guardian who won't let you pass until you cross his palm with silver, thus providing a little puzzle element. However, it's the action I enjoyed the most, and it is certainly fun blasting those trippy aliens that frantically race around the screen just asking to be blown up!

Could Psygnosis have pulled out their fingers and made a decent ST game? We'll see...

Leap, run, shoot, kill.
What more could you desire from an action shooter?

The CryptO'pinion?

Ork is a good mix of platformer, puzzler and shoot 'em up, but I feel an extra nip of speed would have made it perfect. Perhaps if they had used chip rather than samples? Or even used the Atari STe hardware? That would have been nice, so I feel like Ork could easily have been far better so perhaps a missed opportunity? (look below if you have a faster Atari). Anyhow, this lack of agility is my only gripe because I've enjoyed Ork.

One of the better Psygnosis games. Highly recommended to fans of platformers with puzzles and guns.

8BitChip has a download to install to a hard drive supporting faster computers!

If stuck with floppy disks then try Fuzion #185 thanks to Stonish.

Here is a MOD file of the Ork theme which is very nice

(Especially when played on the STe using these players!)