In the Arctic Circle, there are two certainties: not eating will kill you,
and being in the water too long will kill you. You have to brave both
possibilities in this game, trying to keep the fishing nets intact, and
trying to fend off the roaming sharks intent on biting through the nets.
There are both stationary and moving ice floes, and you can jump from one
to the other (or to the shore), with your spear at the
ready to impale a
shark - but sooner or later you also have to jump into the freezing water
to repair the nets, leaving you at the sharks' mercy.
(GST Video, 1984 / released by Classic Console Center in 2006)
This unreleased gem from the Odyssey2/Videopac library is a fine specimen
of the best Odyssey2 games - offbeat, original (or at least adding original
twists to popular themes) and unique. Shark Hunter was designed
for the European market, but was never released in this form when the crash
of the video game industry caught up with overseas game makers. (A version
of it later appeared for MSX computers overseas.) It's fun and
frustrating, and would've been a more than welcome addition to the Odyssey2
or Videopac libraries.
One of the most surprising elements of Shark Hunter is how it uses
the Odyssey2's built-in selection of character shapes, as well as its title
screen - a fairly unique element - which features graphics that clearly
break out of the box of those predetermined shapes. Though most of the
in-game graphics are familiar Odyssey2 staples, they haven't been used in
quite this way before. With original games like this, the Odyssey2's day
should've been far from over, except that more modern technology was about
to leave it in the dust.
Dieter Koenig's Classic Console Center recovered the completed prototype
ROM and made cartridges available in both PAL and NTSC form in 2006,
finally letting gamers who were still clinging to their Odyssey2 and
Videopac consoles know what they'd missed out on. It's an outstandingly
fun little game.
Rating:
A whole dollar - trade it in for more quarters, you'll be playing this
one a lot.
Reviewed by Earl
Green
theLogBook.com editor/webmaster
This unreleased gem from the Odyssey2/Videopac library is a fine specimen
of the best Odyssey2 games - offbeat, original (or at least adding original
twists to popular themes) and unique. Shark Hunter was designed
for the European market, but was never released in this form when the crash
of the video game industry caught up with overseas game makers. (A version
of it later appeared for MSX computers overseas.) It's fun and
frustrating, and would've been a more than welcome addition to the Odyssey2
or Videopac libraries.
A whole dollar - trade it in for more quarters, you'll be playing this
one a lot.