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Title Second Samurai
Game Type Action Adventure
Players 1 or 2
Compatibility ECS and AGA versions (See also Patch available on Aminet)
HD Installable Yes (With Patch)
Company Psygnosis/Vivid Image
Submission William Payne

Review
Second Samurai was released in 1994, just as the 16-bit consoles were
finally beginning to edge ahead of the Amiga in terms of quality action
games being released. I remember around the same time being disappointed
with the quality of Mortal Kombat 2, when it was finally released,
compared to the Megadrive version I was used to playing at my friend's
house. When I loaded up Second Samurai, though, I realised I'd found a
game that reminded me just what my (by now, slightly creaky) A500 could
really do in capable hands.

As with the game's prequel, First Samurai (by the way, the name was
originally intended as a dig at the Last Ninja games, released a few years
before) the player took control of a Samurai warrior attempting to exact
revenge on the Demo Lord that had slain his master. In Second Samurai you
fight through fantasy/mechanical hybrid worlds, against supernatural and
robotic enemies as well as other pyjama-clad ninja and samurai types.
There are three worlds to complete, representing the past, the present and
the future. The first two worlds that you encounter have four sub levels,
the final world has two. For certain parts of the game, your character
needs to resort to a somewhat un-samurai like jet pack to negotiate
trickier sections of the terrain, and even ends up riding on the back of a
dragon, if memory serves correctly. The smoothly-scrolling gameworld,
imaginatively designed enemies fast, stylish and colourful graphics with
appropriate Eastern music were more than a match for anything the SNES and
Megadrive were producing at the time, and as the disk I was playing the
game from somehow managed to kill my floppy drive, it also ended up being
the last game my A500, by now six years old, ever loaded up for my gaming
pleasure.