Cybernoid: The Fighting Machine
System: NES
Release Date: December 1989
Developer: Raffaele Cecco
Publisher: Acclaim Entertainment
Genre: Shoot ‘em Up
Vying for worst game of 1989, we have Cybernoid: The Fighting Machine. As usual, there are some bad space dudes coming for what’s ours. This time, the Zoggians are after our treasure caches on three asteroids! It’s up to you in the Cybernoid spacefighter to blast them into space dust!
You start out and pick from easy, hard, or lethal. Then you’re spit into the first asteroid. You’re not really sure what to do, so you pilot to the next screen. And you die from enemies flying up from the bottom of the screen. You immediately respawn and die again. And again. And again. Then you touch the little spiky looking thing and you have the Cybermace, which is sold in the manual as a super weapon. It’s not. You lose your nine lives and start over again.
Now you realize that the A Button shoots your crappy laser. There are a number of secondary weapons that you cycle through with the Select Button and activate with the B Button. Bombs are necessary to destroy some blocks that impede your path. Stationary enemies shoot out goo and missiles, so you want to destroy them when you can, but the hit detection doesn’t always work out and even if you destroy the missile launchers, sometimes the missiles will shoot out and kill you anyway!
The only way I made any progress was by using time travel. I tried grinding for points in a room, then kept dying, because each individual room has a time limit on top of the asteroid’s time limit. I finally got to a point where moving obstacles and blocks that needed to be bombed stopped me from moving forward and I decided to cut my losses and quit.
Graphics: 1.0
The graphics are pretty bad. There’s flickering when it’s most harmful to you.
Sound: 0.0
Terrible sound effects and no background music. (I realized that the manual says to pause and press the A Button for music, it’s awful.)
Gameplay: 0.0
The Cybernoid controls slowly and terribly. The weapons barely work.
Difficulty: 0.0
The game design is broken. I don’t believe you if you say there’s a way past the room I got stuck in.
Fun Factor: 0.0
I hated this from just about the second I turned it on.
Overall Grade: 0.2
Cybernoid: The Fighting Machine earns an E. This is one of the most terrible games I think I’ve ever had the misfortune of playing. This needed to stay on the 8-bit PCs of the era.