The Vikings (Kele Line, 1986)

Written for the Amstrad CPC by Martin Pedersen.
Written for the Commodore 64 by Søren Grønbech.
Graphics by Torben Bakager.
C64 full screen picture by Joost Honig.
C64 hi-res scroll-routine by Thomas Larsen.
In-game sounds by Ben Daglish of WE M.U.S.I.C.
C64 loading tune by Johannes Bjerregaard.

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INTRODUCTION & GAME STATUS

Here's my second piece originally written for the RESET magazine, with slight adjustments to suit the blog format better. Since there aren't all that many particularly interesting games that can be found only on two machines (for making shorter comparison articles), I had to take on a bit of a rarity this time. The origins of Kele Line's The Vikings are rather unknown, as this advert found at World of Spectrum should point out. Although various sources seem to think the C64 version was released in 1987, and the Amstrad version in 1986, both the games have 1986 as the year of copyright, and the clear date of release in each case is unclear. The game was never released on the Spectrum for whatever reason, although it was to be released through Status Software somewhere along the line with the Amstrad version, after the C64 version had already been released.

At the time of release, The Vikings wasn't all that well received, because it was thought of as an outdated copy of Rambo: First Blood Part II, and truthfully, it isn't all too well thought of even currently, but the time has been kinder towards this game than many other games of the genre of the time. At Lemon64, The Vikings has been rated 6.9 with 20 votes, and at CPC Game Reviews, it has gotten a meagre 5 out of 10. So, you can perhaps imagine why I thought this would work quite nicely for my second entry on the very much C64-oriented RESET magazine.
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