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 | By Simon Nicol Martech1985 Crazy Comets is a reasonably accurate (unofficial) conversion of the Arcade game "Mad Planets" for the Commodore 64. The game originally received above-average to good reviews which were undoubtedly affected by the lower-than-average price point of 7.99 and an early example of the wizardry of Rob Hubbard - but more of that later! |  |
| The premise of Crazy Comets is an simple one. You control a triangular spacecraft that moves around a static (save for a swirling starfield effect) screen. Your ship always faces "up" the screen and can shoot a stream of bullets in that direction by depressing the trusty fire button. Planets and their moons emerge from the void, gradually gaining in size. The bigger the planet, the more shots it takes to destroy and the more erratically it moves (and they do move very fast and erratically) as it nears destruction. Your job is to destroy the planets. | 
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 | Occasionally, space capsules will appear which can be rescued (by running into them) for more points. The capsules are usually accompanied by little comets which must be destroyed. And so it continues, until you inevitably run out of lives and head for that high-score table in the sky... |  |
 | The Music
Crazy Comets was a pretty unremarkable game in 1985. Fun, but nothing too special. What made it worth buying was the soundtrack by Commodore music maestro Rob Hubbard. The expectations were growing in the Commodore music scene after early Hubbard tracks like "Thing on a Spring" and the incredible "Monty on the Run" (not to mention the brilliant contributions of Martin Galway to many of the Ocean titles of the time). However, Hubbard surpassed himself with the Crazy Comets soundtrack, composing and coding arguably the finest music heard on the C64 to that date. The music is well worth listening to today - it's a fantastic tune (especially on the title screen where the game sound effects do not disturb it). The Sarge |  |
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