If you ask me this game breaks free from the "me too" plague and
comes out wonderfully. The ColecoVision was on the receiving end of the best version of
this nifty little game, easily overcoming the horrid flaws of the Atari 2600 and 5200
versions which are vastly unplayable and ugly.The coolest thing about Gorf is the variety of stages. The first is the Space Invaders clone which has you shooting the rows of enemies transcending upon you. Instead of rocks for shields, you have a dome shaped barrier that the enemies can slowly destroy.
Finish that and it's off to stage two. On the Galaxian style stage, the enemies come down in clusters and different enemies have different attacks from dive-bombing to lasers. Stage three is a Space Warp resembling Gyruss, minus the 360-degree control. Destroy a set number of enemies and it's off to the final level.
Stage four is probably the most unique of them all. There is a mother ship that has a dome barrier around it and it flies back and forth while firing at you. The ship will only be destroyed by hitting the solid red core in the center. You could essentially blow the whole ship to dust and still not destroy it. Finish everything and the title restarts with more enemies present creating a higher difficulty level.
The biggest flaw that prevent this from becoming perfect is the audio. Music and explosions are fine, but there is no sound from the enemies and no sound when they fire which lessens the intensity of the game. The graphics are quite detailed and are excellent for the CV though some areas could have a tad more detail.
Those of you who need a shooter fix, need look no further than Gorf. Don't play the versions on the Atari consoles. Those will leave a pretty awful taste in your mouth.
