#463 – P’Radikus Conflict

Set phasers to explode.

PLAYERS: 1

PUBLISHER: Color Dreams

DEVELOPER: Color Dreams

GENRE: Shmup sim, sorta

RELEASE DATE: 1990

Hot off the heels of the stone cold Iraq War “classic,” Operation Secret Storm comes Color Dreams’ latest magnum opus, P’Radikus Conflict. While you can’t kill oversized Satan Saddams in this game (the actual P’Radikus conflict took place in space, not in the Middle East), you can customize your space craft, shoot the P’Radikans and pretend like you’re enjoying yourself. Progress in the game pretty much resembles this: warp somewhere (seriously anywhere, it doesn’t matter), destroy hostile alien spaceships and alien outposts, make some money, upgrade your ship, do it again. Problem is, there’s a whole butt-ton of galaxies and planets to explore, and every single one of them has enemies. Do you visit every planet or are there only certain ones you need to go to in order to progress? I couldn’t tell and I didn’t feel like fighting swarms of never-ending snack treats to figure it out. The shooting portions control like Asteroid, which is to say, clunky and terrible. It’s almost better not to fly around. Shoot the enemies as they come to you, if you’re really that committed to the Lextorian cause. If the P’Radikus (P’Radikii?) were as much of a threat as Color Dreams believed, they should have developed a better game to do them justice. This conflict is a bust.

F