One of the worst platform games ever made and definitely a low point in Mastertronic's varied career.
Barbarian (not to be confused with the excellent game of the same name from Palace Software) casts you as a barbarian (duh) who must destroy everything in sight and avoid various traps. How bad is the game? I'll let Trixter's gripe speak for me: Gameplay is done with "icons", which can be selected with the joystick, mouse, or function keys. For example: To move your character to the right, you press/select the right arrow icon. To swing your sword, you select the sword icon. This would be appropriate if the game were a turn-based strategy game or something--but it's not! It's a weak action game. You'd think that you could simply move left, right, etc. and hit a button to swing your sword, but you can't. You have to use the "icons" for everything. It's the stupidest control system I've ever seen for an action game.
Enough said. Bad game, bad graphics, ridiculous controls. Avoid this Real Dog at all costs and go play the superior Palace Software game instead.
Review By HOTUD
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Comments and reviews
OK, apparently all we agree that it had a crap control system, but somebody managed to play it to the end. What I've always wondered is... did the last button - Leaving the sword on the ground and running away - have any useful purpose in order to win the game?
I played this game on my parents' PC back in 1989. I seem to recall using the function keys to hit the icons (F1=Left, F2=Up, F3=Down, and so on through F10=Reverse Direction). That made the game mostly playable.
I have found it! Mye first game!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86ysVdR2Ssk&ab_channel=YusufAbi
i published a video for this game
The Amiga (and ST presumably) enjoyed better, more colourful graphics, but the gameplay was just as bad. It seemed that Psygnosis convinced themselves that games on the new mouse-controlled 16-bit home computers had to be mouse controlled, and this, Brataccas, and Obliterator (a re-skinned Barbarian) were the sad result. Rather than a smooth-flowing action game, we have something more like a 2D Dragon's Lair; even if it the game had a regular control scheme, that would not have improved it.
Jesus Christ, this has to be the worst UI in the history of gaming. I remember playing this on 286 and hating it to death.
This was the first game I installed on my family's 286 PC back in 1990, on a 5.25" disk from my friend. Unfortunately this game was my introduction to computer viruses, as the floppy was carrying the Marijuana virus. As soon as I started Barbarian my computer got infected ("Your computer is now stoned!"). Got the PC exchanged and all went well afterwards and I got to 'enjoy' Barbarian for a while.
I played this piece of crap back in 1990. I was able to make throw this first enemy which is that frog on that, picture but after that i was dead. Sound effect are allso pain in the ass. Horrible game whit horrible sounds and worst controls in history of gaming.
That's what I thought too! With a lightpen it might have been playable...
Holy crap, it's the precursor to modern touch screen mobile phone games!
No comment nor review for this game at the moment.