Attack of the killer zzzzs…

By Russell Baillie

Body Harvest

Gremlin

Knife Edge

Kemco

Both Nintendo 64

Both these titles represent a double dose of sci-fi for the Nintendo 64 format but neither are about to set the gaming world - or any other planet - on fire.

Body Harvest is a role-playing game, its story a mix of the time-travelling elements of the Terminator films and the bugs-in-space of Starship Troopers.

Giant insects have tried to invade Earth at 25-year intervals - every time the comet they travel on comes within hopping distance. They're here to take mankind's place in the foodchain - hence the title.

Once back on the planet at various times during the 20th century it's your job to play exterminator, go on a seek-and-destroy mission while wearing a suit of bio-mechanical armour. You can also commandeer a range of vehicles from First World War biplanes to 60s cars to speed up your mission.

The problem is, for all its quirky detail and colourful landscapes, it's graphically dull while the gameplay is clunky and uninvolving.

There is a bit of navigation to be done. But finding the giant bugs is really a matter of "look over there giant bug" and then blasting them before they make mulch of you. Nothing to it really. And that's the pity of Body Harvest.

The sci-fi scenario of Knife Edge has you as the nose gunner in an assault aircraft on a colonised Mars where the residents have finally woken up to the fact the Earthlings are in the neighbourhood.

It runs on a peculiar logic - the aircraft is automatically piloted as it darts the Red Planet's ravines (showing a much-copied Star Wars influence) but must be manually aimed. That's a matter of moving the targeting cursor to the right spot and firing. Nothing to it either.

While it gives a good sense of whoosh as in its flying, the craft itself looks like the doodling of a gun-crazed eight-year-old boy. Knife Edge plays like an old-fashioned combat helicopter game, only sped up and dumbed down.

If these two titles were sci-fi movies, Body Harvest would be B-grade and Knife Edge way down the other end of the alphabet.