Llamas. Mutant goats. Explosions in every pixel. Welcome to the world of Jeff Minter, the brilliant British eccentric whose Llamatron from 1991 is the pure essence of arcade madness served up on the Atari ST.
Llamatron is an undisguised tribute to the Robotron: 2084 arcade machine. Ideally you control it with two joysticks, or a mouse and keyboard, one direction for movement and the other for shooting in an independent direction. Hordes of enemies pour onto the screen, you mow them down with volleys of shots, rescue defenceless llamas and try to survive in the mounting chaos. It is pure, relentless action, where reflexes and peripheral vision decide everything.
Minter, founder of the Llamasoft studio, was famous for his obsession with hoofed animals and a psychedelic aesthetic overflowing with colour. He released Llamatron as shareware, in the spirit of an era when games were spread for free and players then sent money if they liked them. This approach turned him into one of the legends of the home computer scene, and to this day he remains a symbol of an independent, auteur approach to development.
Culturally, Minter embodies the type of creator who stubbornly follows his own path. His games were never about realism or a serious story, but about the raw joy of shooting, dazzling effects and humour. Llamatron is a perfect demonstration of this: fast, loud, visually aggressive and incredibly addictive. Minter, incidentally, still creates in a similar spirit today, and his signature is unmistakable.
Anyone who experienced the golden era of arcade machines will find instant satisfaction in Llamatron. It is a game about the chase for a higher score, about getting one wave further and about pure motor joy. It needs to explain nothing, it just hurls you into the action and does not let go.
Why play: One of the purest arcade experiences on the Atari ST from the cult figure Jeff Minter, where the roots of Robotron merge with psychedelic madness and an endless chase for score.
Game 3 of 72 for Atari ST
