The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

The Commodore Amiga was one of the most powerful and affordable home computers of its day, and is home to some of the best and most fondly remembered gaming titles of the late '80s and '90s.

In fact, it hosted so many classics that we found it utterly impossible to compile a top 10, or even a top 20, so here for your nostalgic pleasure is our rundown of the best 30 Amiga games of all time.

You can see our picks from 30 down to 21 here.

And here's the final part, where we run through 10 down to one.

Or if the ZX Spectrum is more your thing when it comes to retro gaming, then we have that base covered, too.

Now without any further ado, let's take a look at the middle section of our top 30, starting at number 20.

20. New Zealand Story

A platformer from Japanese developer Taito, New Zealand Story shares much with its slightly more famous stable mates Bubble Bobble and Rainbow Islands. In this game, you control a Kiwi chick, who needs to save his partner (who rejoices in the name ‘Phee Phee') from the clutches of an evil blue seal. Of course.

What matters more is that you have to navigate a large number of scrolling levels, avoiding enemies and environmental hazards like spikes (but not non-native predators unwittingly introduced into the local ecosystem by early seafarers, in a moment of characteristic historical inaccuracy). What sets is apart from other titles is that you can also hop into various flying vehicles, including balloons and UFOs, to get around certain levels.

First released in 1988, it came to most home computers in 1989 courtesy of Ocean. Taito was at the height of its platforming powers at this point, and really could do no wrong. It knew the genre inside out, and in New Zealand Story had yet another classic on its hands. With cute visuals and excellent gameplay, it was extremely well received by critics (91 per cent in Crash magazine no less).

It was remade in 2007 for the Ninetendo DS, but was received with rather less glee, with the touch-screen elements especially scorned. Happily though this was never an issue on the Amiga, where touching the screen resulted in nothing more than a blurry monitor.

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

19. The Secret of Monkey Island

Published in 1990, this classic LucasArts point and click adventure introduced young pirate wannabee Guybrush Threepwood to the world. It was originally devised by Ron Gilbert (who got into game design thanks to the Battleship clone he found on the Texas Instruments TI-59 programmable calculator his father used to bring home from work), together with other industry legends Tim Schafer and Dave Grossman.

The Secret of Monkey Island was somewhat revolutionary in that it was principally about exploration and story, rather than combat. The concept was born out of Gilbert's frustration with other adventure games, in which wrong choices, or poor combat skills could lead to the character's death, and the need to reload.

The game was well-received both critically and commercially, with the writing, humour, graphics, sound and gameplay all widely praised. Writing for Amiga games mag The One, Paul Presley stated that "LucasArts appears to have taken all of the elements that worked in its previous releases and, not only incorporated them into this tale of scurvy swashbuckling, but even improved on them in the process!"

And then there's the insult sword fighting.

A gift that just keeps on giving, there have been four sequels so far. Monkey Island 2: LeChuck's Revenge, released in 1991, then The Curse of Monkey Island in 1997, Escape from Monkey Island in 2000, and Tales of Monkey Island released in 2009. One more trip to Monkey Island to be released in 2017 perhaps?

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

18. Worms

Worms may appear superficially harmless (besides the parasitic kind, which we won't go into here), and may even be claimed by gardeners as their friends, but thanks to the game first released in 1995, we now know them for the war-mongering, bazooka-toting pugilists they really are.

In essence Worms is a squad-based combat game where players take turns to attempt to wipe out the enemy team, using a range of weaponry and skills.

Interestingly, it was originally created by Andy Davidson as an entry (brilliantly called ‘Total Wormage' at the time) in the Blitz BASIC coding competition run by the Amiga Format magazine. It didn't win the competition, and in fact was turned down by several publishers when Davidson subsequently hawked it around. But when he went to the European Computer Trade Show, he met with Team 17 who made him an offer on the spot, and a hugely successful Amiga (and other formats) series was born.

The game has spawned an impressive list of sequels across just about every format imaginable, so we won't list them here. Suffice to say that just about every conceivable way in which one animated annelid can mete violence out upon others has been fully explored in the Worms pantheon of games.

The original was loved by fans who bought it in their droves, although it garnered mixed (although largely positive) reviews. Some reviewers criticised the game for being repetitive and slow. Hopefully none of them ever tried chess. Now whatever happened to that game? (Hint: we'll find out shortly).

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

17. Xenon 2

It's a Megablast! Released on the Amiga in 1989, this Bitmap Brothers game (they designed it, but The Assembly Line actually developed it), is a vertically-scrolling spaceship shoot ‘em up with great graphics, original features, and one of the best soundtracks you'll ever have the joy of experiencing in a video game.

Interestingly (or embarrassingly, depending on your perspective), we thought the soundtrack was created by the Beastie Boys, until researching this very piece. So that goes to show its quality (if not our pop culture general knowledge). It was in fact ‘Megablast (Hip Hop on Precinct 13)', penned by Brixton-based musician Tim Simenon.

Although vertically-scrolling, one of the unique features introduced by the game is the ability to reverse movement and scroll backwards for a short time, useful when a little extra time is needed to defeat a wave of enemies or a boss, or simply to extricate the ship from a dead end.

By killing enemies and collecting the credit bubbles they drop the player can afford to upgrade the ship's guns, but an interesting glitch happens should the player collect too many over the course of a level. It's possible to collect so many that the counter glitches and wraps around back to zero. Unfortunately for the player they won't find this out until they complete a level, and they'll subsequently be unable to purchase any power ups. The game basically becomes next to impossible at that point, leading most to restart. Oops.

The developers also had trouble initially with the credit bubbles, devoting lots of time and effort into making the background warp when viewed through the bubbles as they float down the screen. Apparently it never worked properly, but when they gave up they thought that simply because of the shape and shading on the bubbles, it gave the illusion of warping the background anyway.

In fact it didn't, but the developers seemed happy enough with the result, and the game looked and sounded fantastic, and was enormous fun to play, so we'll let them off.

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

16. Player Manager

Released in 1990, Player Manager was officially the first game to allow the player to both manage the team, and assume control of a single player on the pitch, in the style of just about every football simulation including the celebrated Fifa series from EA Sports.

The game is based on the Kick Off series, also developed by Dino Dini. It uses the same match engine as Kick Off and Kick Off 2, and the same control system, where the ball is never actually under the players' control, but instead continually bounces off their feet in the direction they're running. With practice though, it's possible to master the control and produce moments of pure skill, whether dribbling, passing or executing the perfect headed goal.

Breaking with reality, the game features only 10 teams in each of the top two divisions, and 12 in the third and fourth - a fact thought to be the result of the hardware constraints of the time. Although very much in keeping with the reality of the day, there are no European competitions on offer to the player, since at the time UK-based teams were banned from European tournaments due to the Heysel Stadium disaster.

An intriguing bug is seen if the player manager controlled by the player keeps going into his dotage. At the age of 107, the player gets back his original pace, stamina and agility, which otherwise have atrophied over the years as you might expect. Since no known professional player has kept going for the same length of time, it isn't currently known if this actually happens in real life...

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

15. Powermonger

We're putting Powermonger in at this point, but we were close to including Populous, its predecessor instead. Why didn't we just put Populous in? Because it's not as good. Now stop arguing.

Like its predecessor, also released by Bullfrog and designed by the legendary Peter Molyneux, Powermonger installs the player as a god, no less, presiding over a three-dimensional map. The idea is to conquer towns and villages by building up an army, until the entire map is won, and the enemy utterly annihilated.

Armies need food though, so it's not just about recruiting as many people as possible, some villagers must be left to gather food so you can pop back and gobble it up. But those villagers are open to being assimilated by enemy forces while your own are off conquering other territories.

So technically it's the usual balance of acquiring new lands, while defending your own. Except savvy players quickly worked out that catapults and cannons (weapons can be built at villages instead of food, if desired) render even a moderately-sized army completely unbeatable. Armed with that knowledge, each map simply becomes a rush to conquer a few nearby villages to gather some troops, wait for one of them to build a catapult, then run around killing everything else in sight.

Another trick was to make friends with any neutral towns that had already developed their own catapults, or other weapons. They'd then let you march your army right into the town centre and snatch their arsenal, at which point you could declare war and slaughter them with their own tools. Effective, but not entirely cricket.

Or you could just sit back and watch, Powermonger was a beautiful game in its day. Seasons change, with corresponding changes to foliage and sounds (cicadas in the summer, harsh winds in winter), and wonderfully, left to their own devices villagers will go about their routines; fishing, farming, shepherding or performing other peasanty tasks. This basic form of AI was clearly a precursor to Molyneux's later game, Black and White.

Still, Powermonger was a great game, despite its flaws, and was received well by critics and the purchasing public alike.

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

14. Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis

Many Indiana Jones fans feel that the story behind 1992's Fate of Atlantis should have provided the plot for the fourth movie, rather than the strange business about aliens and crystals skulls.

Another point-and-click LucasArts adventure, and the seventh to use the SCUMM engine, the game sees the player don the famous fedora and set off in search of the mythical sunken city in the company of Sophia Hapgood, an old friend of Indy's, and conveniently, a psychic. As usual, the Third Reich provides the antagonists.

Intriguingly, a few hours into the story the game splits into three separate paths. The Team Path allows Indy to take Sophia with him for psychic support, the Wits Path provides our hero with a bundle of brain-stretching puzzles, and the Fists Path... does exactly what it says on the tin. So you can effectively tune the game to your preferences, or just keep playing it over and again until you've tried all three. Now that's value.

Fate of Atlantis was originally supposed to follow the rejected script for the third film (which ended up being Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade), which saw Indy searching for Chinese artifacts in Africa, presumably because of a defective satnav. But game designer Hal Barwood decided the story wasn't up to snuff, and so visited George Lucas' very own Skywalker Ranch in search of inspiration, and ended up thumbing through a trashy coffee table book on unsolved mysteries. Naturally it featured Atlantis, and the rest is proverbial.

A version of the game was subsequently released for 8-bit computers, including the ZX Spectrum and Amstrad CPC, but ended up being an entirely different proposition due to the limitations of the older hardware.

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

13. Battle Chess

It's chess, but better. Told you we'd come back to it.

In Battle Chess, the pieces come to life when you move them, with the castle transforming into a huge rock beast reminiscent of Marvel's The Thing, and the queen sashaying around in her long robes.

Best of all there's a scripted fight sequence for every possible combination of pieces, with the castle eating pawns, the queen calling down lightning from the heavens, and the king shooting enemies with the revolver he keeps hidden in his cloak.

But that doesn't mean it's a beat ‘em up, it's still chess, just with rewarding and funny moments for every piece of action.

Released in 1998, it was developed by Interplay and went on to receive a plethora of favourable reviews. One, possibly apocryphal story that circulated about its development concerns the addition of a small pet duck to the queen's animations. It would flap around her as she moved and attacked, but never actually overlap with her. It was included purely because the developers knew that the producers would ask for a change, so they gave them an obvious target, one that would be trivial to remove.

It must have worked, because there was no duck (at least that we ever saw) in the final game. Which is a shame, because it's the one thing lacking from what is a very good game. If, possibly, a little hard, even at beginner levels. Although that may say more about our abilities at chess than the actual difficulty of the game.

A remake titled Battle Chess: Game of Kings was released by Interplay on Steam in 2014. Judging by the large number of negative reviews it is broken, and was never fully finished, suggesting that Interplay doesn't quite have the same quality assurance practices it once enjoyed.

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

12. Civilisation

For many the ultimate turn-based strategy game, the acclaimed series from Sid Meier began in 1991 on PC, and was quickly ported to the Amiga.

The game starts in 4000 BC, and the player's civilisation is nothing more than a grand term for a settler or two. But build efficiently, make allies and look after your economy, and soon you'll make the Roman Empire at its height look like a disorganised bunch of schoolkids rolling around in the dirt.

Meier originally intended his game to take place in real-time, but found the results too similar to other titles out at the time, including SimCity.

He also decided against including multiplayer support in the early titles of the series, reasoning that "if you had friends, you wouldn't need to play computer games".

Despite this attempt to seemingly both insult and alienate his audience, the series is still going strong, with the latest iteration, Civilization VI out this year.

The top 30 Amiga games of all time! Part 2

Computing runs down from 20 to 11 in its all-time ranking of the best Amiga games from yesteryear

11. Wings

Like TV Sports Football in the previous list, Wings is another classic from Cinemaware, in retrospect possibly the most reliably brilliant game development studio of all time.

Released in 1990 but set during the First World War, Wings references the silent movies of the ‘20s and ‘30s. The game sets the player up as a fighter pilot, with his machine gun-toting biplane, and offers up lots of bombing, dogfighting and other missions.

Like other Cinemaware titles the gameplay is well-designed, and the presentation and tone is dramatic and film-like, and those facts weren't lost on reviewers who awarded it high ratings across the board.

The game also makes at least a small effort to convey the tragedy of war, with pilots that have been killed in game crossed off the available roster, and given a memorial.

A remake was put on Kickstarter in 2012 by Cinemaware, but failed to reach its goal by some distance. A second attempt, this time under the title Wings! Remastered, was made in November 2013, and this time reached its target. It was released for Windows and MacOS in October 2014, later moving to Android and iOS in May 2015.

And that concludes the middle section of this trilogy. Which games are you hoping to see in the top 10? What travesties have we committed in our ranking so far? Let us know in the comments!