When it comes to under-the-radar PC Engine oddities, it’s tough to out-weird 1990’s Gomola Speed, a motley cross between Atari’s Quantum and Gauntlet infused with elements of Sega’s Flicky, Hudson’s Bomberman, and even Gremlin’s Blockade (aka the great granddaddy of the “Snake game” genre). Although a pain to categorize and a bit rough around the edges, it’s nevertheless a fascinating bright spot in the system’s vast, under-documented library of Japan-exclusive titles.
Gomola Speed is a product of UPL (Universal Playland), a long-defunct subsidiary of the venerable Universal. While still in operation as of this writing, Universal is well past its prime as a video game developer, as evidenced by the fact that they remain best known in this capacity for their minor early ’80s arcade classics Mr. Do! and Lady Bug. They mainly deal in slot machines these days.
True to its creators’ roots, Gomola Speed is a stridently abstract overhead maze action romp that’d be right at home in an ’80s arcade. You play as a snake-like segmented being called Gorm out to traverse a series of 25 compact levels, avoiding enemies and seeking out the blobby pink orbs (identified as “food”) that must be collected to make the exit tile leading to the next area appear. Every fifth level switches things up by furnishing Gorm with a big boss enemy to defeat in lieu of gathering food. There’s no rationale provided for any of this, either in-game or in the manual, so I suppose you have free reign to use your imagination and dream up some context for Gorm’s bizarre odyssey.
It sounds straightforward enough so far, but the devil really is in the details with this one. Virtually every aspect of how Gorm interacts with enemies and his (its?) environment is deeply strange. For starters, he begins every stage as merely a head and must seek out his remaining nine body segments. Sort of like Atari’s titular Centipede in reverse, now that I think about it. The more segments Gorm has, the bigger a target he becomes. Fortunately, only head hits count as deaths. Damage to a segment only detaches that segment and any ones below it, forcing you to then double back and re-collect them. You can’t make use of the exits unless Gorm is complete, meaning that you can’t decide to stay a head all the time in the interest of maximizing your evasive ability.
A second reason you can’t forego maintaining a full complement of body parts has to do with the way Gorm collects food and defeats baddies. Touching them alone isn’t sufficient. You need to be able to completely encircle and enfold your targets, and that requires at least the majority of your available segments. In the case of enemies, you’ll also have to stun them first. This is accomplished through the use of timed explosives Gorm deposits on the ground from his…er…tail segment. Gross. Like the more famous Bomberman, Gorm must be careful not to get caught in the blast zone of his own ordinance. Unfortunately, all non-boss foes respawn relatively quickly, meaning that it’s often not worth the considerable trouble of trying to stun and encircle them in the first place. I found myself largely relying on basic avoidance rather than combat per se.
The majority of boss levels present the further complication of needing to roam around in search of a special power-up that replaces your slow, awkward butt bombs with forward shooting ones so that you can actually stand a chance against the main threat. This more dynamic weapon option makes the boss battles a real highlight of the overall experience, even if the power-up wears off automatically when you move on to the next stage.
On the whole, I quite enjoyed my playthrough of Gamola Speed. It features a strikingly surreal art style (everything in this deranged little world is apparently some manner of creepy bug or robot), some catchy chiptunes steeped in the gritty, funky PCE HuCard sound I’ve come to love, and non-stop frantic action as you scramble furiously to gobble up food, stun or dodge threats, and keep poor harried Gorm in one piece whenever possible. It offers a fairly forgiving challenge, as well. Five-character passwords are available for all of the first twenty levels, ensuring that you’ll never be thrown all the way back to the beginning due to poor performance.
As I alluded to above, however, there are some awfully rough patches here and there. The need to enclose items and enemies with Gorm’s trailing body segments is the greatest stumbling block by far. It never feels as easy as it should, owing to the way that Gorm can and will inadvertently nudge these objects around the playfield with his head during the attempt. And once they’re jammed up against a maze wall, it becomes harder still. By the time I reached the end after a few good hours of practice, my success rate with encircling objects was probably hovering just south of 50%. Not great for a core mechanic. The aforementioned Quantum solved this problem by using a trackball for movement instead of a directional pad, and this obviously wasn’t an option for UPL. Furthermore, accurate bomb placement gets to be a real pain once Gorm begins to approach his maximum body length. For this reason alone, I wish they had opted to always have the bombs emerge from his head instead of his rear end. I’d gladly trade funny for functional in this instance.
If you’re on the prowl for solid PC Engine deep cuts that don’t require knowledge of the Japanese language (or fan translation patches), Gomola Speed fits the bill, warts and all. Above all, there’s simply nothing else like it that I’m aware of for any platform. I’m always down to celebrate that. So, whatever the hell he is, hail Gorm!
Twentieth Century Gamer 