Silkworm Amstrad CPC

Classic shoot-em-up action in this accurate coin-op conversion. Fly or drive the Silkworm mission on your own or team up with a friend and combine trigger fingers against the might of the enemy. Can you survive the race against time? — Cassette cover

Silkworm is a classic side scrolling shooter, developed by Tecmo and first released for arcade in 1988. In 1989 it was ported to the Amiga, Atari ST, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC and NES (1990) systems by The Sales Curve and released by Virgin Mastertronic.

Gameplay

Silkworm had interesting graphics and relatively fast-paced gameplay. The player can take control of a Jeep mounted with a machine gun or a Helicopter mounted with forward and downward firing guns. Two players can work simultaneously and cooperatively against enemies, with one playing as the Jeep and one as the Helicopter.

In single-player mode, it is generally easier to play with the Helicopter than with the Jeep, but it can be more fun to play as the Jeep. As the Jeep, the player needs to destroy everything directly in front of it or be prepared to jump in order to avoid collisions. In two-player mode, the Helicopter and Jeep must cooperate, and the players depend on each other to succeed. For example, the Helicopter can only fire forward, so occasionally, the Jeep must cover the rear with his swiveling gun. However, when covering the rear, the Jeep is vulnerable from the front, so the Helicopter must cover him.

Silkworm featured a fairly wide variety of enemies, some of which had specific weaknesses, such as the armoured AA guns that could only be harmed when their shields were down to fire. Most famously, there was the "Goose" helicopter - a giant, heavily armoured "mini-boss" helicopter that was composed of several smaller vehicles that connected together.

Trivia

Silkworm belongs to the games that "don't have a final": after a certain level, the game goes on infinitely. Despite many other games of this kind, however, after a certain level it says to the player that it's not going to accept any more coins to continue the current game.

Computer conversions of this game, instead, offered the player a notice as a final screen after beating a certain level, ending the game.

Source:Wikipedia