Manufacturer:
Year: 1987

Other versions
Dr. Toppel Tankentai (Japan) 1987

Dr. Toppel is a classic vertically scrolling shooter, typical for end of 80's, for one or two players. Each round has a scheme with a nice landscape in a fantastic world, where we'll meet any kind of enemies and fixed emplacements trying to hit our craft and hard obstacles to overcome. At the end of each round, as tradition for this kind of shooter, we'll meet bosses, mostly looking like sea creatures to destroy in order to get to the following round. The game's aim is simply to score as many points as possible and pass the many levels.

Game begins with our craft, looking like a weird green insect flying over a blue rocky landscape. Enemies that look like flying insects go in formations towards our craft from the top of the screen to the bottom. By pressing fire button on the joystick/gamepad, you'll shoot a single, round green bullet upwards. Destroyed enemies can leave several power-ups or rewards behind. Power ups include coloured bags, (blue, yellow or red) that give bonus points: 1000, 500, 5000 points, speed up’s, weapon upgrades and orbs acting as shield positioned in front of the craft which also increase the player firepower.

If an enemy bullet hits an orb, it will be destroyed. By pressing the second button of the joystick you will free all the orbs from the front of the players' craft, allowing them to trail around the craft as if on a rope. The orb can then fire sideways and diagonally to attack enemies positioned on the sides of the game area. Press again second button and the orbs will freeze in their current position that can be useful for attacking certain types of enemies or for handling multiple attacks. When the craft is hit, you'll lose one of the 3 lives and the game resumes at the nearest restart point behind where the player reached, without all power-ups collected until that point. If we get to the end of the game with a high score we can insert our initials in the table high score that shows the first five Dr. Toppel's best players.

Ratings

PRESENTATION: 41%
Concise.

GRAPHICS: 73%
Good use of colors, and smooth
background scrolling and
good animation.

SOUND: 68%
Sound effects cover drown
the nice music of this game.

ORIGINALITY: 59%
Apart from the craft controlling
system.... Nothing.

HOOKABILITY: 50%
You just have to shoot to
everything but...

LASTABILITY: 42%
...it's difficult and often
frustrating.

This classic Taito shooter, respects all the canons of the end of 80's games. So, we aren't in front of a particularly innovative game, but some news have been introduced, like multi fire of our craft. Graphics and sound are OK but not impressive, some times colors create a bit of confusion and sound effects are the same as in Insector X. A negative note is that you have to repeat the last part of the game when you are shot, losing all the weapons collected. Dr. Toppel deserves the sufficiency, but after a few games it becomes frustrating and you'll give up soon. If you are very motivated and you want to know what you'll find in the next level... then you'll make only a few more games, before forgetting about it.

Well... I think that at this point my lack of love for shooters is known... unfortunately I must say that at fist impact also this one hasn't been impressive: presentation is inexistent, only a few seconds of demo, and a total lack of any kind of "How to Play". But, once started the game, the bitter left from the presentation disappears: the game, with its graphics appear immediately likable, sound (even if it's quite poor) is in syntony with the game and the attention goes to the orbs that you pick up in the street and that move in relations to the movements done by the player. The enthusiasm at the beginning doesn't last for much: as the enemy fire increases you notice that the major difficulty is not to avoid shots but it's difficult to see where they are: this is due to the colorful background and the minute dimension of the bullets which are the worst enemy of the player, and also of the longevity of the game.
Maybe could be my incapacity, but at the tenth try I gave up (and that is a real shame: the idea of the game is certainly good, even so, in my opinion it hasn't been used properly. Against any expectations, I suggest you to try it!! Who knows... maybe if I'd change my glasses I could avoid the enemies shots.

Shoot as much as you can with the help of the orbs. Cute style, reminds immediately of Insector X for sound effects. The game concept is easy but quite difficult in reality, so you'll lose your patient quickly...