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James Pond 2 : RoboCod ( 1991 )
Stop stuffing the turkey - Christmas has been cancelled ! The evil Acme Oil Company has been destroyed , but James Pond ’ s arch enemy Dr Maybe has survived , escaping to the North Pole , where he has kidnapped Santa and taken over his workshop . Only James Pond , the world ’ s most famous secret agent fish , can save the day . The definitive Christmas themed sidescroller , James Pond 2 is the kind of quirky little game that British developers excelled at – a legacy of the Spectrum days when hobbyists ruled the UK gaming pond . Recruited to defeat Dr . Maybe once more , retrieve the stolen toys and save Christmas , Pond has to battle through 50 levels of runaway trains , mutant pencils , prancing gloves and flying birds with books for wings , stretching himself to bizarre lengths with the aid of his special armour suit . Harmless platforming fun !
Interesting fact : In the original release , Santa ’ s workers were represented as the Penguins of McVities Penguin biscuit fame . It was one of the first commercial tie ins , and as a consequence , sales of Penguins outsold Kit Kats in the UK for the first time .
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Duke : Nuclear Winter ( 1997 )
This expansion pack to the bestselling Duke Nukem 3D sees our all-American protagonist Duke battle the alien invaders all over again in a wintery Los Angeles , before being despatched to the North Pole to defeat Santa Claus , who has been captured and brainwashed by the aliens and a new Feminist Elven Militia .
Facing off against snowball throwing snow men and female elves equipped with dual sub-machine guns and old favourites the pig cops , who have swapped their uniforms for Christmas attire . Revisiting two levels from the original game was not a popular move , in spite of the modifications , and the game was not well received . Still , seeing Duke take donning the red hat as a replacement Santa is worth the two or so hours you ’ ll spend on this – arguably time better spent than watching Bake-Off .
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Christmas Nights into Dreams ( 1996 )
Retro-gamers love waxing lyrical about Nights into Dreams , developed for the Sega Saturn by Team Sonic , and this Christmas themed sampler is so well regarded for its exclusive content that it is considered a standalone title . In an attempt to recreate the feeling of flight , players are tasked with navigating the two main characters through a dreamland collecting sparkling orbs and fighting off the nightmares created by the Wizeman that threaten to upset the balance between good and bad dreams and break into the real world . Ambitious graphics , partly hindered by the Saturn ’ s technical limitations , are matched by an equally attractive soundtrack .
One of the unique features of the sampler is that it utilises the Saturn ’ s internal clock to change the games appearance depending on what time of the day and year you play . Play outside of winter , and there is no reference to Christmas . In November and January , the game becomes Winter Nights , with Christmas objects , snow , and Christmas music appearing . And if this wasn ’ t enough , on New Years Day , the game changes again to New Year ’ s Nights , incorporating a different title screen and song . Fantastic stuff !
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