Doctor Who is one of those IPs that, sadly, has been neglected by the video game industry over the past fifteen years. Oh, sure, there was a Doctor Who game that came out on the PlayStation 2 and Wii, but that doesn’t count since it was a freakin’ card battle game.

Seriously. Instead of some kind of third-person platformer or a role-playing game or… hell, even a point-and-click adventure, Doctor Who fans were stuck with a game that, frankly, barely qualified as a game.

Sadly if you want a real Doctor Who video game, you have to go back to the days of the Amiga, Spectrum, MS-DOS and Windows 3.1. That game would be Dalek Attack.

Depending on which platform you were playing on, you were either stuck playing as the Seventh Doctor (Spectrum) or you had your choice between the Seventh, Fourth and Fifth (Second Doctor on MS-DOS) Doctors. The version I played (and still play) is the Amiga version, which for all future reference will be the one I refer to unless otherwise noted.

The story of Dalek Attack is simple: In the year 2254 humanity has reached a level of technological achievement so advanced that they have become a threat to the most powerful empire in the galaxy: The Daleks. Under direct orders from the one and only Great Healer himself (Davros, for the uniniated), the aforementioned Daleks engage in an open attack on Earth. Either due to his intuition or the writer’s ability to move the plot forward, The Doctor arrives in 2254 just as the attack has commensed and he quickly realizes that it is up to him to save humanity from becoming slaves to the Daleks.

Because of the age of the game, there obviously aren’t any full-motion video or rendered cutscenes. Instead the story is progressed by a series of comic book-style panels. Nothing too amazing, but considering that the game was released in 1992 it gets the job done. My one complaint about this is that no matter which Doctor you elect to play as, you only see Sylvester McCoy’s Seventh Doctor in the comic panels. It’s a strange little oversight and a little unfortunate that even though I can play as the skin, I never truly control Peter Davison.

Dalek Attack is, at it’s core, a 2D Action/Platformer. Because it’s on the PC it takes a little bit to get used to using the keyboard to play it, but once you get acclimated you see that the controls are actually quite good.The one complaint that I could see people having is that at times The Doctor’s movements can feel a little slippery. It’s not too bad and it doesn’t really hurt you too much on jumps, but it can feel akward at times. Apart from that rather minor gripe the controls are solid and responsive.

Not all of Dalek Attack has you controlling The Doctor on foot, mind you. The game opens to a quick “prologue” level in the sewers under London where, after outrunning flying Daleks and saving trapped Londoners, you fight a two-headed robot serpent. To this day I have absolutely no reason why you fight said serpent, but you do. After dispatching said robo-nessy, you’re transported to several destinations around the world where you have destroy all the Daleks and disable their pods. After visiting London, New York, Paris and Tokyo, you have to find and exterminate Davros himself.

Your typical early-90s “Game First, Story Second” affair.

As you explore and progress through the stages (for an early-90s action/platformer, the stages are quite large and you’re encouraged to explore) you collect weapon power-ups, health, energy and a bunch of diamond Doctor Who logos that, to my knowledge, serve absolutely no purpose. Trying to stop you are the Daleks (duh?) and their Robomen slaves, Ogrons and, I believe, Cybermen*. In addition to the enemies you also have cameos by K-9 and, if you have a second player with you, they can take control of The Doctor’s companion, Ace.

Something to note: The Amiga and MS-DOS versions of the game? Practically identical, although the Amiga has far superior sound design. The Spectrum version? …well, here’s a side-by-side of the “prologue” stage:

It makes you wonder why they even bothered. But hey, if the Spectrum was all you had, Dalek Attack was still a fantastic game. (Fun Fact: Dalek Attack was the last official ZX Spectrum game released)

You know, there have been over 70 Star Wars games. There have been over 40 Star Trek video games. Hell, there have been three X-Files video games, but somehow Doctor Who has only had two video games. Ever.

And one of them was a card battle game.

Perhaps it’s because the show isn’t a huge hit in the United States. Perhaps it’s because… um… okay, so I can only think of one valid excuse for not exploiting the Doctor Who name. The show doesn’t have a giant audience in the United States, but the audience it does have is loyal. Damn loyal. And they’ve been clammering for a Doctor Who game for ages. And what do we get?

A freakin’ card battle game.

Imagine what a Doctor Who game could be like with the technology today. I picture a third-person RPG that runs on the same Unreal Engine 3 tech that powers Mass Effect. Navigating across the universe in the TARDIS, engaging in the million different dialogue options that, because of the character, wouldn’t bore you half to death… it’d be a fanboy’s dream.

And it wouldn’t be a God damn card battle game!

*”Believe” because the sprites are freaking TINY and I can’t make them out.

Popularity: unranked [?]