Barracuda - Secret Mission 1

Barracuda - Secret Mission 1 is a 1992 DOS game that tried to weld three genres into one mission and never stayed with any of them long enough to finish the job. It sails into the Persian Gulf shortly after the war with a simple premise: find sunken Iraqi ships and bring back whatever they still hold.

Progress happens in three layers. First you are a blip on a map dotted with waterspouts, searching for the spot where the wreck lies. Then the game switches to a side view and you take a submarine down to the bottom, dodging sea life or blowing it apart with torpedoes. Finally the submarine gives way to a diver, and the real business begins: getting lost inside the hulk.

The ship interior is a large maze, often spread across several maps, and it is hard to navigate because one corridor looks much like the next. Your diver is nearly defenceless, so you keep clear of sharks, jellyfish and tangled wire while hunting for valuables. The idea is decent, and there is genuine atmosphere in the cramped, airless spaces, but the execution undercuts it. Movement on the map screen is painfully slow, the mazes are big without landmarks, and much of your time goes on not being sure where you have already been.

Anyone who enjoys odd, overreaching games from the edges of the shareware scene can try it as a curiosity. Anyone after smooth action or a serious submarine simulation should look elsewhere. Barracuda belongs to that group of games where you can see a good idea and not quite enough time or money to finish it.

On oldgame.cz the game runs directly in your browser, with nothing to install.