| Cosmic Spacehead | |
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NES box art Sega Genesis box art |
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| Developer(s) | Codemasters |
| Publisher(s) | Codemasters |
| Platform(s) | NES, Sega Master System, Sega Mega Drive/Genesis, Sega Game Gear, Amiga, MS-DOS |
| Release date(s) | NES, Sega Master System 1991,[1][2] Sega Mega Drive/Genesis, Amiga, MS-DOS 1993,[3][4][5] Sega Game Gear |
| Genre(s) | Mixed |
| Mode(s) | Single Player |
Linus Spacehead's Cosmic Crusade (later released as Cosmic Spacehead in 1993) is a video game released in 1991. It was developed and published by Codemasters for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis, Game Gear, Master System, NES, Amiga and PC, featuring adventure game elements, with locations connected by platform sections.
The game is the sequel to Linus Spacehead, a game only finding release as part of the Quattro Adventure cartridge.
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Linus is an alien from the planet Linoleum who crashed into the legendary planet Earth. After returning home and expecting a hero's welcome, Linus soon found his fellow Linomen were skeptical of the existence of the so-called "planet Earth" and decides to return to it, this time with a camera. However, he is flat on the planets' currency, Linobucks, and must deal across the planet to get a new cosmic car and a camera. In his adventures, Linus deals himself out of Linoleum (including using a fake ID for Larry Flint to compete in a bumper car contest), quash a robot revolution in Detroitica and gets gas from an abandoned space station.
Each major location of Planet Linoleum has a teleporting device, which can be activated using a card. However, they often leave Linus with a side-effect, required to complete a puzzle. To travel between adventure sections, Linus goes through arcade sections, where he has to reach the other side of the level, avoiding free falls, enemies and collecting Cosmic candy at the same time (after collecting 10, an extra life is added). Linus dies at the smallest contact, so instead of speed running a level (which can be done, since the levels are small), it's more advisable to learn his foes' movement patterns and wait for a safe opening; this is particularly true in NES Linus Spacehead's Cosmic Crusade, where Linus can not change direction in mid-jump (he can in NES Cosmic Spacehead). Passwords are scattered at key locations.
Like other Codemasters games, the NES versions were not licenced by Nintendo. NES Linus Spacehead's Cosmic Crusade was released both as a stand-alone cartridge and as one of seven games for the Aladdin Deck Enhancer. At least in Europe, a later/updated version of the game was released as Cosmic Spacehead. There are several differences between that and the earlier version. NES Cosmic Spacehead includes the Pie Slap mode, and Linus can jump higher and change direction in mid-jump, which makes the platform arcade sections easier. The Mega Drive version was included in a "Codemasters 2-in-1" with Fantastic Dizzy.
All but NES Linus Spacehead's Cosmic Crusade include a two player mode named Pie Slap, reminiscent of Armor Ambush for the Atari 2600. While the Master System version is similar in graphics to the NES version, the gameplay is closer to the remaining versions. In the PC, Mega Drive/Genesis and Amiga versions, the art style is different from the NES version, much richer and closer to 60s cartoons like The Jetsons.
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