Joe Blade II

Joe Blade is the title of a series of budget-price platform games written by Colin Swinbourne and published by Players. All three titles were flick-screen adventures, in which the player controls the title character through a number of rooms, dispatching enemies and rescuing innocent people. The manner of this varies between the three games.

Joe Blade 2 took a rather different approach to the first game. Instead of being a soldier, Blade was this time a vigilante taking to the city to rid the streets of criminals, rescuing old-age pensioners along the way. Blade was no longer armed with a gun, and had to jump over villains, just touching them with his feet, to dispatch them. This almost surreal take on the game was in stark contrast to the comparatively more gritty realism of the first installment. The game was also known for being considerably easier than the first title, almost to the point where many players managed to complete the game in one hour-long sitting.

The Spectrum version of the game featured a version of Invade-a-Load featuring Pac Man.