The main goal of this game is to keep your companions alive. Like a band of fools, they just walk right towards danger (I think they are soldiers from the Krull army as they are about as worthless). There are monsters, spells and other things flying at them and they just merrily march down the street. I personally would be ducking for cover, but maybe that is why I am not army material. So it is your goal to protect these people from harm. You must shoot your crossbow at the monsters and other objects that will kill them and allow them to cross the screen unharmed. As long as at least one person makes it across, the game goes on. But if you lose all of them, then its time for you to give up.

One of the neat features of the game is that you can actually choose your path. As you get past an area, you are given an option of two ways you can go. This helps to add to the replayability of the game. As far as I know, it is one of the first games to incorporate branching paths. While your goal remains the same, you can take different paths to reach it. A nice feature!

One problem I found with the game is that using the mouse actually made it too easy. I was able to zoom past levels without any casualties. It didn't take long for me to conquer the game. This was something I had great difficulty with on the Atari 7800. But at least now I have seen all the game.

While not a tremendous game, Crossbow was one of the more creative of the shooting games and one that deserves some play. And if you were like me, this may finally give you a chance to defeat the game.

This is just a review of the arcade machine.  If you are looking for the actual arcade machine, you may want to check out ebay.  Click below to see if you can find this game.