Insecticide

You take on the role of a ladybird that has been kitted out with a gun and shield. Your job is to blow away the bugs that are crawling toward you while avoiding the others that litter the playfield. The action takes place on a single static screen, and you can move your ladybird around in all 4 directions, except pushing up makes you fly, which is a really nice touch and allows you to quickly move away from swarms of bugs on the later levels.

Across the top of the screen, a 'mothership' style bug moves back and forth. Hit this for various power-ups, including speed boosts and shields. You get plenty of lives, but if you lose just a single one, it sends you back a whole 6 levels! Which is extremely frustrating. On level 8, you'll encounter the first boss, which is pretty easy to deal with as it doesn't move that fast, but be careful because when it fires, it's hard to spot the bullets.

It's quite a playable little game, very reminiscent of PD offerings at the time. The graphics are cute, and your ladybird is well-animated, although the color cycling becomes a little much. There are loads of sampled sound effects that add a lot to the game (although also slow it down, too!) and it feels heavily inspired by Llamatron in this respect.

All in all, not a bad offering.