Reviews

1983 Carnell Software (UK)
by Stephen Kirk

Wow, I had almost forgotton about this cute old game. You play a Saint Bernard called Brandy running to rescue his Mistress from the clutches of the
abominable snowman, in order to reach the crying victim you have to tackle a few obstacles. The game is played scrolling horizontally, in the first sequence you encounter big black wolves, which you either scare away by turning in their direction or kill them with a bite in the neck, the second set sees Brandy jump over holes on the ice and avoiding big gigantic worms (which are in fact walruses), although they do look like those big worms from the 80's sci-fi movie Dune. Nice touch.
In the third set Brandy has to jump over big snowballs and again scare away wolves. This level is similar to Donkey Kong and you basically move thru it without dying, so it's a nul level to me. The fourth set Brandy crosses his away again with the walruses and the ice holes but with the addiction of big skating penguins. I haven't reach the following levels so I can't talk about it, but I guess there are a few more, at least I hope so, because the game is quite cute with big colorful sprites and a different altogether theme. True it's simple and doesn't play well, just enough so you can move your way thru, but it's a quite a cute game from the primordial days of the Spectrum and a big memory bringer.

Note: Use the cursor keys to play

An early game, with big bold graphics for the time.
The controls aren't very responsive. Gameplay is shallow, with a series of simple levels - the same ballpark as the lame, filler levels in "Horace and the Spiders".
The appeal lies in the cute, cartoon style graphics - it gives the impression of being aimed at young children. But the premise of the action is actually quite gruesome and violent.
Very much a product of its era. It hasn't aged well, but has a certain nostalgic appeal.

While loading up The Adventures of Sid Spider, I saw this and thought it was too good to ignore, even if it means my last three reviews have begun with The, my fault as I handpicked this one and I really wish I hadn't, because it's appalling. There are multiple levels in the game, first you have to scare away the wolves, then you have to jump over the ice cracks and walruses, then it turns into Donkey Kong for some reason and you have to jump over snowballs and scare away wolves again in order to reach the top, then we're jumping over more ice cracks and walruses, and this time penguins for some reason, then it's Donkey Kong twice more, then more penguins and then I stopped giving a shit about it and gave up. This game wouldn't be so terrible if the controls worked properly, because here they do not. Just how many times did I lose a life because St. Bernard did not co-operate with the controls? The game being slow and jerky as well did not help matters either. This is crap even for 1983 standards, and Sinclair User gave it 7 our of 10. How? Why? If this has not been considered among of the worst games in Speccy history it bloody well should, because it's dogshit.