Producer: Creative Sparks
Memory Required: 48K
Retail Price: £6.95
Language: Machine code
Author: John Harris

The West has never been wilder! The driver of the San Pedro stage has been shot in an ambush and the coach is out of control. Creative Sparks bring you three different screens of action in this unusual arcade style game. Stagecoach employs an isometric 3D style perspective view where positioning of the characters plays a part in getting through.

The object is to leap onto the stage, get the horses under control and drive the stage on its way, collecting passengers, boxes of ammo or gold and steering a safe course through the dangerous Sierra Peligrosa mountains, avoid the Comanche Indians, and finally arrive safely at the small mining town of San Pedro. This is everyone's chance to become John Wayne.

The first screen is called The Jump. Here you see yourself riding on your horse through a barren desert. But it isn't so barren. The sand is strewn with cacti, animal bones, graves and other debris. Running into anything will unhorse you. The computer automatically picks you up and limps you back to the horse. Pressing the fire button will remount you, but watch out for the cactus plants. Remounting near one will just cause you to fall of again. Fortunately, you can walk your horse past them. Slowing down, you see the San Pedro stage, driverless and plunging forwards to catch you up. It veers all over the place. You must now ride up behind it and leap onto the roof, then walk across the roof and take the reins. Having gained control of the coach you must now drive it on, slowing to let passengers board. Care is required or you'll miss them as they jump up and down in rage, worse still, you could run them over.

Picking up enough passengers will move you onto the second screen, the San Peligrosa mountains. This section of the game requires you to drive between the precipitous mountains, find the way through without damaging the coach too much, avoiding rockslides, and collect boxes of gold or ammunition. All the details can be seen on the map facility. Survive the mountains for a set period of time and you will emerge onto the Indian plain. These ferocious savages will ride up, one to the front and two to the side, preventing you from steering the coach, while a fourth will attempt to jump on the stage, grabbing passengers. All you can do is get up on the roof and attempt to shoot them. If an Indian gets up onto the roof when you are up there, or when there are no more passengers left, then the game will end. It will also end if the damage points mount too high in the mountains, or you fail to pick up passengers in time on the first screen.

There are four skill levels which affect how much the stage moves about while trying to mount it, how close you must stop to passengers to collect them, the length of time allowed for collecting gold in the mountains, how much damage a rockfall will do, and the distance from town you emerge from the mountains. Apart from the display, other information provided is damage points, number of passengers, damage points, gold and ammo collected and distance to town and time spent in mountains. This information can be accessed by a key press, otherwise the screen only shows the game.

COMMENTS

Control keys: user-definable, four directions and fire needed. H speeds up remounting, ENTER for the map
Joystick: ZX 2, Kempston, Fuller AGF, Protek
Keyboard play: very responsive
Use of colour: good
Graphics: good animation with lots of detail
Sound: good tune, otherwise limited
Skill levels: 4
Lives: percentage of damage or lack of passengers
Originality: a very unusual game

Yep, I sure found it difficult to jump up onto the stagecoach in the first part of the game, but on doing so I rode the coach into the mountains. There manoeuvering was made easier by the helpful arrows which indicate an open ended direction, and an ability of the horses to reverse (clever horses)! This is a good game which I enjoyed; a point against it though was the Icing time between starting again after hitting a cactus - but then I noticed that you can speed this up by pressing H. Perhaps there was a lack of sound, but overall, pretty good pardner!

I felt this was a bit of a disappointment after Orc Attack, nevertheless, it should take a long time to master. Instructions are excellent and extensive. Playing the game is quite difficult, more so on the second screen in the mountains. Compared to Orc Attack, the graphics are rather plain although the animation is quite good. There could have been some improvement on the general detail especially the way the stage turns, which it does by rotating through 450 very suddenly, and not squashing up in perspective. This makes the turn look rather unrealistic. Good features are the bucking horse, riding indians and also the way that they drag passengers out of the coach. I would have thought colour and sound could have been put to better use, but saying this, Stagecoach will provide hours of skillful fun.

The perspective view of Stagecoach is a little similar to that in Ant Attack, although it looks a little ungainly when the coach is going away from you. But the animation of 'you', your horse, the passengers and the Indians is excellent and quite realistic. There's also quite a bit more to do in this game than in Ant Attack. Positioning yourself to jump is very tricky, especially with the cactus plants popping up from behind the coach. The presentation and instructions on the inlay are very detailed, and the overall control seems to work very well when you get used to the perspective.

Use of Computer: 89%
Graphics: 75%
Playability: 73%
Getting Started: 89%
Addictive Qualities: 72%
Value for Money: 76%
Overall: 79%

The driver of the San Pedro stage coach has been shot! The object of the game is to get the stage coach under control, collect the stranded passengers, steer a safe route through the treacherous Sierra Peligrosa mountains while collecting the gold, avoid the Comanche indians and finally arrive at the small mining town of San Pedro.

The first stage, called the jump, has you riding behind the San Pedro stage coach and you must ride up behind it and climb on board. Once on the roof you must crawl to the front and grab the reins. With this done you must steer through the desert avoiding cacti and picking up the waiting passengers. If you fail to pick up a passenger they will jump up and down angrily or even worse - you may run over them!

Once enough passengers have been picked up the game moves on to the next stage, the Sierra Peligrosa mountains. Here you steer through the mountains without receiving too much damage. You must pick up the boxes of Gold or ammunition while avoiding the deadly rock slides. All these details can be seen on the map facility.

The last section is all on the indian plains. The indians go into a formation that hems you in while another indian attempts to climb onto the back of your coach to either kidnap one of your passengers or yourself. Your only defence is to climb onto the stage coach's roof and try to shoot the indians.

Stage Coach never actually grabbed me when it was first released, looking at it now I'm not surprised. The graphics are a bit small for my liking though there is quite a bit of detail. Both colour and sound are used well but for me the game isn't addictive enough. Within a couple of games it is possible, on the lower levels, to get near to completion. Overall a pretty bad to average game today.
RC

Hmmmm, this is a bit of a tricky game to judge, the graphics are poor by today's standards but strangely enough it is quite playable and kept me amused for a while. As with many games the idea may be good but the implementation suffers, normally because the graphics aren't good enough. Of the three stages the first and last are probably graphically the better and the more playable of the three, the mountain stage lets the game down tremendously. I found the game quite playable for a while but I don't think I will loose any sleep over it. To sum up; not exactly good but I have seen a lot worse, let's just say 'average'.
LM

(Rob) Most of the ratings except the Use of Computer and Getting Started should go down by about 10% especially the Addictive Qualities. which should go down by about 15%.

(Lloyd) I agree (this is getting to be a habit!), Stage Coach does become tedious after a while and isn't really worth buying unless you've played it before and know you like it.

BLAZING SADDLES...

Memory: 48K
Price: £6.95
Joystick: Kempston, Sinclair, Fuller, AGF/Protek

When you saddle up to play Stagecoach from Creative Sparks make darn sure that you put a lot of cotton wool in your strides or you will end up pretty sore in the nether regions - well, the cowboy on screen will anyway.

The game is an attractively animated Western split into three main sections. The jump comes first. There you are moseying over the desert when suddenly the stage appears. It is driverless, swaying and jolting all over the place.

The idea is to steer your cowboy up to the stage and get him onto the coach roof. Dead easy you may say, but unfortunately the desert is filled with large cacti and bits of junk. Collide with these and you will be thrown off your mount. You will have to remount and set off after the stage again, wasting precious time in collecting the horse.

If you finally get on the stage you take the reins and guide it through the obstacle course of the mountains. On the way passengers must be picked up along with boxes of gold. Then come the Indians, whooping around the coach and threatening to take your passengers. Standing on the roof your cowboy can shoot them down... leaving the stage driverless again and prone to further collisions.

The graphics are excellent. The cartoon effect is very well done with bright colours and fairly smooth action. There are a number of different tasks, each needing skill and practice. Stagecoach is an exciting game, full of incident and Variety.

MACHINE: Spectrum / keyboard or joystick
SUPPLIER: Creative Sparks
PRICE: £6.95

Howdy partners! My name is Kidd Rivers, the toughest cowboy in Micro County. I enjoy rescuing runaway stagecoaches - which is just as well as it seems to happen a lot around these parts. Me and mu trusty steed, Spectrum, are just about to leave town looking for another stagecoach right now. Want to tag along?

If you decide to join Kidd on his rescue mission, you're in for a rough ride. First he has to find the stagecoach, galloping at full tilt over rough country. He has to avoid spiky cactus and rocks among other obstacles. If Kidd falls off his trusty steed the program provides an amusing scene.

Kidd's horse dashes off to the side of the screen. Kidd limps after it, catches it and remounts before continuing the chase.

Meanwhile the stage is still rumbling around the range without a driver - and shedding passengers at every turn. If all six passengers fall out before Kidd reaches the stage and jumps on, the game is all over before it's really got going.

Finding the stage and manouevring Kidd behind it is fairly easy - but then comes the jump, which is a bit risky.

Once on the stage safely, Kidd dashes for the reins and brings the runaway horses under control. He then has to pick up six more passengers who are waiting for a lift into town.

Once he's done this - a few would-be passengers will get trampled in the process, I'm afraid, it's off into the mountains more hazards await our intrepid hero.

Kidd has to drive the coach through dangerous mountain passes which are prone to landslides that send rocks hurtling down at the coach. Little arrows appear to show you which trails are clear. There is a time limit on this part of the game and a countdown timer appears screen.

If you keep getting hit by rocks or running into the mountains, your stage sustains damage.

Use up all your damage point and the game ends right there and then. On your way through the mountains, you'll see gold and ammunition boxes appearing on the road. Steer your stage over them and you pick them up.

If you get lost, you can call up a map of the mountains. The game is frozen until you go back to the action.

Survive the mountains and you're faced with a nasty bunch of Red Indian raiders out for your scalp. You have to fight off the Indian attack by climbing onto the roof of the stage and blasting away with your Colt 45,

Indians will attempt to climb onto the stage and capture the passengers - if you lose them all to the rampaging redskins, then the game ends with you losing your scalp. Nasty!

If you fight off the Indians, you'll live to see the stage come safely home to San Pedro.

Stagecoach is an entertaining and original game. However the graphics are a bit crude - the Spectrum is capable of better - but this doesn't really detract from the game's playability which is considerable. It will take some time master and there are several skill levels to beat.

As I've already mentioned, the falling off the horse routine is nicely done, as are the rampaging Indians. However, I felt the limitations of the graphics showed up most in the mountain sequence. Hit a rockfall and half the stage graphics get wiped away, chequerboard fashion.

Overall, Stagecoach is well put together with a comprehensive menu at the start of the game which, among other things, allows the player to redefine the keyboard controls.

At the end of each game you also see a comprehensive score-chart which tells you how well you've done in various parts of the game.

MAKER:
FORMAT: cassette
PRICE: £6.95

You're riding across the desert when you see a runaway stagecoach. You leap onto it, which is about the trickiest manouevre in the game, and take the controls. Your destination is San Pedro, but first you have to pick up passengers, negotiate (with the help of a Map mode and sign-posting) the avalanche prone Sierra Peligrose, scooping up boxes of gold and ammo en route, and then outrun and outshoot the dreaded Camache Indians.

The first and third sections are littered with cactus and other obstacles. The game is in 3D, but the apparent relationship between objects is very hard to judge and it's pretty annoying to be thrown from your horse by a cactus that doesn't look as if it's anywhere near you. All in all, the animations isn't very successful, the stagecoach, a boxlike affair, particularly does some very odd-looking things with perspective when it's changing direction. Still it's entertaining enough and an original concept.

MACHINE: Spectrum
CONTROL: Keys, Full, Sinc, Kemp, Pro
FROM: Creative Sparks, £6.95

At one time or another most people must. have fancied themselves as heroes of the Wild West. This game gives you the chance to relive those great days as Kidd Rivers.

Kidd's job is to save the occupants of a runaway stagecoach and take them safely to their destination, San Pedro. First he must board the stage by jumping from horseback onto its roof and then, once he has control, he must drive around collecting those unfortunates who fell out of the coach whilst it was driverless.

After finding the lost passengers Kidd takes the stage through the mountain passes. You have a map to help you but it seems to be very badly scaled for your task.

Extra points are accumulated here by picking up boxes of bullion and ammunition which are lying around. This particular stage of the game takes far too long and quickly becomes tedious.

Once out of the mountains you're back on the prairies, which are now swarming with fearsome Comanches. They attempt to board the stage and capture your passengers. If you are lucky you may succeed in shooting the Indians before they empty your stage. When this happens you simply return to do the whole thing again at a higher level.

Stagecoach's graphics are something of an anomaly because although quality is poor and the drawings themselves quite bad, they are surprisingly amusing. I'd call them the computer equivalent of a cheap laugh. Sound is fairly limited and does nothing to stretch the Spectrum's facilities (however limited they may be).

In short, a fair game with some good ideas. Nothing outstanding and nothing abysmal and only one major shortcoming. Why is the mountain stage so hard, with difficult control and a nigh useless map?

One of my favourite scenes in any Western is the part in which the hero jumps from his horse to take the reins of runaway stage and save the day.

Stagecoach appeals straight away because it features that scene and it is fairly easy to do the trick.

The graphics of the cowboy and horse are black and rather sticklike but move rather well, but why, why is the sound so poor?

Stagecoach is fairly entertaining with some original ideas but with the mass of quality software available for the Spectrum it will probably sink without trace. It doesn't quite deliver the goods.

MARTYN SMITH

Creative Sparks have come up with a nice idea for a game, one with some potential. Unfortunately this is all entirely wasted on Stagecoach, a program notable for its frustration element rather than its appeal.

Mediocrity is the name of the game, with the lacklustre animation and sound and with no real redeeming features. Stagecoach misses the bus.

PETER WALKER