Prospector. It's a pretty tough AGD flip screen game, mostly platform action with some very simple puzzles and shooting. I thought 3 lives was a bit mean, so I didn't feel bad poking extra lives (32028,X).
All in all, not a bad 30 mins of play, and there's a hint of Rick Dangerous about it. AMC games haven't released anything since 2018; there is however, an end of level boss, and the promise of a sequel...
Every so often I wonder why I didn't get to know Firelord better—and when I start playing I get an instant reminder. There is so much to like about it, but I find the spawnalot genre really frustrating to play. The graphics are some of the best you'll see on the spectrum, but you barely get a second to appreciate them before a gaggle of baddies hoves in on you. You can't fire and walk at the same time which makes it even harder. I like the idea of the bartering system, but I need to survive long enough to get objects to trade with. Maybe I'm just going soft as I get older* and I need to persevere, which I will, but I wish games like this found a different way of introducing action without the spawnalot mechanic.
*this is well illustrated by fact that the Tudor house fronts made me think of house prices!
R-Tape wrote: ↑Sat Jun 03, 2023 8:57 am
Every so often I wonder why I didn't get to know Firelord better—and when I start playing I get an instant reminder.
This was my first “wow” Spectrum game so despite never getting very far or really understanding it I used to load it up quite often. I think it was the first game I saw (and the only one back then) that did something dynamic with the loading screen. It all seemed very next-level!
I’m not sure why I’ve never gone back and revisited it. I certainly don’t like the spawnalot genre nowadays but I think 7yo me found the theft minigame (and accompanying screeching sfx?) pretty harrowing! And IIRC your armour dropping lifelessly to the ground; I’m sure I heard that sound a _lot_.
(On a side note, were standalone copies not sold widely? I’ve never seen one on eBay, only the Uridium double pack. My own tape was a schoolyard-backup so maybe my dad’s mate’s twin deck hifi was part of the problem. Who can say.)
flatduckrecords wrote: ↑Sat Jun 03, 2023 9:32 am
I’m not sure why I’ve never gone back and revisited it.
If you ever do, I'd say there's no shame in playing it with the infy life and immunity pokes. There's still a game to be had.
I much prefer the approach of the Balachor games. It's got all the good stuff of Firelord, and the baddies aren't all over you every second of the game.
(On a side note, were standalone copies not sold widely? I’ve never seen one on eBay, only the Uridium double pack.
News to me. My copy is the Hewson release with a (apparently redeemed) Christmas gift sticker on it. I've put it on the bottom shelf, so it's probably an unreliable loader.
I fixed a bug, but I don't remember which one.
If you want real fun, try Varina, made in ZX BASIC in 2018 and released in the Espectrotape. The game is based on this same old type-in. You need to get up to the edge on the other side, not before picking a fish...
I think you'll remember the demo version from here: https://filipeveiga.itch.io/varina-woot-2018
If I find time, I'll release the full version on my itchio (with all ten levels and in english) someday!
Ravina 2.0, because I like to whip myself into a furious, stressed rage before heading out for the day's tasks. Keys 5678, you have to land on the boat, get the jetpac, and fly (vertically only) up to the edge on the other side. It's quite addictive to manage to do it once. Doing it consecutively is another matter...
Thanks to @Andre Leao and @filipe.veiga and the team for this recovered type-in and MOD. What's the crack with the MOD by the way? As far as I can see it plays the same as the original, but with an intro added.
Batman the Movie. I was in the mood for a well known classic, and maybe the multiple genres thread brought it to mind too. It's never going to compete with the Miggy version, but the Speccy certainly didn't get a bum deal with this one. Even though I would have complained about the monochrome BITD, I hope I would have appreciated that smooth and fast 4 way scroll.
It's a treat when a game follows the film* and includes re-enacted bits of cinema - like when the (soon to become) Joker falls into the vat of acid. I wonder if many other speccy games do it so well?
*that said, I'm not averse to when coders do a Joffa and go completely off-piste!
BASIC game with a roguelike feel. Levels are procedurally generated, and it has a whole host of elements that anyone familiar with souls-like games will recognise (campfire base, defeat enemies to gain souls, the odd boss fight etc.).
I do like a good dungeon hack. So far the build concept seems to be quite well done... Spend your souls and aim for a high stamina/light-but-weak skirmisher, a lumbering-but-strong warrior, a magic user, or something in-between.
There are some visibility issues and poor colour choices—this is a game that would benefit from the @Ralf treatment. It's still good fun though, and I'm pleased to have remembered so many of the traps from playing the Miggy version to death BITD. Finished level 2 with a bit of perseverance.
I've been doing my Capital City Tester during brewtimes. I'm getting better but I can't get the central American countries to stick. Less said about Kyrgyzstan the better.
Morkin wrote: ↑Tue Feb 13, 2024 10:58 pm
Had to answer a LOT of questions for this. I suspected as much when the loader has a whole bunch of "Character array: " blocks.
Bloody Nora, you're not kidding. I got past 60 questions before I gave up - they were so loaded that it was obvious what the answer was going to be anyway.
Loaded up Karnov instead, because I can be an impulsive risk taking son-of-a-gun sometimes.
R-Tape wrote: ↑Sat Feb 24, 2024 6:17 pm
Bloody Nora, you're not kidding. I got past 60 questions before I gave up - they were so loaded that it was obvious what the answer was going to be anyway.
...There's more than one screen of psycho analysis y'know. It doesn't load all those Character Array: blocks for nothing.
The runaway success of The Wonka Experience's marketing campaign brought the official speccy game of Charlie & the Chocolate Factory to mind. I've been playing the B-side platform(side A is minigames) and it's got something. It's proper oldschool and a clunky engine, but quite addictive if only for the SAVAGE difficulty
My first difficulty was getting the z80 to download! Not sure why it didn't work, grabbed it off old skool WoS and then wished I hadn't bothered. I finally got off screen 1 after 23 deaths, so that's an improvement on Abu Simbel, but won't be rushing back to that in a hurry.
(The minigames are pretty vicious too, particularly what I assume is Grandpa Joe vs the Giant Killer Blueberries on the Violet game)
Ah, I keep forgetting I need to extract the zip to get both sides of a tap/tzx, because Spectaculator (android version) just reads the first file in the zip So I didn't need the z80 after all.
Completed ZX Baldy (snapshots). It's one I fire up fairly often for a bit of oldschool action. I like the simple idea that develops. It would have gone down a storm bitd and we'd remember at least as fondly as games like Nifty Lifty.
Since it's been drizzling all day here, I enjoyed a few hours solving puzzles in Nether Poppleton. Both the game and author's names make me picture a quaint village in the 1950s, a bubble which not even my encounter with a local using a mobile phone could burst.
I'd recommend it—the map is compact and memorable, so no need to spill off a page of A4. I doubt I'll complete it, but it's easy to make a fair bit of progress without getting frustrated.
So I didn't need the z80 after all.
