1985 Interceptor Software (UK)
by Alan Bridgman
A completely unknown game to me.
This was the first time I played it, and really enjoyed it.
It reminds me a bit games like 'Moon Alert' or 'BC's Quest For Tyres' or even, althou quite different, 'Aquaplane' for the 2 objects (Wallie and the Wheel) that you need to control.
But the main object of the game is to eat a line of dots (Pac-Man style) while avoiding the nasties and several types of obstacules.
Differs a bit from what was around 1985.
A simple but quite playable and addictive game.
Beat Pac-Man over the head for 15 minutes none stop with a baseball bat, snap half of his teeth out, stick him on a unicycle, and send him on his merry way...
Wheelin' Wallie is one of those games I always used to see when I was a kid in the electronics store up the road where I used to live, and always kind of wanted it, just cos' it looked weird. The main problem was the copy the shop had was the C64 version. The inlay had no screenshots on it, but it was one of those the inlay makes the game look intriguing type of affairs. Strangely enough when the shop finally got a Speccy copy in my ma wouldn't let me buy it? Which confused me cos' it was in the shops budget section. Might sound insane but the electronics store up the road to me had a budget section for budget games.....Seriously. If they were older or didn't sell well he'd sell them for either 59p, or £1.59.
Wheelin' Wallie fell into £1.59 territory, and I was almost distraught that my ma wouldn't let me have it. I went back with a few quid what seemed like an eternity afterwards on a Saturday afternoon after I'd been swimming, and the Speccy version was gone, and he was back to just having the C64 version. I never ever saw a real copy of this game again....
Fast forward to about 1998, and I finally got to play it, and thought to myself "Phew thank f**k I didn't buy that game what a load of crap". But! Yes But! Having revisited that game a few times over the years leading on from then I've changed my mind over and over.
OK so the game looks awful, the game sounds awful, the game to a certain extent even plays awful. It's a very simple affair, and a 100% situation involving the cover art making the game look a million times better than it actually is. The game barely comes close to you controlling a giant ginger haired gooseberry on a unicycle in a dark and foreboding world at all. The collision detection is terrible, the sound is below average, the graphics aren't completely terrible given how simple the game actually is, but they are a bit naff even by 1985's standards. Although granted this is a conversion of a commode game which also looked completely shit on it's native system, so I can't knock the Speccy version for looking bad, as the native platform looked bad as well. Very brown I might add.....Very, very brown.....Who would've thunk it?
But strangely enough if you can get past the poor collision detection, the weird gameplay mechanics, and the brutal unfairness of that flying teapot, yes there's a flying teapot that kills you, there is a strangely addictive game here. Granted it's flawed beyond belief the ceiling kills you, but there's no graphic for the ceiling so it's hard to tell just how close to the top of the screen you can go? Maybe just don't touch the Interceptor Software logo that stays there for the entire game (Don't worry the Commode version has "Programmed by Andrew" there for the whole game). The red ball is difficult to avoid unless you hang back, the teapot is impossible to avoid if you're on the same level of the screen when it appears, it travels so fast if you're even halfway in it's plane you're dead simple as no avoiding it.
Get used to the flaws, and it's strangely playable though, I still don't like this game that much, but each time I have that curious "Let's see if I can actually like it" type game of it, I find myself actually getting a little further, and not minding it that much. The enemies tend to come in a set trifecta, it seems to always be frog, then red rubber ball, the flying teapot of death.
Weird thing is this game plays like a mash up between well there's no shooting at all but the way you have to move forwards and backwards at any given moment almost reminds me of the caverns from scramble. The fact you're a floating disembodied mouth munching pellets reminds me of Pac-Man, and that you have to control the wheel under your disembodied mouth reminds me of one of those games where you control 2 vehicles at once, can't think of one off the top of my head sorry. Erm? SWIV maybe?, but this game is bugger all like that haha!
It's not a great game at all, but I've played much worse, and if I persevere I find myself getting a little further each time, So I'll give this game a 3/5.
