1985 New Concepts Ltd (UK)
by Mark Miller, Rokneddin Shariat, Anthony Kelly and Kiernan McEnery
This little pearl appeared to me around 1987 and rarely loaded without crashing.
The rare few times I got it to work I was amazed by the colorful and semi-realistic wave movements.
Initially I had a few problems with it. The data menus with measures in inches and not centimeters confused me, but the gear menu was a real challenge, I still cant say if the game as a bug there or if I was doing something wrong, I usually type the letter X to get out of that menu, because none of the values seem to work.
Then there is the key controls, my copy was pirated so there was no instructions of any type whatsoever, and it was a real headache discovering each key and the right combinations. This was just a game I often played (it crashed) but really made me curious and wanting more.
It seemed very original and something about surf was really a novelty. Funny how I always felt relaxed alone in that digital beach.
The game still maintains a charming appeal and when you get into the controlling, the game turns to be quite interesting.
By the way never got pass the first stage, don't even know if there are more than one or this is just a scoring game.
Review by Stack on 23 Feb 2015 (Rating: 2)
Wonderful 'only on the Spectrum' oddity that is buggy, finicky and slightly mad even before you lay the expensive plastic surf board that it came with across the rubber keyboard.
This is a game that takes itself very seriously with multiple meaningless weight and gear settings that could potentially make a difference if the key squashing skillz via the plastic interface really gave much feel for the surf.
Its fiddly and fussy all the way though - even in 'Practice' you will run out of energy, or be returned to the menu for having a board without a leash (which you can't select as the menu doesn't work properly).
30 years ago I was a teenage surfer and I really wanted this game to be what it wanted to be and even though I knew that the board-thing was plain silly, I would have loved a surfing game that carried out even a third of the true simulation ambitions that SurfChamp aims for but fails to ride out.
