Reviews

Back in 1998 I was 14. A bunch of us went into town to the cinema. The girl of my dreams was in the crowd. My first ever crush. Unfortunately the day ended with my best friend chatting her up, then they left together back to her place. My world grew cold and blanched, my eyes filled with tears and my nose blocked with snot.

Happily as I stumbled back to the bus stop, the local games shop had a big poster of Rebelstar 2 in stock. That brightened up my fickle teenage angst considerably.

Anyroad, as for the game, its a refinement of the game engine used in Rebelstar 1. The graphics are more consistent and more appealing. Unfortunately the big falling down is the map. The gist of the game is that the battle should be fought over the swampy marshland. However when any two areas look the same its impossible to get bearings, and any game which is played by taking the fight to the enemy always ends up with you being decimated by the computer taking impossibly long shots against what you though was a covered flank. The only viable strategy is blandly waiting for the enemy to come to you in the start area. Most of the map goes unused.

It can still lead to a tense dash for the landing craft to finish the game, and a very high score will result in the comment 'Death to hackers', which is reward in itself. There is some fun to be had, but overall it feels like a step back from Rebelstar 1. The 'Paradise Valley' scenario from Laser Squad has a similar theme but that time it works correctly.

The first Codemasters game on the Spectrum. My friend bought it, and we played it on his machine expecting just another throw away budget game. But this had us vexed. It was decent quality. Who were these Codemasters people? We decided that the shop had put the wrong price tag on the cassette.

It is a fun game, with the bonus of either playing against the computer or as two players. The computer follows a set path, and automatically kills on contact, so theres no chance of cutting it up.

It would be decent at full price. For £1.99 this is rightly the start of the Codemasters empire.

A beautiful game. There is no sound, and the controls take some getting used to. But once one gets immersed, its very similar to Doom in 2D. There is genuine glee to be had microwaving a corridor full of Things with lighting bolts, and genuine terror whilst fleeing a hyperThing with no magic left.

There is a fantastic remake at Retrospec.sgn.net.

Shadowfire is, like the protagonists, an emigma. Is it a solid game in its own right, or is all smoke and mirrors?

The premise is completely new and very exciting back in 1985. A team of six fighters must raid a large spacecraft and rescue a hostage. The selling point is that the individuals are given orders by the novelty of icons, controlling their direction of movement, handling of items and attacking, which they then carry out independently. The graphics are detailed and colourful and the craft is interesting to explore.

But... theres just so many niggles. Firstly there is a lot of depth and it is essential to read the manual. Not much is self explanatory. It is completely unclear of the value of different weapons, and you'll die quickly if you don't realise that items must be selected to be used. Also the mobility of your team will decrease quickly in fighting; you cannot view a member's details when moving from one location to another so moving en mass will leave you staring at the screen for a long while with nothing to do until they arrive at the destination. After a large confrontation, further exploration becomes a chore since everyone has had their legs shot out.

Theres other downsides too. After rescuing the hostage, the game status will state the mission is incomplete because the spacecraft has not been destroyed. After a long arduous journey to the self destruct control (With no legs), you'll be berated because you've not captured the spacecraft, cos you've just blown it up as instructed. Also the game will occasionally report that you are under attack for no reason. This is actually a known bug, which is explained away in the manual as being an invisible creature.

Certainly theres a lot of pitfalls, and other games like Rebelstar cover the same ground more intelligently. And yet, the presentation is so state of the art, I'm willing to knock it above average just for that.

The game solely responsible for making me the bitter person I am today. My mate had a single mum and had everything, including Skool Daze. I was puzzled as an 8 year old kiddie why I had two parents but couldn’t afford any games. So, not being able to afford £5.95 for Skool Daze, I saved for a few weeks to get this for £2.50 thinking it was the same thing. I was wrong. It is atrocious. Not even well-it-was-budget-in-1983-and-in-16K rubbish, just pure rubbish. Pong is more fun than this. The sprites flicker their way round the screen, the computer grunts at you, and just to provide some challenge the controls are nonsensical. Truly truly awful. Possibly the worst budget label game on the Spectrum.

For a long time, this was the highest rated game in Crash at 97%.

Looking at it now, the only attraction is the large smoothly scrolling sprites. However this is ultimately only 7 frame animation, and Manic Miner had that.

Playing the rest of the game, there is only an illusion of depth. To travel around the faceless city requires much plodding, and unless there is a map handy then it is very easy to pass by an essential shop because the door is on the other side to the direction you are facing in.

The clues are very, very cryptic. Even with a solution many simple don’t make sense.

Finally the other inhabitants of the city will happily steal items from your inventory and there is no way of getting them back. If it is an essential part of the solution, then that’s time for a reload.

Similar games are Everyones A Wally and Jack The Nipper. Both are much more rewarding, even if the animation isn’t in the same league.

Maziacs had heart. Even for the time, it was not technically advanced. However there is a sheer joy to the game that drags you in. The choice of colours is simple but bright, and there is a surprising amount of life in the stickman. The adverts of the game claim that a Hollywood stuntman staged the fight sequences. This is a dubious claim, however when a Maziac catches you without a sword, the protracted fight sequence that follows will have you holding your breath over the outcome.

Swords Of Bane is a cracking strategy game that’s been lost in the mists of time. The 48K version came with only one available map, but the 128K version allowed for a further two to be played on.

The game is turn based, and a squad of medieval foot soldiers are moved around a map to defend themselves against a much larger demonic force. The soldiers are purchased at the start with more powerful troops costing proportionally more, and the available resources decreases and number of enemies increase as the levels get harder.

With only limited ranged attacks, the game does not allow much in the way of cunning strategies. Winning battles is very much down to attrition and grinding down the enemy faster than yourself. There are different species of demons with different abilities, which adds some flavour rather than just grinding the stats. When the big boss shows up to be defeated, and you’ve not got any fully healthy soldiers left, the game gets tense.

The graphics and presentation aren’t great but do the job. The main letdown is the nasty interface which only lets your troops be moved in sequence, so getting your formation just right before the first demons show up is a lot more effort than it should be.

Oh what a dear lost game. This was published as a type-in in September 1983 in Your Computer. This was the source that got me on a long career to where I am today.

It was about 200 lines of basic, and I slaved over it for days to copy it in precisely as in the magazine. Basic was still gibberish to me, so I had no idea what I was doing other than pressing buttons.

But the magic moment came, after entering the last line, of running it. And it worked first time. The bleepy sound, slow responses and flickery sprites were like magic. My creation come to life. Multi-million line projects just don't bring the same wonder these days.

Sadly, the magazine has been long lost though the listing in on WOS. As a game, it is naff. But we've all got to start somewhere, no?

A fun little adventure game. Its not particually challenging, which is a good thing because you can wonder a long way in the game without getting stuck. The puzzles are all possible and logical, and give a nice reward when they are solved.

The game is set in four zones, pastiches on the games Lords of Midnight and Manic Miner, the film 2001 and a wartime airfield. The good humour shines through; you will laugh.

If you've not been into text adventures before, try this one first.

The follow on Shadowfire. Enigma Force is now down to four members. The android and birdman, both awkward to animate, have conveniently died off.

Yes, animation. Unlike the static displays of Shadowfire, the current location is shown as the action take place. Once some enemy soldiers enter your location, a gun fight will ensue. It makes a change from watching anxiously as your force's strength goes down, followed by flashing warning lights. Now you can see what the position really is.

Although the icon control is still in place, this time you can take direct mind control of one of your team members. And here lies possibly a slight problem with the game. The controlled member can move much faster and fight better under your control than under computer control. When a member reports to be under attack, you cannot afford not to take direct control rather than let them get on with it. Similarly if the force wants to move over several rooms, it is much quicker to move each individual manually rather than giving orders and wait as the member dawdle along under their own steam. It would have been nice that the ordering system from Shadowfire was still useful, but the manual control unbalances it.

Also lacking from the original game is the characterisation. Sevrina still has her door opening toolkit, Maul is slow, and thats it. Fighting ability seems to be the same.

Rather than being a static world, the game offers a few good twists. Instead of the whole world being against you, there are two warring sides which inhabit the sewer system where the action takes place. If the two enter the same location, they will quite happily forget about fighting you and start attacking each other. Near to the start is a spawning room for one of the sides. Entering this, under heavy gunfire, will announce that they are now your friends and you'll be left alone. On the far side of the map is the enemy spawn room, and Zoff. They'll fight you until Zoff surrenders to you, and then you can sit in perfect peace and watch the two sides go back and forth. Its a neat touch.

The game is can be easily finished, but it has kept the same polished sound and graphics from the original.

As a final asides, with the talk about respawning insect soldiers endlessly fighting in underground tunnels during a forgotten war, theres a recent Doctor Who story very similar to this...

You could tell the poor kids from the rich kids at primary school in 1984. The rich kids all got Knightlore for Christmas (At least, those that didn't have a BBC) and the poor ones got Booty.

From the early range of Firebird games for £2.50, Booty was the only half decent one amongst it. Like later budget titles Finders Keepers and Feud, everyone has a copy somewhere in the attic nestling next to Make A Chip and Survival.

Otherwise its a competent platform game. Dodge left and right on each screen, collect the keys, open the door and hope that it leads onto the next screen rather than flood the boat. Similar to Mr Freeze released at the same time, but with less flicker. Its not a lot of fun today.

Nether Earth could well claim to be the best real time strategy on the Spectrum. The other claimant might be Stonkers, but Nether Earth doesn't crash.

Its odd how this game did not get more acclaim. Its got competent isometric graphics, good sound and decent controls. Its still fun to play through today. The only downside is that the computer isn't very aggessive and is easy to beat, especially since it outnumbers you 3-1 at the start.

This scummy game blighted my youth. For my 10th birthday in 1984, my parents finally agreed to let me have a full priced game. So I choose this. Cos its football, innit. Had to be better than TLL.

The game is abysmal. Truly. The goalie and throwins are all automated, all you get to do is run. The computer is dim and runs straight at the goal; its just hard coded to jump a bit to the side after kickoff. The only interesting point to the game is that the crowd figures are unique.

I tried to hype it up to my friends at my party. But there was the sinking feeling that I knew I'd been sold a baddun. Should have got TLL instead.

The real kicker is that it was re-released two years later at greater price still to cash in on the 1986 world cup.

The code type-in from hell. Two pages of machine code with just a checksum for comfort. No basic to follow. Give it a few days of bashing those little rubber keys, and you'll get a result.

And what you will get is a very fast if frustrating shooter. Graphics and sound are minimal, and the game is constantly throwing a bouncing 'bird' at you if you stand still. But you need to stand still to aim straight. Get it wrong a couple of times and the maggot will split multiple ways, and you've no chance.

But then, the pay-off was never in the games. It was always the pride in having your own efforts come to life after all that typing.

A fun graphic adventure for none-adventurers. Its pitched somewhere between Valhalla and Shadowfire but with no irksome text entry and friendlier interface.

Although there are four team members, theres no difference between them sadly so no thought has to be placed on choosing the best man for the job. Fighting is simply a matter of sending forward the member with the most strength. But the game is possible to solve, and rewarding when progress is made.

A last mention should be made of a great bug where there is a bar that doles out infinite beer half way through the game. The bar can be returned to even when about to fight the final baddy, and strength maxed out again. But any game with free beer is alright by me.

An awesomely bad game where the developers couldn't match their ideas. But the killer is, Crash still gave it a mighty 96%. I think this is in part the game featured icons, which would always gain extra marks back then, and the writers were showered with free Zoid toys. There was a preview each month up to the release of the game.

It just doesn't work very well. The idea is sound of giving your zoid orders to move around, more like a tank commander. But the graphics are disappointing. The enemy zoids only ever appear as dots on a map (They are 50 ft tall war machines! Lets see them then!). Killing one involves a rubbish mini game of firing a missile and dodging oncoming mountains and invisible walls to reach the target. But if the zoid fires at you, theres a different game where waves of missiles come at you and you have to shoot them down. It would have been nicer to have the same weapons on both sides. If you kill one, the 'dot' disappears and you get a badly drawn nuclear mushroom cloud. Its just not fun or interesting, and this is a game of giant fighting robots. How did they manage this?

And yes, this was from my poor childhood where I could only afford two games a year. It was this, or Turbo Esprit. I chose this. Ratbags.

Its a game of the film - Only this time its good! It would stand well on its own, and theres not many tie-ins on the Spectrum that can say that.

For a text adventure, it has many location pictures and all the locations feature in the film somewhere. There is not much exploring to be done here, but thats fine.

The grammar can be difficult sometimes ('Weld snowplough'?!) but its got a good sense of humour, and if you've seen the film then you'll have a good idea of what needs doing. It also appears to be the most tipped game after The Hobbit.

If nothing else, just give it a play in the house at the start, and keep pressing the button on the remote control in the kitchen. Funniest. Thing. Ever. (On the Spectrum anyway).

Genius! Possibly the best Spectrum game basic you've never played.

Its a collection of mini games where you have to get from one side of a bridge structure to another. Each node on the bridge gives a new challenge.

And theres the rub. Each game is cunningly created to be unfair. Sooo unfair. The game is fun in the same way that NetHack or Dwarf Fortress is fun. Its not the winning, or even the playing, but the inventive way you die.

You see, one challenge will give a set of instructions to guess a number. By the time you've read the instructions and think you've got it, the last line will read 'You have 5 seconds to guess'. You're already out of time. Gotcha.

Next, the challenge will be finding your way across a field of landmines. Although the bridge screen uses cursors, the controls here will be TFHB, just for the hell of it. Just as you get used to the new controls - Out of time. Gotcha.

Theres an add the number. 935 + 237 in five seconds (Including instructions) before an ogre kills you. Giving a panicked answer of 1072 will give a reply of 'The ogre turns and walks away.'

Phew. Pause.

Before continuing as 'Before running back and clubbing you for the wrong answer.'. Gotcha.

Utter genius in a so, so cruel way. And just to give one last leaving present, answering 'N' to the question 'Is there another adventurer' will reset the computer'.

Oddly, this seems the only game the author ever wrote.

I had a quick play on this to see if I remembered it correctly. And yes, the aim of the game is indeed to club women on the head, drag them back to your cave by their hair, and watch as the Children count increases.

Theres also the onerous task of having to feed them, which involves clubbing other creatures of unknown origin and taking them back to the cave. The monsters are unthreatening magenta blobs. Maybe this was during the Cambrian Explosion.

And thats the game. Once you're over the shock of dragging your wives around by their hair, theres not much left. And these days we get upset over Duke Nukem. Pussies.

Another game that didn't last the test of time. This was one of the first games I owned, in fact it has the privilege of being the second game on my sacred BASF C90. (The first game is Maziacs from 1982, and the last is Flying Shark from around 1988). It was so ineptly pirated that it had to be started with a poke.

Its a Scramble clone. It clearly now a compiled Basic game, with the same engine used for the other Silversoft game Orbiter, a Defender clone. The screen grinds aross and once you get into the narrowest of caves, the reactions of your ship really do drag.

Considering Penetrator was out at the same time for the same cost, that is far superior. I finished it for this review for the first time in 30 years. The final area just hangs, and returns to the front page with no fanfare. Bit of a let down.

An shameless, and interesting, rip off Exolon. The graphics, sound and weapons are the same design, and the looks would suggest that it was the same author. But playing it shows the pirates didn't have the same magic. When about to leave the screen, in Exolon the monsters stop coming. In Yeti they continue, giving a sudden random death. Not fun. A very pale imitation.

Ken Wright churned out lots of this type of wargame for the Spectrum from CCS. He just changed the map and graphics for each game, and never once hit the polish of Vulcan, perhaps the best wargame there is.

Whilst the system might just work for pre-20th century battles on a single battlefield, the failures of this game show what a dismal attempt of copy and paste this was. Units can only be ordered to move in groups of six as 'armies', and each army can only be directed by pointing out the center and left and right flanks. So if you really need a tank unit to fit into a certain square, forget it. It might do it if it feels like it. Or it might move off in the opposite direction.

Now if this was Napoleanic cavalry on a smoky battlefield, that might make sense (Though be no less annoying). When each square will be some 20-30 miles across, and each turn over several days, all with radio communication, it doesn't work. Plus, because units can only be brought in slowly onto the beaches on the north coast, you never get the chance to fully manoeuver anyway. Not a fun experience at all.

A truly miraculous 1985 game that was both budget - and good. Its not quite JSW when it comes to its platforming but is competent, and changes to be a maze game.

The aim of the game isn't obvious, and its not exactly obvious when you've managed to escape the castle either. But collecting and trading the items is entertaining.

An early Don Priestley game. Lots of character in such a simple game, and wide areas of primary colours, which made early Spectrum games so joyous.

Other than that, a simple game, except for the alarming habit of the enemy tanks to shoot one another in the back if they wait too long. That always makes me catch my breath.

My situation was very similar to the David Christmas review. Evenings were spent as a fevered youth entering the code, and hoping that the code could be saved to tape before the machine overheated and crashed. But, eventually, a working game was produced like glass from sand. And its not-unreasonable as a game either.

My brother, who knew these things, reckoned that one of the poke statements was a bonus score so that the sprite could sneak up behind the spider and pull its legs off if timed right. Oddly I never managed to see this effect.

The remaining interesting point about this game was that it showed up as maybe the best entry on the Cascade 50 tape. It is unknown whether the original author of the type-in got the reward or the entry was some sneaky chancer.

The HumbleBundle of its day. At a time without any re-releases or compilations, to have the 10 games stuck together for less than a full priced game was a revelation. Plus, the only two stinkers are Sorcery and Jack And The Beanstalk.

The first, and possible the best-ever, compilation on the Spectrum. Its a puzzle that it wasn't repeated.

The problem with a Transformers game is that the two aspects of the robot (Vehicle / robot with big gun) are never going to come together. The purpose of the game is to explore and collect the pieces of treasure scattered around, but theres never any real reason to change into a vehicle. Its still reasonably fun as it is.

BUT

I'm going to upgrade it from 3 to 4 because driving as a vehicle off a platform from a great height is one of the most rewarding experiences of hari-kiri in a Spectrum game. It even beats jumping off the flagpole in JSW. Or the skull-marked door in Mercenary.

A rather sweet little magazine type-in. And surprisingly difficult to get the 100 members in 30 months needed. I learned my trade from following listings like this, which also meant I became stumped when I needed more than 26 variables. The magazines never allowed sensible variable names more than one letter long.

Also looking through the code, the best policy is to pile into social events in an all-or-nothing strategy. Not just teaching people to code, but some useful life lessons too.

Does what it says on the tin. Saved me a fortune in the mid-eighties, before tape-to-tape stereos (And flash loaders, sadly) arrived.

A really annoying game in that it had great potential and really good ideas, its just imcompentantly written. Its like an early Lost Vikings and does capture the feel of Thunderbirds of using the ships for a heavy-equipment rescue mission. But the controls are horrible, the music is horrible and the graphics look cheap. Its a sad waste of the license.