Producer: CCS
Memory Required: 48K
Retail Price: £5.95
Author: Nicholas Hodges

After the disappointment of the last two offerings, I was well pleased to come across this one. Once again it's from CCS, virtually the only company working in the strategy games field as their main area. Despite the fact that CCS continue to put out the most diabolical rubbish, along with the occasional goodie, I'd still like to commend them for a CRASH Plasticine medal for artistic bravery, in the face of ongoing public apathy.

Superpower is a good game. It may not be anything spectacular to look at (definitely unspectacular), but it is intelligent and thought-provoking. The game is basically a variant of the old mainframe decision-making game, Hammurabi. You play the part of a superpower attempting to increase its influence in a certain region, made up of nine countries; these countries are democracies, dictatorships and one-party states. Each country has a certain output, which is taxed at various levels. The states spend their money on defence, welfare, infrastructure, and police; the multinational companies lobby to have their taxes reduced, but they might get them raised, or they might be nationalised (I remember Suez).

The game really presents a remarkably accurate model of an unstable, developing area such as Central America or the Middle East, with all the Machiavellian comings and goings of the real, expansionist world. I got the feeling when I was playing this that I was in charge of a massive CIA operations to convert the entire region. There are six main ways of gaining power over a nation: by Investment (and bribery) in the economy; by Diplomacy (or counter-diplomacy) by which means you forge military and commercial blocs, or persuade countries to go to war with each other; by Economic lobbying, ie attempting to persuade countries to adopt a more favourable attitude to your investments in terms of taxes; defence spending etc; by Arms Aid; by funding opposition parties; and finally, by overthrowing governments, which can be achieved, among other ways, by hiring a hit man for five million dollars

The range of options is huge; the author may be very well experienced in running political and economic models to have thought it all out. If all this sounds a bit heavy for your tastes, don't worry - it's actually great fun puzzling out how to maximise your advantages (and profits) in each country, and I got a little vicarious thrill each time my opponents' assets got nationalised. I've got a couple of ideological reservations about the game: it's very materialistic (What about your house, then, eh? -Ed), and I personally think it would have been better to have found some other basis apart from profit on which to gauge the success of the player(s). Despite that, though, this is still one of the best decision-making games I have seen, and even if you're not interested in politics, it beats stuff like The Great Space Race hands down (the graphics are better too!). If you're getting tired of sprites and shoot-em-ups, and the 48,000 views of an orc's ear lobe leave you yawning, I'd strongly recommend Superpower - you keep turning round expecting to see yourself on News at Ten! If I had my way this game would be compulsory for all new recruits to the Foreign Office - I got more out of this than a year's lectures on international relations at university.

BUSINESS IN THE CLASSROOM

Cases Computer Simulations have produced a range of educational software programs covering a variety of subject disciplines, including 'minority' subjects such as agriculture and political studies. The programs follow a set format, involving assimilating a wealth of information, and using it to make correct decisions at critical moments. Relevant information is presented in a variety of ways: bar charts, histograms and maps are used to very good effect, and maintain the players' interest throughout. Different levels of difficulty are also offered, and the games can be used by one player at a time or by small groups working on competition.

Aimed at older pupils and college/university students, these programs are realistic simulations of real-life situations, providing the user with valuable practice in the application of the their acquired knowledge. Schools and Colleges are placing more and more emphasis on the importance of information skills, and CCS's range of educational software certainly fills a gap in the market - there are very few educational programs available for college students, and fewer still for the minority subjects.

The programs are all for the 48K Spectrum and cost £5.95 each. They can be obtained from CASES COMPUTER SIMULATIONS, 14 Langton Way, London SE3 7TL.

Superpower is a strategy game showing the superpowers' influence over Third World countries, and is intended to supplement a Political Studies course. Each player runs the intelligence agency of a major world power, with the ultimate aim of protecting his power's assets in a continent of developing countries.

At the beginning, each player has assets in the nine Third World countries, and each is struggling to achieve the highest rate of profit growth. This might be brought about by peaceful strategies, such as building a defensive alliance among the strong countries, or by more aggressive means such as encouraging nations to nationalise a rival's assets. A variety of information is available: a report on any country shows its stability, wealth, foreign relations and government spending: a comparison can be obtained between nations in terms of industry, debt and government spending; or a study can be made of a superpowers' assets table. This information should help the player to make decisions, including what to do about investment, foreign policy, taxes and the armed forces.

Annual budgets must be adhered to, and the players must therefore indulge in a variety of strategies, either to maximise the growth rate of their own country or to minimise that of the others. A player might, for example, find himself weighing up the arguments and counter-arguments for persuading a friendly nation to spend more on welfare. While this might reduce expenditure on the hated police force, it could mean that the country is left unprotected from coup or assassination attempts.

A detailed understanding of political theory is a pre-requisite for the successful tackling of this program, but it is useful in extending a student's depth of understanding.

COMMENTS

Control keys: clearly explained and kept as simple as possible
Keyboard play: very good
Graphics: sensible use of graphs and tables in most programs. The graphics in Airline are particularly good
Use of Colour: limited

MAKER: CCS
FORMAT: cassette
PRICE: £5.95

A real mega-game from CCS, combining aspects of both Insurgency - their two-player government vs. guerrillas strategy game - and The Prince, their multi-player interactive adventure. Up to six players meddle in the affairs of nine small Central America-ish countries, grasping for profits. Each country has a mass of differentiating parameters and players have dozens of possible options from the information and decision menus. The number of things you can do in a turn is limited only by your cash in hand, and with various possibilities carrying different price tags, you have to juggle things pretty carefully.

The main problem, helped by a printer options, is top keep track of the sheer volume of changing information which, though very well laid out, can't be held simply in the head and isn't available just on demand.

My admiration for this very complex, well thought out and demanding game is tempered only by an annoying glitch in the loading - you're not told to stop the tape during the game options selection, though you are told to start it again afterwards. Still, if you want a game that gives you plenty to do and think about, Superpower plus reams of notepaper will keep you busy.

SUPER POWER

MICRO: Spectrum 48K
PRICE: £5.95
FORMAT: Cassette
SUPPLIER: Cases Computer Simulations, 14 Langton Way, Blackheath, London SE3 7TL

In Superpower each player takes on the role of an intelligence agency. Your goal is to protect and expand your country's influence and assets in a group of Third World countries, at the expense of the other players, or in the solo version, against the computer. You may play with up to six players.

Having stated your password, your total budget allocation is shown. The actions open to you are broadly split into two areas. Information includes access to other players' interests, details of the countries' assets, defence spending, police strength, and which other players have a stake in them.

The other major group is Decisions, which include investment (increasing your stake in a country), which involves bribing the countries politicians; foreign policy, a polite way of describing meddling; taxes and spending, influencing the countries allocation of their resources; arms and advisors, helping to equip their armed forces; funding opposition parties, to undermine the present form of government. The ultimate aim is overthrowing governments, by ballot, coup or assassination.

The potential scope of the game is massive, and the more players the better. Backstabbing and undermining a player's most profitable assets are par for the course. There are so many different things to do that you never have enough resources to cover all your options, as well as defending and attacking. Data is constantly updated - a news bulletin comes up at the end of each whole turn, showing where investment has been made, and if any of the player originated events have taken place, or whether random computer generated disasters or good fortunes occur. Nothing is more frustrating than an oil strike in a country you have neglected.

As with any multi-player game, you have to sit out away from screen view whilst the others take their turn. It does speed up quite quickly if you know what you are doing.

Tactics generally should be to try to totally control two or three of the countries, and to dabble in the others to disrupt and frustrate. Caution must be exercised, particularly in a democracy, because if another player helps the opposition party to gain power, he can tell them to nationalise your assets, regardless of how much you have invested. One party states are hard to crack; they are often strong in detection, having large police forces and being adequately served by reasonable armed forces. Dictatorships are prone to assassination attempts but are costly and invariably attacks are doomed to failure.

This game is most decidedly the sort of thing to involve yourself in if you love Diplomacy, Machiavelli, or the like. Give full rein to your most paranoid feelings, it hardly ever pays to be benevolent. Don't trust anything or anyone. The key is to invest, defend your investment, and when you think it safe, attack, undermine and be as unpredictable as you possibly can be.

I liked this game very much. It's got simple mechanics, and is a nicely presented challenge for a group of schemers or just the one of you!