HUMOUR INVADES THE PUBLISHING MARKET

John Gilbert reviews the latest books including the first for the Spectrum

The mass of ZX-81 books is still increasing. The author of the moment still seems to be Tim Hartnell. His new book for the ZX-81 is Making The Most of Your ZX-81. It will help beginners and contains many programs which can be typed-in immediately.

While the book is good for the complete beginner who has just read the manual, it is not recommended to anyone wanting to learn more about the capabilities of the ZX-81. The text just enlarges on the basic manual and the programs are mostly 1K long.

The book is humorous in places, either deliberately or unintentionally. For instance, one of the first programs is a simple game of Russian Roulette. The screen display is so simple but very amusing.

Making The Most of Your ZX-81, is available from Computer Publications and costs £6.95.

Another new book for the ZX-81 but with a slightly different format is The ZX-81 Add-on Book, by Martin Wren Hilton. It is remarkable for two reasons. First, it is one of the few books written about the hardware side of the ZX-81 market. It describes how extra memory can be added to the ZX-81, taking the Sinclair 16K RAM pack and the Audio Computers 32K RAM as examples.

Backing storage devices are also surveyed, including cassette tape decks and disc drives. Information about optical bar codes and modems is also included. The book explains the operation of the dK'tronics Graphic ROM and the Quicksilva Character Board. It also has a section about the future and the Sinclair miniature television.

The second remarkable thing is that the book is written by a 16-year-old. He has his own computer and writes for an American bi-monthly magazine. The ZX-81 Add-on Book is published by Shiva and costs £5.50.

Shiva has also published a book by Ian Stewart and Robin Jones, Computer Puzzles - For Spectrum and ZX-81.

The authors pose a series of problems, some old, some new, for which they have written programs to demonstrate the problems and to enable the user to try solutions quickly. The programs are interesting but when you solve one of them you have the same feeling you have when you have beaten someone in a game.

Also included is a Spectrum section for those lucky enough to have the machine. The price of the book is £2.50.

The quality of the books being written has improved with the advent of the Spectrum. For instance, Programming your ZX Spectrum is invaluable for people who could not find what they needed to know in the user manuals.

The book expands what is written in the manual and goes further by describing some of the things which have been omitted. It deals with coding of programs and also shows some of the techniques of structuring Basic programs.

The choice of programs has obviously been well thought out and they certainly show the capabilities of the machine.

One criticism is that it explains Basic statements like GOSUB and GOTO in too much detail. Other than that, it is a good book which is recommended for beginners. It is available from Interface and costs £6.95.

Over The Rainbow is a collection of programs in a softback which shows the potential uses of the Spectrum. Programs include games, utility routines and business programs. Some colour insets indicate some of the programs running. The book is from Melbourne House but seems overpriced at £6.95. That is not a criticism levelled only at Melbourne but at the whole computer publishing industry, which seem to trade on the belief that people will buy knowledge at any price.

Computer Publications, Unit 3, 33 Woodthorpe Road, Ashford, Middlesex, TW15 2RP.

Melbourne House Publishers, Glebe Cottage, Glebe House, Station Road, Cheddington, Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire, LU7 7NA.

Interface Publications, 44-46 Earls Court Road, London, W8 6EJ.

Shiva Publishing, 4 Church Lane, Nantwich, Cheshire, CW5 5RQ.

'Over the Spectrum' published by Melbourne House, the software people, is a colourful compendium of programs by various authors. And if a computer book of this ilk is to be judged by the games it contains, then the title is neither pretentious or overambitious.

From the outside in, the price of £6.95 is in the upper region of what one might expect to pay for such a book (and perhaps more of that might have been spent on the binding as I found my copy began to fall apart at the seams in its first few days). It does, however, contain eight colour pages. Really? Mine actually had twelve but four of them were double.

Too often I find books of this kind offer little other than poor attempts at reproducing existing arcade games while the Spectrum is suited to running equally exciting and enjoyable games of a different nature. 'Number Reversal' is a game that tests your powers of logic by challenging you to put into order a random series of numbers. The only facility you have to change the sequence of these numbers is the ability to reverse the order of some of the elements. I found it a demanding, and all too often frustrating game, and at only 41 lines long one that could easily be listed and saved.

Longer, but equally impressive, is 'Fruit Machine' - notable for the extensive use made of Spectrum's user-defined graphics capabilities. As the title suggests, the program simulates a fruit machine; since I usually end up losing on the real thing, I found this version to be ideal and just as entertaining with over 60 user defined graphic characters produced on the 16K machine. The listing given in the book does require the 48K RAM; but the accompanying text details how to successfully reduce it to fit aboard the smaller machine.

Amongst the rest of those non-arcade type games is a puzzle called 'Leapfrog', Blackjack', and '3D Maze Man' in which you are trapped in a maze, escape is against the clock hindered by some unfriendly monsters. What makes this maze game different from the rest is that by cleverly controlling the graphics, the simulated 3D maze is only revealed in response to your actions on your journey through. The program notes clearly reveal how to alter the appropriate data statements to define your own maze, and consequently the number of possible games is as many as your imagination allows.

Many similar books go to some length to justify the quality of the arcade games they contain, laying blame at the hands of the machine's limitations or those of the language. 'Over the Spectrum' has no need to make such excuses, where the weakness in BASIC exists, machine code has been employed. 'Space Escape', 'Lunar Landing', 'Alien Blitz' and 'Spectrum invaders' are as good as any commercial versions available and better than most and all are capable of running on the smaller 16K machine. 'Freeway Frog' is particularly notable; by extending the area available for user-defined graphics to allow for 55 rather than the 21 normally available, a great variety of screen characters are produced and their subsequent employment makes for a top quality game.

Of course, games of such a high standard require an equally high standard of programming, often to novice programmers ones that can be difficult to understand. New and experienced programmers can both benefit from the accompanying texts, which offer detailed program descriptions, full program structures and special notes that give advice on adapting the programs to produce others from them. With the novice much in mind, the notes refer the reader to the manual at those points where advanced programming techniques are called upon.

'Over the Spectrum' is a book that you can use the first time you put your fingers to a computer and by listing the programs you will soon be running up to seventeen high quality games. It is also one that will continue to offer advice and instruction as your own skill increases. Published by Melbourne House it is a 164 page collection of programs by a professional software house and costs £6.95. For further information contact Melbourne House, Glebe Cottage, Glebe House, Station Road, Cheddington, Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire LU7 7NA.

GAMES PEOPLE PLAY

In pursuit of the definitive games book, Phil Cornes and Mike Turner corner a selection of tomes, getting to grips with them all, be they good, bad or just plain ugly.

Many years ago, when you could still buy 16K of dynamic RAM for approximately £240, I drove all the way from my home town of Stoke-on-Trent (which didn't have a computer shop) to Liverpool (which did), simply because Microdigital was selling a book of games listings. The title was, as I recall, What To Do After You Hit Return and, for my money, the star listing was a version of Wumpus.

To be asked, then, to review some eleven books of games for the Spectrum (with its super Hi-res colour screen and Z80A processor) should have been little short of a pleasure. Little did I know! I found that not only did the games frequently take little advantage of the startling advances in video presentation, but - worse - often had no 'meat' about them at all.

DOWN TO BUSINESS

First off the pile came Games To Play On Your ZX Spectrum by Martin Wren-Hilton. The listings have been typeset and may therefore contain syntax errors, but your Spectrum will tell you about these when you try to type them in. There's nothing actually exciting in the book and, indeed, the author even admits that one of the listings is the first game he ever wrote! One consolation is that at £1.95 you'll have wasted the least possible amount of money.

The Spectrum Book of Games by Mike James and various others has listings printed on a reasonable quality dot matrix printer. However, these appear to have been word-processed and so the same comments as above apply regarding syntax errors. Once more there is nothing outstanding in the selection of games (Fruit Machine, Noughts and Crosses and a dice simulator, for example) although the presentation is good. Objectives for all the games are clearly detailed, together with advice on how to play them, typing-in tips and a list of the main subroutines and details. All well and good but the whole thing is wasted on a poor selection of games. At £5.95 I really can't describe it as particularly good value for money.

60 Games and Applications for the ZX Spectrum by David Harwood is split approximately 50/50 between the author's two groupings. The utilities vary from an eleven line idiot's remember routine (which only changes program line numbers, ignoring GOTOs and GOSUBs, etc) to a correlation/regression program which produces a value for Pearson's Correlation Coefficient and the linear regression equation, but which requires you to enter all the X co-ordinates followed by all the Y co-ordinates, rather than the more usual X, Y pairs. Equally the games range from a version of Breakout with ZX80 style graphics and a ludicrously complicated set of instructions for running and typing-in, to a version of noughts and crosses which "unlike many... allows you to win"(!) and forces you to start on the centre square. At £4.95, and despite a reasonable Draughts program by Tim Hartnell, this book again represents dubious value for money.

ALL KINDS OF EVERYTHING

Spectrum Spectacular by Roger Valentine has 50 programs, fewer than 20 of which are games.

There are some useful machine code routines given as both Basic programs and as assembly listings, although these are poorly documented and contain errors. For instance, in one perfectly good left and right scroll routine, the author suggests a couple of modifications for 'fun' effects. One of these, using the SRA instruction to clear the screen with a 'Venetian blind' effect, will not work in all cases. Replacing the SRA with an SRL (203,62 in decimal) cures the problem. At £4.95 this seemed fair value for money.

Instant Arcade Games for the ZX Spectrum by Jean Frost at £3.95 is indeed good value. It's not, however, a book of games listings in the more conventional sense. Take the 'control program listing' for a typical space arcade game; each individual subroutine (producing the backdrop - stars, night skyline and so on - calculating fuel reserves, laser status, and checking for the game endings) is formulated. Then add to this a collection of user-definable spaceships, aliens and tanks with both Basic listings and pictures. Not bad, eh?

Following chapters are on writing your own games and designing your own characters. It's a publication that caters for the two mainstreams of games playing and it definitely comes as recommended reading.

Also highly recommended is Sixty Programs for the Sinclair ZX Spectrum by Robert Erskine and friends. It's a larger format book, making it easier to read than most; on the other hand one or two of the games are of questionable taste... like Exocet - Let's Play Falklands. This really is the only aspect that lets down an otherwise excellent collection of games of varying length and complexity. They range from Countabout, a counting game for two-to-five-year olds, to such substantial offerings as Asset Stripper and Evolution 1, 2 and 3. All in all at £4.95 this takes the top spot for best value for money of the pure listings books.

FREE EYE-STRAIN WITH EVERY COPY

Next up we find Creating Arcade Games on your ZX Spectrum by Daniel Haywood, a book let down by the variable quality of its listings. These appear to have oozed out of one of the poorer ZX Printers and in parts they're so faint as to constitute a source of severe eye-strain - particularly when struggling with long multi-statement lines. But one or two of the games are of a reasonable standard, explained in depth and supplied with lists of the variables used - together with the functions they serve in the game: this is the book's strongest point. Typical of the contents are ICBM, a version of missile command, and Scramble.

Now let's don protective clothing and really plumb the depths. By any standards, a 64-page book containing 20 trivial programs at just under £7 cannot be classed as good value. Richard Attwasser's Twenty Programs for the ZX Spectrum is, unfortunately, just such a book. Old chestnuts such as Breakout, Android Man and Mastermind are typical of the contents. There's even a program for storing telephone numbers - always a questionable use for cassette-based micros which are switched off most of the time or even dismantled; sorry, but a card index is still far more efficient. A cassette of the games in the book is available for an additional £2.95, so at a combined price of £9.90 for both book and cassette, this comes close to robbery with violence.

Back in the land of thick tomes with lots of listings, 49 Explosive Games for the ZX Spectrum by Tim Hartnell et al proves to be another victim of the ZX Printer. The listing of Frog on a Log (starting on page 133) is surely the worst example of random pixel plotting in any of the eleven books; novice programmers will have little chance of entering it without errors. There are several mammoth adventure listings - Doors of Doom stretches over twenty-four pages (no, I didn't test it!). There are Space games, two-player games, mazes and arcade games, as well as two sections of utility programs in machine code and Basic. One of these is a tape copy program and one has to question the ethics of publishing this, even if it does lack sophistication and will only work with certain machine code programs.

EVERY PICTURE...

Over the Spectrum (edited by Philip Williams) contains 30 programs; two-thirds of which are games - colour screen photographs are included showing most of them in action. The assortment is varied... In fact, if anything, it attempts to cover too much ground. Freeway Frog, Fruit Machine and Alien Invaders vie for space with Sales Analysis, Payroll and Block Line Delete. It is not entirely clear who this book is aimed at. Still, some of the games have excellent graphics, including Draughts (which has a machine code routine for sorting out the computer's move) and Chess. The latter is not very intelligent and plays quite slowly; in fact, the author even suggests amending the program so it can be used as a human versus human game. There's also a 30-location, eight-problem adventure for those with the patience to type it all in, plus solutions for those who lack the wherewithal to play it. At £6.95 this book leans towards being over-priced.

Finally, reasonably priced at a mere £2.95 is Games for your ZX Spectrum by YS's own Peter Shaw. Twenty-four games are included, all rolled out from yet another temperamental ZX printer (somebody must have the good one, surely?). The games are all fairly short, although some are quite interesting. Pontoon has good graphics, as does Ascot, a horse race program. However, by far the best section of this book is a detailed chapter entitled 'How to write better programs'. Here you'll find some good material on writing a fairly complex strategy that uses as an example a game called Dome Dweller. In a similar manner to the Jean Frost opus, series editor Tim Hartnell gives a listing for the main control loop, a collection of things the program has to do and a fairly detailed description of the variables to be used. This alone is almost worth the cover price.

In addition, there's a glossary and bibliography - which aren't necessary and don't appear to bear any relation to the rest of the book. With these two rogue sections exorcised and 50-75p off the price, Shaw's book would represent excellent value for money.

PICK OF THE BUNCH

Looking back over the eleven books for this month, they would seem to fall into four quite distinct groups. Top of the bill, and living up to all my expectations are: instant Arcade Games for the ZX Spectrum and 60 Programs for the ZX Spectrum. These are the two that no Spectrum owner should be without and they represent the modern equivalent of the ideal tome I yearned for many moons ago.

The next four books, represent good value for money. They are: 49 Explosive Games for the ZX Spectrum, Spectrum Spectacular, Creating A rcade Games on your Spectrum and Games for your ZX Spectrum.

The third block includes Games to Play on your ZX Spectrum, The Spectrum Book of Games, 60 Games and Applications for the ZX Spectrum and Over the Spectrum. These four come into my 'lukewarm' category. The reason for their downgrading are varied, ranging from 'good game presentation wasted on poor games' to 'generally good but overpriced'.

The final category contains only one entry. I doubt that anyone could seriously challenge the fact that the one remaining title is just a waste of paper at the asking price. I stoop to mention the title again.

EXPANDING BOOKSHELF

John Gilbert looks back at the year's books to help enhance the ZX machines.

In the last year scores of books have been written about Sinclair machines and it seems as if anyone who knows anything about the ZX-81 or Spectrum can enter the literary field and become an author.

During the early days of the Sinclair boom, most authors were content to collect together a few programs and write a short piece about each one. That made a book which could be on the streets in the shortest possible time.

One of the main publishers of ZX books is Interface. Its early contributions to the ZX-81 market included Getting Acquainted With Your ZX-81, by Tim Hartnell, and The Gateway Guide to The ZX-81 and ZX-80. by Mark Charlton. Both books are full of listings and very little explanatory text and similar in content.

Hartnell seems to have made a one-man attack on the book market in the last year. His first books were full of listings and contained little text but his latest have dealt more with the techniques of programming and are more helpful to a computer user.

The rationale for books of listings was that they would give people who had just received their machines something to type-in and play with before beginning to program. That reason no longer applies. Magazines such as Sinclair Programs print listings which first-time users can type-in, so there is no longer a need to fill the pages of a book with long listings.

The lesson does not seem to have been learned. Several companies have published books of program listings for the Spectrum. They are well-produced and colourful but ideal only for first-time users or people not interested in programming. The best of them include Computer Puzzles for Spectrum and ZX-81, by Ian Stewart and Robin Jones from Shiva, and Over the Spectrum from Melbourne House. Over the Spectrum is a book of listings but the introductory text to each program is more comprehensive than in other books.

Details are also given about how to adapt techniques used in the programs to the user's programs. The Shiva puzzle book is exceptional. The authors pose problems and give listings which simulate the problems in an effort to solve them.

At some time in the last year authors must have felt that the market for books of listings had reached saturation point. People wanted to learn how to program and several books on programming techniques appeared.

One of the first on techniques was The ZX-81 Pocket Book, by Trevor Toms, published by Phipps Associates. Toms described several ways of saving memory, a much-discussed subject among ZX users. In the book are several programs which use the techniques described and also provide light entertainment when difficulties arise.

Another book on techniques which caught the imagination of users is the Sinclair ZX-81 - Programming for Real Applications, by Randle Hurley, published by Macmillan. It details several software projects, including a word processor and data filing program. Hurley also deals with memory-saving techniques and problems which may be encountered by a user when programming. The author has promised a book on machine code but it has not been published.

Peek, Poke, Byte and RAM, by Ian Stewart and Robin Jones, and published by Shiva, gained fame for providing an easy introduction to programming for the beginner. The book takes nothing for granted about the reader and contains many things which the ZX-81 manual did not embrace.

The author of a technical book faces two problems. The wording must be precise but not fall into jargon. The author must also try to find new areas to explore and not draw on material used in other books. That does not seem to worry many authors but soon the technical market could be saturated with books on the same structured programming techniques and memory-saving devices.

People need to know about those things but there are already many books which explain them adequately. It would be better if authors were to explore other areas and there are many as yet unexplored ones in computing.

The machine code market for Sinclair machines is still very young but what has been published is very good. One of the easiest books about machine code is Machine Language Programming Made Simple for your Sinclair, published by Melbourne House. The book takes an almost child-like stance but proved very readable and excellent value for the beginner.

Mastering Machine Code on your ZX-81, by Toni Baker, is also a good introduction to the subject but slightly more difficult for the beginner to understand.

Machine code can be entered into the Spectrum with greater ease than the ZX-81 and is expected to make people more willing to use it. Once they start doing so they will have greater programming power at their fingertips. The Spectrum is an ideal machine on which to learn and if this sector of the book market is overlooked it would be a pity.

A new market for ZX books has been opened in the electronics field. Two examples are the ZX-81 Add-on Book, by Martin Wren-Hilton, published by Shiva, and 20 Simple Electronic Projects for the ZX-81 and other computers, by Stephen Adams. It shows how to build things like tape recorder controllers, numeric keypads and even a cheap thermometer. The book explains the working of several add-ons at present available from retailers and includes projects which the reader can set up, including a burglar alarm and a voice recognition system.

The book market is becoming as lively as the software market and no doubt many books will be produced for the Spectrum and the ZX-81 in the months to come.

A general criticism of all the books mentioned is that they are all too costly. Paperbacks which would sell for no more than £3 are being offered at £9.

There are two probable reasons for the high prices of many books. Perhaps the market is so small that the prices have to be high to cover the costs. The other reason could be that the publishers know that people will buy a recommended book at almost any price. The satisfactory solution seems to lie between the two.

The book market needs strict controls over price and quality if it is to survive in the computer field. If companies do not start to reduce prices and publish better-quality books, computer users will become more cautious and selective. That has already begun to happen with software and the signs are that it is starting to happen with books.