Producer: Micromania, 16K
£5.95

Unfairly written off by a review in a well known magazine, this program rates as one of the most flexible and playable of its kind. Large, bright graphics with the usual features and a smooth action. Only four ghosts, but at the higher skill levels they are frighteningly intelligent at getting you. 10 skill levels, tunnel, and an unusual feature in the invisble maze mode, which starts off easily enough with all the dots outlining the paths, but becomes difficult as you eat the dots. Good sound too, and all round good value. Overall CRASH rating 72%. 100% M/C.

Producer: Micromania, 16K
£5.95

Unfairly written off by a review in a well known magazine, this program rates as one of the most flexible and playable of its kind. Large, bright graphics with the usual features and a smooth action. Only four ghosts, but at the higher skill levels they are frighteningly intelligent at getting you. 10 skill levels, tunnel, and an unusual feature in the invisble maze mode, which starts off easily enough with all the dots outlining the paths, but becomes difficult as you eat the dots. Good sound too, and all round good value. Overall CRASH rating 72%. 100% M/C.

ELECTRO GOBBLE - PACMAN TYPE GAMES

In our sixth comparison, reviewers CHRIS PASSEY and MATTHEW UFFINDELL snatch a glass of water and a handful of power pills and prepare to do battle with a legion of ghosts...

Pacmania came over from the States quite a while back. Initially the game was regarded as odd in that it was relatively non-violent for a computer game, but it rapidly established itself as the number one arcade favourite. Although the craze is over now, there are still a lot of pacfans around. As a classic maze game, Pacman was among the first arcade originals to be copied in numerous forms on to the Spectrum. Copyright owners, Atari International, have been promoting their expensive 'official' version since before Christmas, but it competes against some very strong 'unofficial versions. Some are good, some not so good, and there are some interesting variants.

In brief, the classic version should have a medium complex maze connected horizontally by a wrap around tunnel. In the four corners are a similar number of power pills. Each pathway of the maze is regularly dotted. In the centre is a 'home' for ghosts of differing colours and point values, which are released into the maze at intervals. The object is to take your Pacman, an orange ball with a gobbling mouth, around the maze and eat all the dots to promote to a more difficult screen with more intelligent ghosts. Eating a power pill will cause all the ghosts to turn blue and edible. In this condition they should run away from your approach at a slower speed than yourself, Strawberries appear at intervals and can be eaten for bonus points.

Producer: Micromania
Memory Required: 16K
Retail Price: £5.95

Good controls, joystick options and large, almost full-sized pacgraphics which are smooth too - YES, I'm telling the truth. This has the best character movement around the maze. It also includes some new features like invisible mazes. Tunnel and power pills are included but, alas, no fruit. Micromania don't seem to have attempted a direct copy version but have produced a fresh variant. Although I say that, I would like it to have the original features too, but once cannot have everything.
CP

The first impression this version gave me was that it must be the best ghost gobbling game on the market - at the moment. The characters move smoothly and are well drawn, with the ghosts looking very much like the arcade equivalent. The star of the show looks very convincing as it gobbles its way continuously around the good-sized and well-planned maze. Several non- characteristics of the original arcade game crop up during play - no fruit for one, worst of all the ghosts give no indication when changing from edible to non-edible states after a power pill has been eaten. Being able to choose your own skill level also become unrealistic. One feature this version has that no other does is the invisible maze - just to make life a little more difficult. Both colour and sound have been put to good use, tunes adding a nice intro to each new-life screen. The keyboard is just right. A very good version, but it would be difficult choosing between this and the R & R version.
MU