Producer: Budgie
Retail Price: £2.99

You are an Octon, a creature given power by the symbol of the octagon. Trapped in the confines of a four level complex of 60 cell worlds, your only chance of escape lies in the successful building of this octagon from pieces held at the complex's core.

Octons move left, right and upwards, or fall under the pull of gravity. Each cell is populated by creatures such as snakes, spiders and fish, which move across the screen and increase in number with each successive level. Contact with these saps your psychic power, but for protection you carry a stun gun which temporarily vaporises your opponents.

To transfer from cell to cell, at least four tokens m must be gathered and taken to your 'stand on' (home platform). Collected tokens are displayed at the bottom right of the screen, along with any relevant messages. You may choose the standon from which you exit the cell, as long as it is a neutral white- or corresponds to your designated colour. The count at the top of the screen is reduced by one unit when a new cell is reached.

A teleport is used to transport between levels, but this can only be done when they are the correct colour, and when a key is in your possession. The position of this key is displayed on a scanner at the bottom left, with its number showing which level you presently occupy.

No more than one octagon section can be picked up and carried at any one time, and access is gained to the outside world when all of the pieces have been fitted into their appropriate positions at the starting point on level one.

COMMENTS

Control keys: Q/A up/down, N/M left/right, SPACE to fire
Joystick: Kempston, Cursor
Use of colour: generally bright appearance
Graphics: a busy screen but generally small characters
Sound: reasonable tune, but few FX
Skill levels: one-but four players may take part
Screens: 240 cell worlds

I don't really know what to make of Octagon. At first sight it seems to be very good, but after a few goes it becomes obvious that you should be able to do more than just fly around a stack of similar screens. A quick reread of the inlay uncovered a little more, but it didn't really disclose how to get deeper into play. The sound is poor: there's no tune, and very few spot effects whilst playing. Although I can appreciate some of the nicer points, it isn't really that good.
GARETH

Things looked quite promising at first - the neat inlay, interesting scenario, abundance of useful options, a short but sweet tune on loading, some average but colourful graphics and the option which allows up to four people to play - but unfortunately the game is a great disappointment. Your character moves in a very jerky fashion and the interim screen that flashes when you move from cell to cell is unnecessary and frustrating - this destroys the flow and makes the proceedings very disjointed. The above average presentation increases the value, but unaddictive gameplay is a major let-down.
PAUL

I'm afraid I don't like Octagon at all. The graphics are colourful (almost too colourful in fact), but they look quite poor. The scenario didn't quite sink in for a while, and the gameplay didn't appeal to me at all; I didn't like the technique of pressing the initial letter of the action required. Finally, the 'arcade' sequences are pretty appalling.
MIKE

Rino
£2.99

Pieces of eight! Pieces of eight! Yup, the key number of this particular beast on Alligata's Rino label is more than seven, less than nine and adds up to quite a neat mazey platform with a large element of strategy.

Up to four people (or octons) can play Octagon at once, questing to find the eight pieces of the octagon that have to be retrieved from the centre of the complex. The complex is built rather like a honeycomb, made up of sixty cells, each linked by several tunnels. Every cell is inhabited by various nasties that can be stunned but not killed, and constant contact with them wears down your own psychic power until all your get up and go has got up and gone, leaving you an ex-octon.

Each cell has four tokens - these must be rounded up individually, whilst avoiding the mashes, and returned to your standon. Without these four tokens you won't get the key that allows you to move on to the next cell. Occasionally you have the option of getting more tokens that'll save on the running about when you get to the next cell... but there again you might not even get there if you get golloped up in your greed for more tokens. And think carefully whether the direct route is the one you want to take to the heart of the complex. Since each cell has its own style of escape, you might find that a little wander round the honeycomb gives you a route more suited to your gameplay.

With all the fetching and carrying involved - there are sixty cells with four levels, and eight successful return journeys needed to complete just one level - you might begin to feel like a bee going round in the same old patterns all the time. However, the puzzles are sufficiently hard that each cell counts almost as a mini game in itself. If you're a marathon runner rather than an explosive sprinter and can put up with galling graphics, then Octagon is worth at least the few pieces of eight you'll have to shell out for it.

Label: Budgie
Price: £1.99
Joystick: Kempston and Cursor
Memory: 48K/128K
Reviewer: Jim Douglas

Most budget titles are joystick-jumping arcade games, so it's good to see, for a change, a strategy game for once.

Octagon is Alligata's first venture into budget software on the Budgie label.

You - and up to three of your friends (if you play the multi- player options) have been put on ice and trapped inside a four level complex of 60 cells. All you have to do is rebuild the eight pieces of some mystic Octagon.

And all you have is a laser gun, some psychic powers which tell you where you are in the complex, and teleports which'll take you from one cell to another.

Each cell comes to life with two or three squirming monsters. Locate and pick-up the transporter globes from within the cell and carry each one in turn back to the transporter terminal. The blobby monsters fly along pre-determined paths and get in the way while you try to pick up the transporter globes. Shoot them and they'll disappear for ten seconds, giving you time to make a grab and dash. If they hit you they'll drain your energy and once that's gone it's back to Cell 1, Level 1.

If you collect four or more globes you move to the next cell, where you face more monsters, obstacles and globes. When you get through to the central core of the complex - which is a bit like playing TV's Blockbusters without the questions from Bob Holness - you move on up to the next level. Complete all four levels return to the outside world and that's it.

Octagon is an original and frustrating combination of strategic logic and arcade anarchy. I only have one complaint. Since there's no Sinclair joystick option and you can't redefine the key controls, you can't play it using a joystick with the 128K +2.

Spectrum 48/128/Plus 2
Cassette
Publisher: Rino Marketing

Some games are easy to play requiring at the most movement horizontally and vertically, with a fire or two thrown in. On reasonable keyboards having to choose from more than four or five keys is not too bad, but on the dreaded Spectrum keyboard having a choice of six different keys is ridiculous. That is if you're using a joystick as well, otherwise you can add another five to that list. Eleven keys to bother with, which is one of the reasons I am not totally addicted to and besotted by a game called Octagon, from the quaintly named Rino Marketing, available on cassette for the Spectrum family.

On the plus side, at least it is different. It would appear that you, the player, have been granted secret psychic powers derived from the Octagon symbol and must complete your quest. What is this strange and wonderful quest, one wonders? Well, when you wake up as an Octon you find you are trapped within the confines of a four level complex of 60 cells, it says on the cassette inlay card.

Your quest, should you choose to accept it, is to rebuild your octagon symbol from pieces which have been left carelessly at the core of the complex. Up to four people can play at the same time, which sounds vaguely ridiculous and was not an option I bothered with. You can save and later restore your progress to and from tape if you want to, and if you intend to have a serious stab at this game you will need to, never mind want to. Me, I preferred to record a Little Feat album, but then I'm an ageing hippy.

Graphically this is not particularly awe-inspiring, and some things are not very clear which is not good news for what is really an arcade adventure. Collecting keys as you go, you can move from one cell to another by entering a transporter, but only if you hold a key and you can also only use transporters of your own colour. Enemies abound, although you have got a gun to stun them with. Only to stun because you must never touch them, as this decreases your psychic powers, should you have any left after reading the instructions for playing the game.

Sorry chaps, but I was not impressed. It was much too complicated, though I suppose if you had plenty of time to spare you might eventually get the hang of things. You might also be able to design your own nuclear reactor, which might be slightly easier.