Alternative Software
£2.99
Pom, pom, pom! Yes it's finally arrived - Postman Pat from Alternative. Well, to tell you the truth, the game's been out in the shops for ages (I've even printed tips on it), but we only received a review copy the other day. So was it worth the wait?
As you might expect the game is based around Pat's adventures through the day in Greendale. You start off at the Post Office where Mrs Goggins (who thought these names up?) will tell what to do first. Once you have your orders, off you go. Different tasks must be completed, ultra-exciting things like rounding up sheep for Peter Fogg to boring everyday chores of delivering letters. There are about five tasks in all, and after you've completed them they start repeating themselves. The game ends when the timer gets down to zero.
The game is set out in two different ways. First of all there's the overall map of Greendale and the surrounding countryside that you see from an aerial view. You control Pat's post van in this bit and have to drive around from place to place. Each of the houses, farms and fields are well drawn and coloured, with obstacles like oil and mad people on bikes to avoid. When you reach your destination the view switches to a cartoon scene just like on the telly (well almost)!
Postman Pat caters for all ages because Alternative have included an easy and a hard version. If you play the east version you don't have to worry about hitting the mad biker or oil slicks. A fun gave for a while, but once you've completed all the tasks the novelty soon wears off. What I want to know is where's Jess?
Overall | 62% |
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Coming, erm, now actually, to a cinema near you...
THE COMPLETE YS GUIDE TO FILM AND TELLY GAMES
Knowing full well what a square-eyed bunch you are, we thought it was about time you were given the facts on film and television licenced games. Once again, JONATHAN DAVIES was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
(Cough. Deep, manly voice.)
'In the beginning there were loads and loads of Speccy games. Loads of them. They sold all right, but not exactly in enormous numbers. The trouble was, you see, that none of them seemed particularly exciting. They had nothing that caught the public eye. They were just computer games. Had no 'cred'.
Then a small cog within a long-since-extinct software house had an idea.
"Why don't we give our next game the same name as an incredibly popular film? Then everyone would buy it just because they'd seen the film and they'd foolishly think the game would be just as good. How about i, eh?"
"Er, we could do, I suppose."
"Great."
"But what if the film company finds out? They might sue us or something."
"Oh yeah."
"Tcha."
"I know - we could ask them first."
"That's a point. Go on then."
"What? Me?"
"Yeah. Give them a ring and ask if they'd mind."
"Oo-er. Cripes. Okay then." (Dials very long trans-Atlantic phone number.)
"Hullo. We'd like to name our new game after your film and we were wondering if it was okay by you. Right... yes... oh, I see." (Cups hand over receiver.) "They want us to give them lots of money."
"Erm, well in that case we'd better." (Removes hand.) "Yes, that'll be fine. We'll send you some right away. Bye."
"Super."
"But. er..."
"What?"
"How are we going to come up with a game that's anything like the film?"
"I don't know really."
"How about if we have a bloke walking around shooting people?"
"That sounds fine. I'll program it right away."
And so the film and telly licence was born. It... cough. Choke.
Oops. There goes the deep, manly voice.
Anyway, film and telly games, eh? Everyone's doing them these days, as they're one of the few remaining ways of making serious money with computer games. Run a grubby finger down the charts and you'll find nearly all the top-sellers are film and telly licences. (Or arcade conversions, of course.)
But why do we keep buying them? After all, just because a game's named after a really brill film doesn't mean it's going to be any good, does it? Surely we aren't buying them simply because of the flashy name on the box?
Erm, well in the old days, software houses assumed this to be the case, and chucked out a stream of absolutely appalling games with 'big name' titles. Things like Miami Vice, The Dukes Of Hazard and Highlander were all pretty dreadful, but it was hoped that they'd sell on the strength of their names. But we weren't fooled. Oh no. The games didn't sell well, and the companies were forced to think again.
Eventually they came up with... the 'bloke walking around shooting things' idea. And they've used it more or less ever since. Lucky then that they tend to be jolly good all the same, and sometimes come up with the odd original idea to spice things up (like The Untouchables did, or perhaps Back To The Future Part II).
RATINGS
As always seems to be the case, the trusty YS ratings system doesn't really seem adequate when it comes to film and telly games. So here's what we've put together instead...
LIGHTS
What does it look like? Nice? Or not very nice at all? (You mean are the graphics any good? Ed) Er, yes. That's it in a nutshell. (Then why didn't you just say the first place? Ed) Erm...
CAMERA
How does the general atmosphere compare to the film or telly programme the game's meant to go with? Have programmers just taken a bog-standard game and stuck a flashy name on it? Or have they made an effort to incorporate a bit of the 'feel' of the original?
ACTION
Does the plot follow along the same sort of lines as the film or telly programme? Is there plenty action-packedness? And is the game the same all way through, or does it follow the original's twists and turns?
CUT
Um, how does the game compare to all the licences around at the moment? Is it better? Or worse? In other words, is it a 'cut' above the rest? (is that really the best you can manage? Ed)
LICENCES ON THE CHEAP
A fiver doesn't buy much these days, but it's generally the most the budget houses can afford when it comes to licence purchasing. Cheapie film and telly games, therefore, tend to be a bit, er, obscure.
POSTMAN PAT
Alternative
Postman Pat, as you probably know, is a lump of plastic that stars in one of television's more nauseating kiddies programs. He's irritatingly smug, overwhelmingly tacky and inexplicably popular. There's Postman Ruddy Pat merchandise everywhere you look, and the licence was bound to be snapped up by some eager cheapie software house.
This is the result, and it's a predictable walk-around-delivering-things game. Pat drives around in his van stopping at houses where's he's given errands to run. And that's about it really. All it excels at is being as boring as the telly program. Buy it for your kids? They'll never speak to you again.
Lights | 58% |
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Camera | 85% |
Action | 42% |
Cut | 40% |
Overall | 49% |
All information in this page is provided by ZXSR instead of ZXDB