Producer: Beyond
Memory Required: 48K
Retail Price: £7.95
Language: Machine code
Author: Tayo Olowu, Paul Voysey

After a less than auspicious start with Space Station Zebra (reviewed last month) Beyond Software (part of the EMAP group who also own Computer & Video Games magazine) have really launched themselves with this colossal arcade strategy game. 'A program which makes other programmers gasp,' it says on the excellent packaging - and perhaps it will.

Psytron comes in a large box containing the cassette, a competition entry form (more later) and a very detailed 20-page booklet explaining how the game is played, and what Psytron is. It looks rather daunting but is essential reading. However it can be read in stages until all the six levels of the game have been absorbed. Psytron is not a game for a few moments play - it will take ages.

The action all takes place on a huge base on the planet of Betula 5. The planet's atmosphere is not compatible with humanity, so the base is sealed within its own life support system. The base has an inner ring from which radiate the various surface installations. These are the medical centre freezetime generator, oxygen unit, docking bay and teleport centre, recycling unit, pleasure dome, crew quarters, fuel dump, power plant, matter disruptor and the food store. The game provides 10 screens which are views of the base, seen from the centre and all the way round.

The Psytron is in sole charge of Betula 5, and as the Psytron, you will have to undertake everything to protect the base. Shooting aliens out of the skies and dealing with the remote droids they drop which run around the inner ring to blow up the vital airlocks make up the arcade component, but repairing facilities and deciding what installations to sacrifice at critical moments makes up the strategy element.

Psytron is a game of six levels of progressive difficulty which have been designed to take you into the game step by step, piling more and more responsibility on your shoulders. Each level must be mastered before the next is attempted. The computer looks at your last five scores and calculates an average - if it's over the passmark then you can move on to the next level. The computer keeps a service record of your achievement which may be saved and reloaded after game load. This is all important because the service record is used in compiling your overall score for the final level. Beyond are running a competition with a prize of a QL computer for the winner. If someone conquers the game completely, then they will win, but it is considered almost impossible to survive for an hour on level 6, which is really required to get the special code. The competition closes on November 30, and if not already won, the prize will go to the highest scorer at that time.

The screen display is split, with a little over half the top being the monitor views of the base (10 in all). These views are drawn in detailed black line and cross hatching with a yellow strip for the ground and a pale blue for the sky. It all looks like a comic drawing. Below is the white and black ringway with airlock access. In this ringway enemy droids are dropped and they can be seen running along to their randomly selected detonation points. Below is the screen report which details what section of the base you are seeing, and updates damage and status reports. Other info provided includes fuel levels, percentage of damage, crew status and time.

At the bottom right-hand corner is a 3D view of the ringway looking along it. This will show a droid on the run. Your pursuit droid also shows up on the ringway and may be guided to chase the enemy droid until it comes into view on the 3D panel. It must be destroyed by fire before it reaches its destination.

Meanwhile, overhead enemy saucers are constantly attacking the base from all directions, dropping bombs which explode colourfully. A gun sight is provided. The enemy saucers are animated in 3D as well.

Describing this game in a review would take pages, and there is a great deal more to playing it than we, have said here - after all, it takes 20 pages for the producers to describe it!

COMMENTS

Control keys: (droid) Q=forward, A=turn around, M to fire (Skywatch) Q/A up/down, O/P left/right, M to fire, N=fast scan, S=skywatch mode, D=droid mode
Joystick: Kempston
Keyboard play: very responsive
Use of colour: original and very well used
Graphics: excellent
Sound: well used
Skill levels: 6
Lives: 1
Screens: 10

Psytron is a fantastic arcade type strategy game. The graphics are very good, with alien ships in the sky above the excellent views of your base. Challenging, addictive and difficult are words which sum up this game. In fact, the word game is almost an insult to this Beyond scenario. As there are several tasks to be done in maintaining the base, learned at the various levels, Psytron has plenty of lasting appeal! Don't let the useful booklet put you off, you can load and play Psytron straight away although the advice it contains is more essential on the higher levels. Side B of the cassette has a glimpse of their next big game, the adventure Lord of Midnight.

The rapid access to any of the 10 screens, combined with the natural change of views if your gunsight leaves the screen, makes for a very exciting background against which to play this furious and tiring game. The graphics are superb, oddly not very colourful, but the way they have been done is very convincing. At this stage of reviewing the game it is impossible to say what the higher levels are like - it will be some time before I ever get up there! But if the three I have so far seen are anything to go by, it's a great game all the way and very addictive as well.

This game builds up your skill qualities until you are ready for the grand finale - a very good idea. The graphics move about realistically and in full perspective, the 10 segments of the space station are all very well drawn. The upward scrolling information on the Screen Report is great, as you can see what damage is occurring while you're fighting off the alien saucers. Colour and sound have been used well, although there isn't a great deal of colour in the game itself. Your last five scores are taken and averaged for promotion, which is a marvellous idea, although it can be disheartening if one of them happens to be very high. Psytron is fantastic fun to play and the difficulty of each level and the fact that there are six levels means that it is going to take a long time to master, making it dangerously addictive. Definitely a thousand percent better than Space Station Zebra, and overall breathtaking and overwhelming.

The player eventually becomes the Psytron - something less than human and more than a computer - and is put in charge of the Betula 5 installation. Your job is to cope with the defensive demands when the attack comes. The overall aim is to process the information (and highly detailed it is) supplied in the 20-page booklet accompanying the program.

Ian: The graphics are excellent, with instant access to the ten views around your base, all of which detail the surrounding buildings and landscapes. And a near perfect use of colour goes even further towards making the overall display startlingly clear. Each year a program comes along that sets the standard by which the others must be judged. Psytron is 1984's yardstick.

Frank: The idea is simply splendid, and there's so much going on it's impossible to get bored. With its well-defined, clear and colourful graphics, and a manageable but challenging speed, the game is addictive from the very start, and gets more so as the player progresses.

Phil: There are six levels to the game, but it'll take a great deal of practice to get there - especially as the speed is very fast. However, there's not a lot of sound used, but this goes unnoticed alongside the superb graphics. Overall, it's one of the most interesting games to come on to the market.

Use of Computer: 85%
Graphics: 93%
Playability: 88%
Getting Started: 98%
Addictive Qualities: 91%
Value for Money: 88%
Overall: 91%

Psytron was Beyond's first hit for the Spectrum, after a less than auspicious start with Space Station Zebra (reviewed issue 4). It was hailed by Beyond as 'A program which makes other programmers gasp' this may have not been so (ask Simon Brattel from Design Design) but all who laid eyes upon it thought it was great. Except maybe a couple of conned reviewers who have been dying to get their own back.

As a result of reading the CRASH review (which I had no part in writing) I promptly went out and bought the damned thing. As soon as I opened the huge box I wished I hadn't, a twenty page booklet lay there waiting to be read and understood. On playing Psytron for the first time I found it slow and a bit monotonous. 8 months later my view of the game hasn't really changed. More a case of nice graphics shame about the game.
BS

I remember buying this game and thinking it looked terrific, but on loading the game and playing it for a few goes I found it totally and utterly boring. True the graphics were brill, but graphics maketh not a game. Sound was used well and the speed with which the 10 panoramic views appeared was marvellous but I couldn't help feeling that there was something missing, maybe it was the fact that the game started off pretty boring and it took quite a while to work up to the more exciting levels. Overall I thought Psytron was pretty looking but there wasn't enough action going on straight away.
RC

(Ben) I wouldn't change the 'Use of computer' rating or the 'Graphics' rating. But as for 'Playability' I would knock that down to about 75-ish as it got very monotonous after level 2. 'Getting started' would be altered to about 70 because the booklet takes some getting into and you have to play each level 5 times before you can progress to the next. 'Addictive qualities' wouldn't really be altered much only about 3 to 4 per cent knocked off and the 'Value for money' rating would be somewhere around the 75 mark.

(Rob) Most of the ratings still stand but I would certainly alter the 'Playability' to about 68 and the 'Addictive qualities' right down to about 57 otherwise the rest are okay.

BEYOND PRAISE

Memory: 48K
Price: £7.95
Joystick: Kempston

Arcade games involving alien spaceships and destructive droids have taken another step forward with the release of Psytron by Beyond. The scenario is not startling - you have to defend a space colony against alien attack. The aliens try to bomb various installations and drop saboteur droids into the tunnels below which self-destruct when they reach their target.

What sets Psytron apart from the herd is its staggering complexity and extremely high-quality graphics. The game is played across 10 screens representing different areas of the colony and each picture can be called-up instantaneously. Beneath the view are status reports, including a continuous scrolling report simulating the kind of screen window associated with far more sophisticated machines than the Spectrum.

The first level may seem tedious. All you have to do is hunt the saboteur droids through the tunnels; when you have achieved a 50 percent score five times in a row the game allows you to continue to the next level, where you shoot at spaceships. More and more elements are included, until the final level arrives.

At that advanced stage not only do you have to keep zapping the aliens but you must also manage your crew numbers, deciding your defensive priorities to ensure the survival of the colony's buildings and the population. If the medical unit is destroyed your wounded will die; if the docking bay is damaged vital supplies may be lost.

Beyond is offering a Sinclair QL to anyone who can survive for an hour at the highest level. If anyone can, they might be better employed running the NATO central defence systems, or imprisoned forcibly as a potential danger to the public.

MACHINE: Spectrum
SUPPLIER: Digital Integration
PRICE: £7.95

Strategy games seem to be catching on at the moment. Stonkers has been selling well and now Beyond Software hopes to emulate Imagine's success with their latest, Pystron. Although this is another arcade/strategy game, it's nothing like Stonkers - thankfully.

Psytron itself is the defence system of the Betula 5 installation. The Psytron scans for oncoming intruders, tracks down potential saboteurs and generally makes the world a safer place in which to live.

During the game, you take on the role of the Psytron and your objective is to survive the oncoming attacks. A lot of strategic planning is involved and a game can take quite a long time to play.

It's not words-only, it's graphics based, and very impressive they are too. The installation can be viewed from 10 different viewpoints and the graphic representation on each is superb. Only two colours are used, but this is the only possible a round th Spectrum's limit on colour resolution.

There are six levels to the game and the idea is to survive for a certain amount of time at each level while also achieving a sufficiently high score. You can't progress to a level until you have succeeded at the one before it. Because of this, and to save experienced players having to complete the early levels each time they play the game, you can save scores to tape and continue with the same game another day. In fact, you can save the five highest scores so far, so you can select your best efforts.

Level one is fairly straightforward. As controller of the Pursuit Droid on a mission from the Psytron, you must seek and destroy the alien saboteurs which are being beamed down into the installation's service tunnels in the airlocks. You can see the three-legged aliens crawling through the tunnels on the main screen and you're also given a close-up view of the area in a small window in a corner. By level four, you will have to send in repair crews to patch up the damage caused.

Level two has you patrolling the skies above. The game still takes place on the same set of graphics screens, but uses a different area. Your ultimate objective again is accurate firing and surviving for a certain fixed time limit.

Level six, the final conflict, asks you to survive for an hour. Achieving this goal has two advantages. First, you can tell your friends that you've just finished level six of Psytron. Second, if they're not suitably impressed, then tell them that you now qualify to win a QL, if you're the first to have finished the game. This really will make them green.

If you're a fan of this type of game. then you'll love Psytron. It's certainly complicated and you'll have to come back to it quite often if you've any chance of winning the QL. (let's just hope that Clive can actually deliver the goods before someone wins it.)

All the normal features are here - sound effects and joystick options. The 20-page manual tells you almost everything you need to know, but is let down by some awful grammar and spelling. The important facts are correct, though.

It's well worth the £9.95! asking price, but - be warned - it's not a game which you can conquer in a single sitting.

YES, IT'S A STP FORWARD

MAKER: Beyond
MACHINE: Spectrum 48
FORMAT: cassette
PRICE: £6.95

A slick, complex and damnably difficult turnaround in which you, dear hacker, become the computer. Become the mighty Psytron computer, that is, the system in sole charge of the vast and intricate Betula 5 installation. You remain ever vigilant for intruders, of which, needless to say, there are many. You pursue flying saucers across a panorama of ten screens, chase insect-like alien saboteurs along narrow tunnels, trying to hit them before they knock off an airlock or blow a hole in the pleasure dome or something. When they do cause damage, you have to assess it, allocate resources to effect repairs and generally juggle supplies to keep the whole place going.

As I said, damnably difficult. So difficult that if you manage to keep the place going for over an hour at the final level, you stand to win yourself a QL. To do that, you have to know the thing inside out, match the strategy of a military tactician with the coordination of a concert pianist and probably have a fair bit of luck as well. For myself, despite much beavering away into the night, I've only managed to master Level 1 (chasing the saboteurs). Popping off the saucers before they zap the power plant or knock out the fuel dump (Level 2) is, as yet, beyond me.

All of which, I suppose, augurs well. Psytron is certainly not the kind of game you master, exhaust and discard in a couple of afternoons. It's graphically superb, nicely-priced and does seem to match Beyond's claim to provide "challenging software". My only quibble is that the initial training levels could be a bit more encouraging. But then, I'm lazy.

MACHINE: Spectrum 48K
CONTROL: Keys, Kemp
FROM: Beyond, £9.95

The two engineers who programmed this game are said to have spent 7 months full-time work on it. It shows. Psytron is one of the most ambitious and intricate games yet seen on a micro.

The Psytron is a super-computer which you use to run an advanced space station. The first thing you'll like about the game is the way the colony is drawn, From your position in the centre of it, you can look out in ten different directions (just press a key 0-9). Each of these ten views is an imaginative, high-resolution drawing showing such things as fuel tanks, the medical unit, the pleasure dome, etc.

The colony of course is under attack, your job is to save it. But the eventual skills required are so complex that the program sensibly introduces their to you one element at a time, by taking you through five training levels before you can begin the real battle.

In level one you have to destroy alien saboteurs which are being dropped into the colony. This involves using a service droid to chase them through the main circular corridor. A small panel on the bottom right of the screen gives you a nice 3D view of the action.

Level two is a good deal more difficult. It's a 3D shoot-'em-up in which your aim is to destroy the spinning alien ships as they zoom in to drop bombs on your base. What makes it difficult is that you have to keep them at bay on all ten different screens at once. Your only hope of avoiding serious damage is to learn which of the attackers are most dangerous and concentrate on them. The programme documentation, which takes the form of a large, beautifully produced booklet, could have been more helpful on this point.

In level three you must both do the shooting and chase the saboteurs. In levels four and five the strategy element of the game is realized. You can halt the action by going into 'freeze-time' and begin allocating men to carry out repairs and ordering fresh supplies from your mothership.

To get from one level to the next, you must achieve a sequence of five separate scores which average higher than the prescribed pass mark. Once you've done this however, you can save your 'service record' on tape and hence continue from where you left off when you re-load the game. Nevertheless it's likely to take many hours of play before you can reach the real battle where your goal is simply to survive as long as possible.

Most games which try to combine arcade action with intricate strategy fail dismally. What makes Psytron special is the fact that its many elements are all linked to each other in a convincing way.

For example, damage to the supply port will hold up supplies, damaged airlocks will hold up the rate of repairs, a bombed freeze-time generator could prevent you entering freeze-time and a hit oxygen or fuel supply would jeopardize the entire colony. You must constantly decide priorities.

The effort needed to take on such a detailed simulation may not appeal to everyone. Players who like a game which gets straight down to furious mega-zapping are unlikely to have the patience for such a complex program. But for those who want a really meaty, long-term challenge, Psytron is out of this world.

An unusual combination of land management and arcade action coupled with superb graphics made Psytron one of the finest games of 1984.

You control an intelligent computer system defending a space colony from attack. Action takes place on ten screens simultaneously and at a number of levels. As you work your way through the game planning becomes necessary as you must conserve your crew numbers, and organise supplies to vital areas in between zapping the invaders. Psytron also features a window for scrolling status reports and some of the most breathtaking background pictures of any arcade or adventure game.

Position 10/50