Meep meep! The cartoon exploits of the Road Runner and his hapless tormentor, Wile E Coyote, are fast, hilarious and above all, violent. Mark Caswell orders a few ACME booby traps, straps on his rocket-powered roller skates and hits mach speeds in his pursuit of the feathered fiend...

Hi-Tec Software
£3.99 cassette

Don't you just love 'em? The supersonic bird and the coyote who never gives up. There are plenty of thrills 'n'spills, and who can forget the classic scene where Wile E falls several hundred feet and kicks up a small cloud of dust as he hits the ground? Fans of the cartoon will be pleased that Hi-Tec have pixilated the Looney Tunes (th-th-that's all folks!) duo.

You play Road Runner, who's chased over eight levels by one of the most accident prone characters in cartoondom (I reckon the holder of this dubious honour is Tom the cat, Jerry's counterpart). The first sees RR picking up as much bird seed as his greedy tum will hold (bird seed equals energy). But out for your blood is THAT coyote, in a range of death-dealing machines.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT

Along with Wile E's kamikaze attacks, a range of unfriendly creatures try to send you to birdie heaven. In the status panel there's an energy bar which depletes on contact with the creatures or nasty objects Mr Coyote lobe, so a lot of ducking and diving is needed. This part of the game is timed; if you pack in enough carbohydrates, you move onto the second part.

Here RR's allowed to show his paces as he zooms along a deserted and dusty road. Deserted, that is, except for fur-face and the very nippy contraptions he uses to catch you. The more energy you enter this part with, the better your chances of escaping.

Set in the road are a variety of obstacles that slow you down if you're not careful, and Wile E soon appears on a rocket. Basically it's a question of pumping up your energy to survive, or alternatively having enough patience. Personally I found little to keep me playing for long.

COYOTE CHAOS

The first section's a simple case of 'dodge and peck'. This is easy at first, but later it becomes @$!'#cx impossible. The second part offers very little challenge if you peck enough seed and avoid the obstacles.

Both the bird and the coyote are instantly recognisable, but I'm afraid I must have a moan: the backdrops are colourful but they often hide the monochrome characters. Many's the time I lost sight of the Road Runner - and it wasn't because of the speed he was moving! Much like the cartoons, my favourite part's at the end of the second section, where the coyote plummets off a cliff to his doom, but that's not reason enough for me to recommend this licence.

MARK [59%]

Yeah - one of my favourite cartoon duos in their own game! This is the first game in the new Hi-Tec Loony Tunes range but not the first Road Runner game. The Hi-Tec version looks very 'budget '. A good budget game should look like it could be sold at full price - Road Runner couldn't. There are two main stages which once completed repeat with different backgrounds and a slightly harder difficulty level. The scrolling sections are quite fun but when things repeat you soon get fed up. Graphically the game's great: the animation of the characters and the sequences where Wile E falls from a great height couldn't be better. Call me old fashioned but I want a bit more variety in a game.
NICK [68%]

Hi-Tec
£3.99 cassette
Reviewer: Linda Barker

Rolf Harris' Cartoon Time was one of the best shows ever to grace the nations television sets. Instead of just watching cartoons run into one another, there was the added attraction of our Rolf warbling and drawing the acest doodles ever. In just three seconds he could get the very essence of Bugs Bunnyness onto paper.

Wile E Coyote and Road Runner were Rolf Harris staples and, as with most cartoons, we loved it 'cos it was violent. Wile E Coyote spends his entire life trying to catch Road Runner who, in turn, spends his time eluding the nasty canine and making him run into walls and fall off of cliffs. It obviously didn't hurt him, 'cos after a few seconds of star-gazing our Wile was up and running. In fact Wile was, like all those cartoon nasties, completely indestructible. No matter how many times Tom got knocked senseless by dustbin lids and broom-wielding maids, no mailer how often Sylvester swings for Tweety-pie and slams into the window you know that they're going to live to face another day

HAPPY BIRD-DAY

Unfortunately Hi Tec's Road Runner And Wile E Coyote hasn't got half the thrills of the original cartoon. You can't really do much to Wile E, except make him fall off of a cliff. This is definitely the best bit of the game. As you hop just out of Wile E's reach, he goes tumbling down a massive abyss. Whoo!

There are two levels, well there are eight actually but four of them are pretty much the same and the other four are, erm, very similar. The first of these levels has you pecking away at little piles of bird-seed, avoiding sandworms and bombs, collecting apples, banging into power-ups and, most importantly of all, avoiding Mr Coyote who whizzes about like a very whizzy thing indeed.

You're up against a clock, so all you've got to do is survive the level and peck up as much birdseed as you can. This comes in dead handy in the next level, so concentrate all your efforts on getting all the seed in, rather than going for the bonuses. My copy had a very strange bug on it which allowed old Road Runner to jump up to the top right-hand corner of the screen and sit pretty 'til the clock finished ticking away. As long as I didn't move, I was okay. As bugs go, it was pretty handy but none of the other copies around seem to be faulty. Ho hum, perhaps it was a special treat, just for little old me.

The second part of the game sees you running along with Wile E in hot pursuit. Basically, you just have to keep on running, jump up now and then to grab an apple or jump over the various unidentifiable obstacles that are strewn across the path. This is where all that birdseed comes in handy, you should have built up enough energy to outrun Wile E. If you haven't, well - you're dead meat. (Well, 'til the next game anyway.) The next six levels are basically the same again, except the graphics change ever so slightly and it gets harder.

WILE WE'RE AT IT...

The colour is pretty crappy throughout 'cos the blues and yellows are so muted. What's worse are the appalling graphics. They just sink into the background and refuse to stand up and be counted. I was sitting inches from the screen and I still couldn't make out what was going on. I ended up pecking worms instead of birdseed and jumping over apples rather than bombs. It's also pretty difficult, pop your head up and Wile E will come zooming over. Pow!

There are only two moves to master in Road Runner And Wile E Coyote and thats along and up. Apart from the fact that I found it quite difficult to see anything, there isn't really a anything massively wrong with this game. Thing is, there isn't anything outstandingly good about it either. It's just a plain run along and collect-em-up.

I was disappointed. I expected a bit more from the Looney Tunes licence. I'm not asking for much, but I'd like to be able to tell the difference between a worm and a pile of birdseed. Cherryade and a pair of bison are much more fun. (Bear up, bison!)