Titus
£8.99

Yes, it's a whole new concept in computer gaming! Breakout, oops sorry no it's not that at all. Well perhaps just a tad then. The boring little bat at the bottom of the screen has been replaced with a square. There's eight-way scrolling and little icons that do various naughty things to the sqaure (sounds fun so far!).

Surprisingly, you have to knock a metal ball around the map and hope that it knocks away all the breakable blocks in the landscape. If it does you've completed that level. That may seem a bit easy, but the nasties come in on later levels.

Then are many nasty icons including teleporters which transport you from one side of the landscape to the other, contact blocks which build themselves into walls when you pass them and the nasty death icons which kill. The speed the ball rebounds around the play area gets quicker the longer it's allowed to bounce, till you turn into a mad person trying to catch it (doesn't take much for some people - Skip).

I wouldn't exactly say that this is an original concept. It's more like loads of other games piled into one. The graphics are not that impressive either and the colour schemes get very garish. There's some playability to be had here, though, and you can have fun trying to catch the ball as is goes spinning off in the opposite direction. If you're after a game that twists the breakout theme then Titan is for you.

NICK

Here's a novel twist on one of our dear old friends, and a playable one too! With heaps of colour splashed around on the large scrolling maps, and not a bit of clash in sight, it makes the whole - and occasionally tricky - game all that much more fun. A few reservations about the lastability: Titan's control method and gameplay cannot really be mastered, remaining heavily a hit-and-miss situation a lot of the time.
RICHARD

Titus
£8.99 cass
Reviewer: Matt Bielby

Hey, Jackie, what's this Titan thing remind you of? Hmm, thought so. David, Dunc, what do you two reckon? You think it's a bit of a Breakout clone too, eh? Hmm. Titan is reminiscent of the bat, ball and bricks classic alright, but it's more of a variation on the theme than a straight copy, and a very speedy, smooth and playable one at that!

So, how's it all work then? Well, erm, you do control a little square bat, and you do have to bounce a (rather large) ball around and, yes, you do have to knock out blocks until you've wiped the screen clean. Hmm. So far, so Breakoutish, I have to admit. So what's the difference? Well, for a start, the size of the screens, or to be more accurate, 'play areas'. They're big (big! big!), often about four screens big in fact, and in later levels up to about eight screens or more.

This doesn't create too many problems though, 'cos the game scrolls very quickly in all four directions as it follows your bat about. It doesn't follow the ball though, so this can bounce off into some far corner of the play area and have to be tracked down. This can be good (your ball may be taking out a few blocks as it bounces) or it may mean you suddenly find yourself dead for no apparent reason. Why? Well, to complicate things in the same way that those falling icons did in Arkanoid, Titus has introduced 'Death' characters to the game. These kill you whenever they're touched by either the bat or the ball. Often they are trapped behind groupings of bricks so, once you start to knock the wall out, it is very difficult to keep your free bouncing ball away from them. Another complication comes from the blocks that your ball can't harm and which need to be knocked out by the bat itself. It's also a big game for another reason. Did I tell you how many play areas there are? 80. 80!! Are you getting a fair amount of game for your money or what? (Clue - yes you are.)

But it's not all roses. For a start, though the game is one of the smoothest strollers I've seen, the graphics are more 'competent' than stunning. It's really ever so simple and blocky. For instance. none of the bricks are individually defined (unlike in Arkanoid, say) so you are knocking out chunks of a whole rather than individual tiles. The bat, while fast and smooth moving, is rather small and often moves in large jumps, steadfastly refusing to hit the ball at the correct angle to go in the direction you want.

You can imagine the thinking that went on behind Titan. Titus has taken a look at Arkanoid or whatever and thought "How can we make it a bit different? I know, why not do each level over a number of screens?" Well, fine, it is a bit different and at the same time retains a great deal of the immense playability of those other bat and ball games. I'm far happier to see this variation than another straight clone, for instance. But, and it's a fairly large 'but', the simple one screen design of Breakout is still superior. In this version it's simply frustrating having the game finish for whatever reason (your ball hits Death or something) and have the action take place totally off-screen. Not only that, but there are simply too many bricks to destroy on too many levels, and, without the laser add-ons that helped speed up Arkanoid, it takes an age to clear some of the screens, even with skill playing. Still, it's quite a neat little game and easy to recommend. In fact, so easy I think I'll recommend it. Simple to play but difficult to master, so why not go and buy it?

Label: Titus
Author: In-house
Price: £9.95
Memory: 48K/128K
Joystick: various
Reviewer: Tony Dillon

Titan is fast, colourful and destructive. It features mega-fast smooth scrolling, more colours than a Spectrum actually has and dozens of levels.

And now the bad points. It's boring, repetitive and far too easy. But before I really start to slag it off, I'd better tell you about it, otherwise I won't get paid.

You are a block. You, the block, are situated in a maze. The early mazes are simple, like a box, and the later mazes are more complex. Also dotted about the maze are other blocks. To complete a level you have to destroy all these other blocks. To destroy all these other blocks, we introduce the twist in the tail, a ball. So, the basic game idea is to bounce a ball off a block into some other blocks to destroy them. Sounds original enough.

But no, that's not the whole story. There's even more to it than that. The maze actually covers loads of screens, and you can scroll all over the place at really high speeds. Cor, sounds brilliant!

Pop! What was that? Oh, that was my little dream bubble bursting and me falling back to reality. Titan is dull, pure and simple. Graphics? It hasn't got any. All it uses are coloured blocks, character block scrolling and a garish selection of colours. Indeed, the speed of the scrolling coupled with the colours is remarkably headache inducing.

I mentioned earlier that it's really easy. Now, the thought of a ball ricocheting at high speed while you struggle to hit it with your bat might not seem too easy, but when you think that out of every five screens, there's normally only one you can die on, that changes the perspective of things. The only things that can kill you are blocks marked with a skull, and they are very few and far between, let me tell you.

I don't like Titan, as you might have guessed by now. It's very dull, very repetitive and very Titus. As usual, avoid it at all costs. In fact, don't even read this review. Quick, rip out the page and burn it. Now, come on hurry up! Aaaaargh!