Producer: Domark
Retail Price: £14.95
Author: Oxford Digital Enterprises

If for some strange reason you didn't get a copy of the board game Trivial Pursuit last Christmas then fret no longer. DOMARK have just brought out Trivial Pursuit - The Computer Game! It's based very faithfully on the original board game with a few additions and adaptations for the computer.

Like the board game, the basic idea is for players to travel around the board answering questions and trying to collect six wedges, one for each subject. instead of throwing dice, when a player has a go the fire button must be pressed to release a dart which lands in a numbered section of the screen. The player can then move his or her counter to the highlighted space on the board. Once a player's token lands on a square a question is asked.

Well, the question isn't actually asked by the computer but instead by a very cute little character called TP. TP dons different caps depending on which subject you are attempting. Questions in each subject can be straightforward text, graphical or musical, and when your choice is made, the little master of ceremonies scampers across to the school room and fires the question at you. TP is an agreeable little chap and is full of congratulations if you answer correctly and full of commiserations if you don't. There's no typing into do - shout out the answer before the time limit expires and you are asked whether you got the correct answer or not. Keying Y for yes or N for no allows the game to progress.

An option menu heads up the game. The first thing to do is enter the names of the people playing, which governs the order of play. A game can be continued or restarted. To make things just that bit more competitive you can alter the amount of time available for answering a question. The real star of the show is TP, but he can be sent to bed if you want a bit of peace and quiet - after all his job is very tiring! You can also turn the sound down if you're planning on playing late into the night and don't want to keep the neighbours up.

Even though there are lots of questions in the basic game, eventually you will have attempted them all. When this happens, a new block of questions can be loaded from the second cassette in the package - and further cassettefuls of questions are promised.

The screen layout is very similar to actual board game. There are six sections, each representing the different question subjects which are Art and Literature, Science, Geography, History, Sport and Leisure and Entertainment. At the top of the screen in the right hand corner a chart shows how many wedges each player has won. When a set of six wedges has been collected the aim is to try to get to the centre of the board and complete the game by winning.

As in the board game, a player can only compete for a wedge when the counter has been landed on one of the subject headquarters. In the schoolroom TP asks you questions. A clock shows you how long you've been playing and a candle reveals how much time is left to answer the current question.

One feature on the computer game that isn't present in the tabletop version is the score board which keeps track of each player's performance and can be consulted at any stage to see how everything's going and who's currently in the lead.

Now, which sport was it in which there was an outcry when skirts were raised...?

COMMENTS

Control keys: redefinable: up, down, left, right, fire
Joystick: Kempston
Keyboard play: no problems
Use of colour: tidy
Graphics: clear - fine for a boardgame
Sound: basic, nothing superb
Skill levels: one - but additional question tapes will be available
Screens: main board screen plus menus and 'visual' questions

Surely there isn't anyone out there who hasn't played the board game? Everyone who has ought to get into the computer version pretty quickly - it's an excellent game. The most obvious problem of the questions occurring more than once in the same game seems to have been avoided quite well, and the option to load in more questions from cassette is there if you feel the need. Graphics are quite good, and though the board game of course has no sound. I think that the Spectrum version would have been better off without any, as some of the tunes are nigh impossible to recognise. Despite this, Trivial Pursuits is an excellent game, and everyone with a combination of brain and Spectrum ought to get a copy of this.

Trivial Pursuits seems to be the kind of game that will keep hundreds of families attached to their computers. I'm sure that it will have quite a cult following, but I feel that Trivial Pursuits is the kind of game that you either love or hate! The computer game is an excellent translation of the board version and keeps all the player participation that is so crucial in games of this ilk. The game features lots of useful options like the sound on/off and TP in action or not, and of course the option to load new questions which I felt was necessary if you were going to play the game more than once. TP is a very cute little character, and the way that he changes his hat for different subjects is a nice touch. As board games go, this is the best on the Spectrum, but you'll have to be a dedicated player to enjoy it, as games can go on for hours if you're not too clever.

Sadly Trivial Pursuits is one game that I have never played as it always seemed to be a bit of a waste of time. If the computer version is anything to go by, the original must be a scream. Graphics and sound are not usually hot points in games of this nature but they have really been made into a large part of this game. I think the success of playing this game largely depends on the people you play with, so if you don't think you'll be able to play in a large group you shouldn't really cough up the fifteen quid that DOMARK are asking for it.

The best part of a year has passed since we first saw a copy of Trivial Pursuit on the Spectrum. I can imagine that in this length of time many copies have been shelved because the amount of questions were limited, with repetition setting in as more games were played.

Surprisingly, DOMARK have waited until now to release another adult question set, and have followed the makers of the board games quite closely by bringing out a Baby Boomer edition.

The Baby Boomer edition is based on 'one of the most exciting periods of our time', well that's what the inlay says, and to be fair it does offer a lot more enjoyment than the high-brow Genus edition. The questions are concerned with three decades; the fifties, sixties and seventies, and their entertainment and events. Aimed generally at the 'baby boomers' (children born during the post-war baby boom) this question pack covers such topics as the Silver Screen, Broadcasting, Publishing, News for olds even). The life and times of... and R.P.M which is the music heading.

Although a little too Yuppie for my liking, I strongly recommend it as a replacement for any worn out Genius I question tapes... just who was that last man on the moon again?

The Young Player edition has been around since just before Christmas and is basically a simplified Genus edition, great for the seven to eleven year olds, but not much fun for anyone else. The different headings are: Games/Hobbies, People/Places, Good Times, Nature, Science/Technology and (rather surprisingly) Art and Culture. There's a great deal of variation in difficulty between the questions, which might put some of the younger players off. Here are two typical posers as an example: 'How many years are there in a decade?' and 'In which film did a nine year old Tatum O'Neal receive and Oscar for playing a tom-boy?'. This is not as bad as it might have been, as harder problems are more often than not accompanied by a set of multiple choice answers.

Both 'uniload' packs cost £7.95 and consist of about 3,000 questions. The new question sets can only be used in conjunction with the original game, or alternatively an whole new pack can be obtained for £14.95.

So whether you're a baby boomer or a baby boomer's baby, or whether you drive a pram or an XR3i, DOMARK have something to keep you guessing.

Domark
£14.95

"'Ere," said Ed, "We all know your favourite pursuit's Rachael, and you won't get more trivial than that, so cop a load of this!"

Actually, I have a soft spot for this particular game, even if it is the numero uno yuppie pastime. There's something so satisfying about knowing the names of the 1922 Accrington Stanley Soccer Squad, when all around you are struggling to remember who knocked England out of the '86 World Cup, with his hand (some of us will never forget... nor forgive!).

But back to the review. Quizzes have a fairly consistent history on the Spectrum, ranging all the way from the bad to the mediocre and back again. One of their worst failings is that they become mere tests of your key tapping ability. All that typing and you lose your points, just because you hit the wrong letter.

Domark has found a way round this. The computer displays the question, then the answer, and asks you if you were right. Providing you're not schizophrenic enough to cheat yourself, it's a neat solution to the problem. Of course it does make Trivial Pursuit ideal for group play but near useless for individual outings, despite the suggestion that you should play yourself against the clock. So gather family, friends and the rent collector round the TV set and prepare yourself to meet TP!

TP, who he? Surely not Troubleshootin' Pete? No, this TP is a thousand times worse. He's an animated wotsit with a selection of hats, who walks on and asks questions. TP, we soon decided, stood for Total Pain, so we switched him off. He's just the sort of addition that the game doesn't need. Luckily the program caters for a wide variety of personal preferences. You can set a time limit for answering questions, from five seconds to nine minutes. You can have sound effects. You can kick players out of the game or pause while one of them slopes off to make a cuppa. And, of course, you can load new sets of questions, though there didn't seem to be too much repetition with the default set. All these choices are made through a simple-to-operate menu system.

At heart, Trivial Pursuit, the computer game, is still a chase round a wheel-shaped board, picking up wedges at the intersections before racing back to the centre. Answering a question correctly, the category decided by the colour of the square you're on, gets you another go. One thing that the computer can do that a bit of cardboard can't, is set visual and musical questions. These add something to the game, though I'm not really convinced that identifying a tune played backwards is quite true to the trivial facts philosophy.

As to the board, it's some-thing of a psychedelic nightmare. Obviously, so many colours in such a small space wasn't going to be easy on the Spectrum, but I can't believe that this craziest of crazy-paving is the best Domark could do. It almost gave me a migraine looking for my playing token! Only one token appears at a time, which helps a little, but also takes away some of the feeling of the chase. In fact, I always think that board games lose out when there are no nice pieces of card and bits of plastic to push around.

Perhaps I'm just nit-picking, because Trivial Pursuit is still fun in this incarnation, and compared with the real thing it's cheap. But I'm not sure that the addition of sound and visuals are enough to persuade me to leave the battered box with its dog-eared question cards in the cupboard.

REPLAY

D'you know what I got for Christmas? Nothing. But you don't care, you're only interested in Replay.

Hit Squad
£3.99
061 832 6633
Reviewer: Linda Barker

I love Trivial Pursuit, the boardgame, with a passion that is hard to describe. Y'see, it's kind of like the game that I grew up with. I remember having Triv parties in the sixth form which involved loads of Twiglets and Martini, and then I played it at university and then my landlord threw it away. I was ever so upset, and I haven't got round to buying a new one yet, so I was dead chuffed when this gamette popped Through the Shed letterbox. "I wanna do that one!" I shouted as Jonathan stacked it neatly on his shelf. "You're welcome," he grinned. "No, honest, I really want to play that. It's good is it?" "No, it's crap." he replied.

Cast your minds back a couple of months to Pictionary. Done that? Right, you'll remember then that Pictionary was the computer version of the popular boardgame in which you had to guess the phrase, or word, from a picture. The computer told you the phrase or word and then asked you if you'd got it right or not. So, of course, everybody said yes - even if they were way off course. Trivial Pursuit is the same - you get asked a question, given the answer and then asked if you got it right. In a way though, I still found it quite entertaining cos I like answering triv questions, but that's just one of my own personal little foibles and I wouldn't dream of assuming that you lot feel the same. With more than one player, Trivial Pursuit is tonnes more fun cos you can't cheat quite so easily. As a one-player game this is worthless, as a multi-player game it's fun. But you cant beat the original.

HISTORY

Q - What is Trivial Pursuit?
A - It's a very expensive board game for the upwardly mobile and one of the hottest licencing deals ever. Domark has the deal and has produced the computer version of the game.

Q - Ordinarily would this auger well for the product?
A - Possibly not. Domark has produced more than its fair share of dodos. Absolute dodos, in fact.

Q - What might one have expected?
A - Silly bleeps, poor visual representations of the counters and the board, things changing colour due to attribute problems, limited choice of questions, little imagination.

Q - But?
A - Domark has done an absolutely wonderful job. This conversion is superb.

When board games get converted to the computer the odds of the end result being something worth playing are pretty small. Off-hand only Scrabble has really stood out by managing to exceed or at least show different aspects of the original.

Trivial Pursuit the computer game always sounded like a real loser. The essence of the game seemed too fragile to be recreated on a computer. Part of the fun is arguing about whether or not an answer is correct, letting people off and giving (or refusing to give) hints. How do you code that?

The answer is you don't try.

Domark decided not to make the computer in any way check your answer, it just asks the question, you fight about the answer and then press Enter.

The computer then tells you the right answer and you press Yes or No depending on whether you were right or not.

It means you can have all the shouting matches you want...

GEOGRAPHY

Q - What's where?
A - First of all there are the main menu screens which you can revert to at any time. Then there is the main screen of the board which alternates with the drawing room 'question asking'scene whilst you are actually playing.

The actual board takes up about two-thirds of the screen and has been changed from the original so that it is now a rectangular shape. To the right are wedge information details. Below is list of the subject titles which you can move around with a joystick, highlighting those which represent possible squares for you to land on.

On the Question Screen the bottom two-thirds display the drawing room in which TP asks the questions. The upper half is where the actual question is printed. When a question features a visual display the projection screen hangs down from the top of the drawing-room screen.

If you choose the analysis option then a series of simple bar graphs appear indicating who is getting most questions right and on what subjects.

ART AND LITERATURE

Q - Has Domark retained the original questions?
A - Some of them. Ardent Trivial Pursuit (board game) players will recognise a few but, to Domark's credit, many new questions have been developed.

Q - Such as?
A - Questions that can use the sound and graphics of the machine. For example, questions on geography use visual ideas like recognising a country from an abstract geometrical representation of it.

Q - Other examples?
A - Music questions where tunes are played using the Beep.

The graphics are not bad at all. I particularly like the way a projection screen comes down in the usual drawing room and the graphic shape is superimposed on that. Again it reflects effort and attention to detail. There are all sorts of little things you notice after playing the game a while. Question time is measured by a candle in the drawing room gradually burning down, the hands move on the grandfather clock showing how long the game has lasted so far. If you have a music question little lights wink on the hi-fi.

The board is a reasonable representation of the real thing and after your dice throw all the squares you could move are shown by flashing squares on the board. Confusing at first but you do get used to it.

Other displays show what wedges you have and how close to completion other players are.

SCIENCE AND NATURE

Q - How is Trivial Pursuit presented?
A - The box contains two cassettes, the game as such including a few hundred questions and an extra cassette containing 3,000 more questions.

Q - What is remarkable about the question tape?
A - it uses some new system called Uniload which means the one data cassette tape is good for several computers. Other data tapes are promised, too.

Q - What input system has been used when playing the game?
A - Lots of menus where options are highlighted using joystick commands, although you may use the keyboard if you wish. Very neat.

In the opening menu you enter the names of the players and select other basic options like sound-on and whether there will be a time limit on answers (a digital clock clicks the seconds away). Here too you may load up new question files (although you may be instructed to do this automatically by the game should a category of questions become depleted). A last option - Analysis - provides a detailed analysis of who is getting most questions right and on what subject. This can be invaluable when it comes to finding a player's weak spot on the final question...

More evidence that Domark has really tried with this one is a character called TP who acts as quiz master and dart thrower. Let me explain ...

Having selected your subject option, the board screen disappears to reveal an elegant drawing room. In strides TP, a large nosed, er thing, that wears a variety of different hats depending on what category of question is being asked. It bleeps and there are clip clop sound effects for footsteps. If you take too long to answer TP strides up and down and taps his foot.

SPORT

Q - How many people can play Trivial Pursuit?
A - Up to six.

Q - Can one person play alone?
A - Yes, provided you are honest about whether you are cheating or not.

Q - Do you play against the computer?
A - No, it just keeps track of how many you get right and times you.

Q - Can new players join in once the game has started?
A - Yes, there is a special facility to enable this. You can also change the names of players at any time if someone 'takes over' someone else's hand.

Trivial Pursuit, the computer game, is about as sporting as the original. The questions are set at about the same level of difficulty as the original.

As ever there are sometimes clues in the question and much of the time an intelligent guess may be enough to win the point. Remembering old television programs and the top twenty from 1964 will help too.

Domark promises future specialised versions of the game, ie new add-on data tapes. Baby Boomer and so on, just like the board game. These are planned for the new year.

ENTERTAINMENT

Q - Is Trivial Pursuit (the computer game) entertaining?
A - Yes, incredibly so. It'll be the perfect Christmas present for aunts and uncles not sure exactly what sort of software to buy and it may even get the whole family sitting around the Yuletide monitor screen.

Q - Is it a Classic?
A - It certainly is.

Q - Is this a turn up for the books?
A - You're telling me.

Label: Hit Squad
Memory: 48K/128K
Price: £3.99 Tape
Reviewer: Philip Lindey

All those family gatherings can get a bit trying. 'No you can't watch the telly, grandad is telling us about the Napoleonic wars', 'No you can't have third helpings, this has to last for sandwiches tomorrow you know!' Tsh! What you need is some mental stimulation.

Trivial Pursuit is, unsurprisingly enough, based on the best selling board game of the same name. You answer questions on one of six categories, or more frequently, fall to answer these questions because you haven't got a flippin' clue what the answer is.

The categories are Sport and Leisure. Science, History, Geography, Entertainment and Art and Literature. The idea is to move around the hexagonal board collecting slices of pie for correctly answering questions on each corner, which serve as the headquarters for each of the topics. Once you've won six slices, you must reach the centre of the board and answer one final question to win. Up to six people can play or more if you form teams.

This game is excellent, its only disadvantages compared with the original is that as a board game it was very social. Everyone sat around a table opposite each other having lots of fun. Now, on TV or monitor everyone must sit on top of each other, and concentrate on the screen rather than the other players. I also feel that unscrupulous people could cheat or argue more in this version. Steve Keen take note.

ALAN:
If you're into quizzes then this is definitely the king. It's already riding high in the charts and was bound to be a Christmas success. If you haven't already got a copy get one, and get some pals into play it with you sad person.

MACHINE: Spectrum/C64/Amstrad/BBC
SUPPLIER: Domark
PRICE: £14.95

They said it couldn't be done. But Domark has done it! Turned the world's best board game into an entertaining computer challenge. If you've been hiding your head under a stone for the last few years you won't know that Trivial Pursuit has sold almost 70 million copies in board game form worldwide and entertained at least twice that number of people who enjoy answering totally trivial questions.

Domark's version, programmed by the Oxford based ODE team, follows closely the spirit of the original. But it uses the capabilities of the machine to present more titillating trivial questions in a way the inventors of the board game never dreamt of. There are pictures using computer graphics - and sound questions, too.

The game has a host. A little chap called TP. And the game takes place in the study of his luxurious Oxford home.

Everything he needs to test your knowledge is there - a screen to project graphic questions, a hi-fi to play the tunes and all the best reference books. He also gets to wear a different hat for each different question category - a crown for history, a beret for art and a mortar board for science.

The game begins with the set up screen which allows you to enter the names of the players - up to six - load new questions, turn the sound effects on/off, set a time limit for answers - and even turn old TP on and off if he irritates you!

Then it's on to the board screen where TP throws a dart in place of the dice to get you moving. If you turn him off, the numbers on the board flash rapidly acting like a dice until you hit the fire button.

Once you've thrown, you can select which of the six categories you want to answer a question from. Once you've done that, TP wanders off to his study where he ask you the question. The timer is represented by a candle on a shelf. If you've got the timer on it burns down. TP also walks around impatiently tapping his foot...

You have to say your answer out loud for everyone to hear before pressing the fire button. TP then gives you the correct answer and you have to tell the computer if you were right or wrong. No cheating please! Then it's back to the board screen for another go.

The computer keeps track of how many questions you have answered, how many you've got right, and in which category. This is another thing the board game can't do for you. Give an indication of what areas you're really smart at!

Your ratings appear in bar graph form and you can call them up at the beginning or end of any turn from the baord screen.

All the question you've come to expect from Trivial Pursuit are included. They also include a number of computer game questions. Like what do the initials J.S.W. stand for. Betcha can't guess that one!

The sound questions are a bit tricky on the Spectrum version - you have to strain your ears to hear - but they are fun. Especially when the tune is played backwards!

The best thing about the game is that you can play with a whole bunch of people. No longer do computer games have to be solitary pastimes. And it means the game really captures the TP spirit.

Another good feature is that you can enter a new player who comes along after you've started a game. Simply go back to the main menu screen and enter his or her name and you're away.

ODE have developed an amazing new multi-load system which means one tape can be used to load question modules into any computer. This means that they can be continually updated.

Domark will be issuing a Young Players Edition, and a Baby Boomer Edition. But the system means that the game could go on forever adding new modules.

Trivial Pursuit on computer is as much fun to play as the original - and the graphics and sound add a whole new dimension. TP will make a far from trivial addition to your games collection.

Various
Domark
Quiz
£14.95

The reputation of Domark for producing high-quality games is not particularly enviable. Releases such as Friday the Thirteenth have done little to endear it to the buying public. Contrary to popular opinion, however, Domark has never been short of good ideas; unfortunately it may have been short of good programmers.

With Trivial Pursuits, its latest release, it has managed to change that. Not only has it acquired an extremely-sought-after licence but it has had it programmed by an excellent group of programmers, Oxford Digital Enterprises.

Packaged in the familiar colour of the original Genus version, it remains faithful to the principle of the game, while adding extras only a computer game can provide. To answer the critics who doubted the ability of any computer game to ask questions, Domark has managed to produce a data-tape which increases the total questions to around 3,000, with 500 being stored in the computer at any time.

By adding a character, Tee Pee, who acts as a random number generator, and a question master, Domark has made sure that the game will appeal to quiz fanatics of all ages. In play, the game is divided into two sections, the board area and the question area.

The board is identical to the original, as are the categories, but when you have chosen, you are asked the question in a separate room. In an attempt to make the game more social, you are required to be honest with the game, telling the computer whether or not you answered correctly. Although that is satisfactory for group play, it leads to massive cheating when you play alone.

One very attractive feature of the computer game is the visual and musical questions, which vary from the "Who composed this overture?" to "Which game uses this pitch?"

At £14.95. Trivial Pursuits, the computer game, cannot be called inexpensive but it is head and shoulders above any other quiz game available. In one fell swoop, Domark has reestablished itself as one of the top software houses and if it keeps its promise and produces more data tapes, this game will become an all-time classic.

Domark
£14.95

The only potential problem with converting a phenomenally successful board game like Trivial Pursuit to the home micro would seem to be tampering with a winning formula.

Few would have thought that the flaunting of irrelevant knowledge would exert such a hold over people but as trivial pursuit addicts know when the cheeses are down knowing whether frozen peas float or not assumes huge importance.

The Trivial Pursuit craze shows no signs of abating and Domark have produced a package faithful to the original but with several useful additions that add to the fun.

There are 3,000 questions, loaded in blocks ready to tax your memory for facts you would rather have forgotten before Trivial Pursuit came along. It's a two cassette pack. One being the game itself and the first batch of questions, the second an additional "Uni-load" question pack which can be loaded into a Spectrum, Commodore or Amstrad.

One enhancement on the original is the inclusion of musical and graphics questions, so that for instance you can be confronted by the map of a country and asked to identify it.

Another inclusion is an animated question master called TP who bounds around the question screen in a number of guises. He's destined to become a "love him or hate him" figure. Some may feel he's a cute bonus while the purists will argue the original game got along just fine without him. Wisely Domark have added a cut off switch so you're not stuck with him.

You can fix a time limit for answering questions - anything from five seconds to nine minutes. A very useful feature for strategists is the inclusion of a score chart which keeps an up to the minute record of all the players performances. The breakdown is for each category of questions so when a player is going for the final winning question you can knobble him by confidently choosing his weakest subject.

Graphically the game is pleasing to the eye and the board layout is very clear. Most importantly perhaps it's very easy to play and you can find your way around the game and all you can do in next to no time.

Trivial Pursuit is bound to sell well on the strength of the board game and if you enjoyed that you won't be disappointed with its computer game counterpart.