Producer: Code Masters
Out of Pocket: £1.99 cass
Author: Paul J. Machacek, graphics by Bernie Drummond

After a seemingly endless list of simulator games, Code Masters now bring you the story of how the immortal gods spend a wet Sunday afternoon. Providing the actual programming are Bernie 'Head Over Heels' Drummond, Paul Machacek and Guy Stevens.

It can't be easy being a god, lording it over the mortals, sending the odd earthquake, tidal wave or Nick Roberts' Debbie Gibson record to keep them in their place. So to relax, the gods give each other complex puzzles to solve, and you have three guesses whose turn it is today (come off it, it was my turn last week). You take the part of an immortal superhero who is playing for the ultimate stakes, lose and you will be stripped of all your status, as well as your immortality.

But at least someone is on your side, Venus (we're only good friends, honest) has kindly hidden four items to aid you in your quest. Power boots enable you to jump obstacles, a warhammer arms you against the games less friendly inhabitants, a trans-dimensional bag enables you to carry any object, whatever its size, and a mystical helmet entitles you to be showered with gifts from your fellow immortals.

Once these items are found it's on with the show. You must find and defeat the five Guardians who wander the corridors of the complex. To do this you have to destroy their spirits, which are trapped in certain rooms. Once one is killed you enter the DeadZone and if the DeadZone is successfully navigated a bonus life is awarded (but I thought you were immortal? - Ed) (don't ask me why? that's just how it goes, I'm afraid - Mark). But life is not that easy, as many puzzles, pitfalls and nasty creatures stand in your way as you wander through the rooms and corridors.

Although the main character is unique, many of the puzzles and traps look as if they have been lifted straight from Mr Drummond's graphics for the CRASH Smashes Head Over Heels and Batman. The nicely detailed backdrops, by contrast, remind me vaguely of the Ultimate games Knight Lore and Gunfright. As in most cases the walls of the various rooms are not visible until you enter them, as well any nasty surprises lurking there.

To obtain surprise gifts from other gods - such as winged shoes, teleport keys and ESP activators - is essential. Gold is especially useful as you can buy the aforementioned goods from traders if the gods feel a bit stingy.

Super Hero, despite graphically resembling almost every other arcade strategy game in existence, is certainly playable. If you're not as tired of the genre as me, give it a try.

MARK [69%]

THE ESSENTIALS
Joysticks: Cursor, Kempston, Sinclair.
Sound: ear-wrenching at times.
Options: thankfully it can be switched off

Although the graphics do rather resemble the Head Over Heels style, that doesn't make them any less cute. I particularly like how the chubby super hero's hair is blown upwards as he jumps through the air. Sound is disappointing though, its only good point being that it can at least be turned off. Play some good heavy metal music in the background and you'll discover some fascinating, if unoriginal gameplay. As in most isometric arcade adventures, pushing blocks around the screen to access higher areas is the main constituent of play, but the addition of teleports and traders makes Super Hero more interesting than most in this ageing genre.
PHIL [68%]

BARGAIN BASEMENT

Cheaper than a speeding bullet. Leaps small molehills at a single bound! Is it a bird? Is it a Wankel rotary engine? No, it's 'budget king' Marcus Berkmann with the latest in budget software.

Code Masters
£1.99
Reviewer: Marcus Berkmann

Now if you do want to buy a rip-off of Knight Lore, you could try Super Hero. Actually the model here is just as much Batman as Knight Lore, what with graphics by Jon Ritman's old mucker Bemie Drummond, and gameplay modelled clearly on the first 3-D game they wrote together.

To get going you have to run around and collect various little goodies, one to help you jump, one to let you fire at things, one to let you carry things and so on. Then you have to collect the Spirits of five Guardians to finish the game, all to be found in a huge maze of rooms.

As it's a cheapie, the same care and attention that distinguished the Ritman games are not present, but it's quite playable all the same and for HOH fans, fairly easy. Now what we really need is a Ritman-type game for the really hefty computers, something to keep us occupied for months and months - the 3-D isometric game to beat the lot. Pleeez Jon, pleeeeeeeeez, pritty pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeez....

Label: Codemasters
Author: Paul Machacek & Bernie Drummond
Price: £1.99
Memory: 48K/128K
Joystick: various
Reviewer: Chris Jenkins

"SuperHero is the best 3-D game we've ever seen," says the blurb on the back of the pack. Bear in mind, though, that the quote is from Codemasters themselves. SuperHero isn't bad, but no way is it the best isometric 3-D effort ever; even Ultimate's Knightmare and Gunfright, on which it's most closely based, are better, and they've just appeared on a greatest hits compilation with several other excellent titles.

The trouble doesn't lie in the graphics, which are by the excellent Bernie Drummond (Head Over Heels), or in the game design, by David Darling and Mark Baldacheck. It's not even in the dreadful cover illustration, all wonky perspective and ill-proportioned limbs. It's actually in the screen handling, which is very slow and jerky, especially annoying when you're moving from one chamber to another and the game holds you up for a moment while it fills in the contents and background of the new scene.

The backgrounds, though, are excellent; weird and grotesque carvings, strangely futuristic machinery and a great selection of monsters. The plot's the usual thing; you play an immortal warrior, challenged by the gods to a series of puzzles. As you move from chamber to chamber you must first seek out a number of gifts which will help you to enter blocked-off chambers; a pair of flying shoes, a magic sack, a boomerang warhammer and a mystical helmet which entitles you to more free gifts (a bit like collecting petrol coupons).

To help you out further, you can also obtain objects from Traders - small scuttling creatures with floppy ears. Run into one, and a trading menu comes up, allowing you to buy extra lives, paralysers, Mercury's shoes (a short-lived speed-up), keys to teleport devices and clues to where to find further objects. You can also gamble with Traders.

You can also buy ESP activators, which, in the presence of ESP orbs in certain rooms, point you in the direction if the nearest Guardian Spirit. You must capture all five spirits to defeat the five guardians, and each time you find one you are thrown into the Dead Zone, where you have to steer clear of some particularly nasty monsters until you can find your way back to the main chambers.

The puzzles in the maze are of the usual pixel-splitting kind; avoid the exploding pyramids, figure out a way over the booby-trapped floors, and negotiate paths over piles of blocks and obstacles. Some of the monsters, such as the savage bulldogs, are very good, while others like the energy balls are average. That just about sums up SuperHero: good in parts poor in others. If you particularly enjoy isometric 3-D arcade adventures, you won't regret spending £1.99. Otherwise, look for something more original.

Code Masters
Spectrum £2.99

Surprisingly enough, people are still producing isometric perspective arcade adventures on the Spectrum, even though this type of game was milked dry about two years ago.

Unsurprisingly, Super Hero's 3D platform/puzzle gameplay differs scarcely one jot from that of any other game in the genre. In fact it's probably more irritating than most, firstly because it is slow, and secondly, because the sides of the screen have been blanked, hiding the corners of each playing area, so you can walk off platforms or into monsters without even realising your mistake. There are some good ideas here, such as the wide variety of goodies to collect, and Bernie Drummond (Batman/Head Over Heels) has produced nicely detailed sprite and scenery graphics, but Super Hero is just too frustrating to be fun.