Jumping Jack

Crash

Gary Bradley

"Jumping Jack is quick and bold, With skill his story will unfold..." ... or so we are told between screens in Imagine's addictive best-seller Jumping Jack. It seems a millenium since Arcadia stormed across the Spectrum screens of Britain and set the scene for games to come. The company has released several notable programs since, and Jumping Jack is one of the best. The basic theme is to guide your man, Jack, from the bottom to the top of the screen without falling through the multitude of moving holes, thumping into girders or being flattened by the odd nasty on the way. It's a game which is addictive through its simplicity and will be played for years to come. Splendid, often hilarious graphics, 20 levels, fast-moving action and constant excitement all help maintain that 'just-one-more-go' quality. Jack starts at the bottom of the screen beside the scoreline and lives remaining (up to his neck in letters)! Above him two holes move across a dozen horizontal platforms - but the number of holes increases as play progresses! What you have to do is jump up a level whenever a hole passes overhead, while avoiding plunging down a level through holes travelling on the platform beneath his feet. Each jump creates a new hole (there had to be a catch, didn't there?). Holes travelling left to right move down the levels when they leave the screen; those right to left move up. The most efficient strategy is probably to try to follow one hole all the way to the top and jump up to the next screen. This is often hindered by the holes moving down and the sheer number of aliens (one being added each time you complete a screen). Double holes can be most frustrating! If Jack falls, or is hit by a nasty, he squirms pathetically on his back seeing stars (literally), thus he is immobile and vulnerable to further holes approaching. Happily, a life is lost only when Jack falls all the way to the bottom line again. Basically that's all there is to it. There are 10 different animated aliens and Jack himself is a masterpiece. The sound is nice too, and the 'splat' when Jack is paralysed by a nasty is most realistic (to tell the truth, I don't know what it would sound like, but I 'm sure Imagine have come pretty close)! As a little extra to add to the addiction, further lines to a terrible limerick are added between screens - read it at your own risk! Oh, and there's an extra Jack every five boards. Loading of the game is reliable, and in the middle, an attractive title is displayed. Several Jack-like characters (relatives no doubt) leap on to the screen to spell out the name of the game - it's an hilarious and clever addition. Once loaded, the game starts straight away and there is no mention of a joystick. Oddly enough, Imagine seem to have got themselves a little mixed up with the keyboard controls: while most arcade games use the left hand for sideways movements and the right to fire or jump, Jumping Jack uses CAPS SHIFT to jump and SPACE and SYM SHIFT for movement - most unusual and a little annoying at first. If you're quick and bold and have enough skill, you might just see what happens after the 20th screen - although five of the bizarre aliens is hectic enough! So buy it, avoid the holes, dodge the snakes, ghosts, witches, aeroplanes and others less identifiable, and above all, have fun. This is one game you won't tire of.

Crash

Producer: Imagine, 16K £5.50 Author: Albert Ball At first sight the extremely simple graphics might be a disappointment - but this is a classic game. Jack's stick figure is beautifully animated. The platforms are merely thin black lines. At first there are only two holes, one moving down level by level, and one moving up similarly. Each successful jump creates another hole, so it gets frustratingly difficult to progress. Should Jack fall down a hole he lies stunned, if he falls through two he's out for even longer. If he falls all the way to the bottom he loses a life. Getting right to the top results in a line from a poem - you have to collect the rest of the lines, but the poem isn't the real reward in this game - it's playing the game. Subsequent levels add more monsters which must be avoided by using the wrap around screen. By the time you're dealing with twenty holes and six monsters it's a nut house. Quite simply one of the most addictive games around and excellent value for money. Joystick: Fuller, Kempston.

Read it at Crash - The Online Edition

Crash

Producer: Imagine, 16K £5.50 Author: Albert Ball At first sight the extremely simple graphics might be a disappointment - but this is a classic game. Jack's stick figure is beautifully animated. The platforms are merely thin black lines. At first there are only two holes, one moving down level by level, and one moving up similarly. Each successful jump creates another hole, so it gets frustratingly difficult to progress. Should Jack fall down a hole he lies stunned, if he falls through two he's out for even longer. If he falls all the way to the bottom he loses a life. Getting right to the top results in a line from a poem - you have to collect the rest of the lines, but the poem isn't the real reward in this game - it's playing the game. Subsequent levels add more monsters which must be avoided by using the wrap around screen. By the time you're dealing with twenty holes and six monsters it's a nut house. Quite simply one of the most addictive games around and excellent value for money. Joystick: Fuller, Kempston.

Crash

Producer: Imagine, 16K £5.50 Author: Albert Ball At first sight the extremely simple graphics might be a disappointment - but this is a classic game. Jack's stick figure is beautifully animated. The platforms are merely thin black lines. At first there are only two holes, one moving down level by level, and one moving up similarly. Each successful jump creates another hole, so it gets frustratingly difficult to progress. Should Jack fall down a hole he lies stunned, if he falls through two he's out for even longer. If he falls all the way to the bottom he loses a life. Getting right to the top results in a line from a poem - you have to collect the rest of the lines, but the poem isn't the real reward in this game - it's playing the game. Subsequent levels add more monsters which must be avoided by using the wrap around screen. By the time you're dealing with twenty holes and six monsters it's a nut house. Quite simply one of the most addictive games around and excellent value for money. Joystick: Fuller, Kempston.

ZX Computing

Documentation 3/5

Addictive Quality 4/5

Graphics 3/5

Programming Achievement 3/5

Lasting Appeal 3/5

Value 3/5

James Walsh

PRICE: £5.50 MEMORY REQUIRED: 16K Imagine have produced a program which is, by today's standards, short of graphics and character, though one which is still quite fun to play. Jack is stuck at the bottom of the screen and must jump onto the revolving platforms above him. He can only do this when there is a gap in the platform directly above him. There are twenty levels of platform which are harder to negotiate as you get higher. If you fall through a gap in the platform on which you are standing, you go down a level and get knocked out for a few seconds. If you are unlucky you may find yourself falling down a number of levels and unable to do anything about it. A life is only lost if you fall down to the lowest level. Though the graphics and extent of the game are rather limited it is fairly addictive and fun to play.

Your Computer

Overall 4/5

16/48K Spectrum £5.50 Imagine "Jumpin' Jack is quick and bold with skill his story will unfold." This is the first rhyme you encounter in Imagine's Jumpin' Jack, a quirky and clever game which is much better than the poetry which punctuates the player's progress. The object of this addictive game is to move your man, the Jack of its title, to the top of a series of screens consisting of horizontal lines. To move up you must jump through the holes which appear; to avoid dropping through them you can run right or left. Jack himself is an ingenious piece of graphic design, all pumping legs and flailing elbows. When you mistime your jump, poor Jack is electrocuted on the lines and writhes in truly gruesome convulsions. At the beginning of the game there are no obstacles to progress, except your own ineptitude. However, when you have conquered screen 1 not only do you see the next line in the limerick you complete by finishing the game, but you also come up against the first hazards. These are either a pretty little steamtrain, a manically chopping axe or a lunatic with a shotgun. Jumpin' Jack has the charm of a nursery rhyme and the cruel twists of fortune of snakes and ladders - or even life, if you like to see deep meaning in the hours spent with your micro.

Personal Computer News

Lasting Appeal 4/5

Playability 5/5

Use Of Machine 4/5

Value 5/5

Shirley Fawcett

NAME: Jumping Jack SYSTEM: 16K Spectrum PRICE: £5.50 PUBLISHER: Imagine Software [redacted] FORMAT: Cassette LANGUAGE: Machine code OUTLETS: Sinclair dealers SIZZLING POWER LINE Remember learning kerb drill or even the Green Cross Code? When you stood at the edge of the pavement looking right... and left... and right again and if all was clear, then cross keeping a constant watch. With Jumping Jack, you can relive those dear dead days, only instead of charging across the street, you have to leap up a set of red lines which not only won't stand still, but are also infested with ghosts and dinosaurs and all those everyday hazards. OBJECTIVES In six lives, you have to get to the top of a set of eight moving red lines by jumping up through the gaps that appear randomly, and running to avoid falling through gaps that appear in the line you are standing on. And when you've got to the top of one set of lines, you get another set, but this time complete with a menace which will knock you flying. The more screens you complete, the more menaces - but each time you fall back down to basecamp, you lose another life. IN PLAY Imagine has come up with yet another game that has good graphics, an original plot, and the sort of game you just can't stop playing. Jack, the hero, is a Hungry Horace-like pair of eyes on legs, looking left and right as you wait for a suitable gap to appear in the line above you. And as soon as the line he's standing on is threatened with an approaching gap, and you get him running left or right, his dinky little legs go nineteen to the half dozen. If you try to jump through a suitable looking gap too soon or late. Jack apparently gets electrocuted - are these red lines power lines? - and lies on his back waving his legs in the air. While he's incapacitated, and looking uncannily like a helicopter, holes creep up beneath him, so it's quite easy to end up at square one. The lines can also hunt in two directions, so as fast as Jack tries to run one way, he's still in danger of being confronted With another hole headed straight for him. A dirty trick. Complete a screenful, and you get a line of - well, poetry? It's a limerick that starts out 'A daring explorer named Jack ...' and presumably gets even worse. VERDICT Stirring stuff, simple but very addictive. You get enough lives to make a fair impression on the game even on startup. As there are only three keys to bother with, left, right and up, you won't get your digits in a twist.

C&VG (Computer & Video Games)

GAMES TO LAST A LIFETIME! The next range of games will take "half a lifetime" to get through all their levels. It is a range of three games due tote launched in early July, two of them on the Spectrum and one on the Commodore 64. As we go to press the details are few and far between but we do know a little about Zzoom (previewed right), and the other two are Zip-Zap (Spectrum) and Arcadia (64). Both are arcade games featuring more levels than the average player will ever be able to accomplish. We can reveal that the company is Imagine Software of Liverpool and the game is a 48K only cassette for the Spectrum. Three games are to be previewed but according to Imagine the main reason for the trade preview is to show off the new 48K game. Already in the shops from the Liverpool firm is a new game called Jumping Jack. This is the first Imagine game written by a freelance programmer but, like the majority of the firm's other games, is based on an original idea. You control a little character who appears at the bottom of the screen. Above him are several parallel lines - moving platforms which he must hop on to. The key is to wait for just the right moment when the gap in the platform appears and then hop up at just the right moment. Each time you get to the top of a screen you are given one line of a poem providing an added incentive to get to the end of the game and discover the rest of the verse. Jumping Jack is available from most Sinclair software shops at £5.50. We have 100 cassettes of Jumping Jack to give away this issue. See page 110 for details but be sure you're quick off the mark