Meteor Storm

Crash

Quicksilva, 16K £4.95 Mercifully, Quicksilva have proved their originality in the games field by going onto games which make this one look as silly as it is. If you like asteroid games then this is pretty fast. Simple outlines hover in a blank black space. Ship orientation is in eight directions using all the number keys which means you can't concentrate on the game.

Read it at Crash - The Online Edition

Crash

Quicksilva, 16K £4.95 Mercifully, Quicksilva have proved their originality in the games field by going onto games which make this one look as silly as it is. If you like asteroid games then this is pretty fast. Simple outlines hover in a blank black space. Ship orientation is in eight directions using all the number keys which means you can't concentrate on the game.

Crash

Quicksilva, 16K £4.95 Mercifully, Quicksilva have proved their originality in the games field by going onto games which make this one look as silly as it is. If you like asteroid games then this is pretty fast. Simple outlines hover in a blank black space. Ship orientation is in eight directions using all the number keys which means you can't concentrate on the game.

Sinclair User

Gilbert Factor 7/10

John Gilbert 7/10

ARCADES BROUGHT INTO THE HOME John Gilbert reviews more complex games. Almost every major type of arcade game has been simulated on Sinclair computers. There are also new games which have an arcade format but have evolved on a microcomputer. The Spectrum is an ideal machine on which to play arcade games. The quality of them has improved substantially since the launch of the machine. Some of the first arcade games to be produced for the Spectrum were versions of Space Invaders, the game which started the arcade craze. Spectral Invaders was the first to be announced by Bug-Byte, which was already renowned for its arcade and adventure games on the ZX-81. So far it is the game which most closely resembles the original arcade version. Although it is slow it is difficult to score points, as you can fire only one laser blast at a time. Another invaders game, Space Intruders, was launched at about the same time as Spectral Invaders. The game is much faster and is recommended for those who like to keep their fingers on the fire button and amass a big score. The only criticism is that the aliens and mothercraft are very small and the mothership is blue on a black background and so is very difficult to hit. Apart from that Space Intruders from Quicksilva is good value at £5.95. Namtir Raiders, for the ZX-81, is a space invaders game with a difference from Artic Computing. The player still has to face the hordes of aliens which come down the screen but the laser base can be moved up and down as well as left and right. The player has five laser bases during the game and they can take only five hits from alien bombs. There are three levels of difficulty-easy to impossible. The game, costing £3.95, is addictive and the graphics are neither awkward in design nor jerky in movement. The game which is gaining popularity with 48K Spectrum owners is Time Gate, from Quicksilva. The authors claim that it is the ultimate in 3D arcade space action. The game is loaded in two parts, the first being a lengthy instruction manual. After the manual has finished you can load the game. The object is to destroy a race of aliens called the Squarm who are trying to colonise Earth. The enemy fighters are also seen in 3D and so are the planets on which the player can land to refuel and repair the ship. It is by far the best arcade action game so far for the Spectrum and costs only £6.95. Asteroids is also becoming popular on Sinclair machines. One of the first companies to launch a version for the ZX-81 was Quicksilva. It was a good version on such a small machine and is still proving popular. Quicksilva has also introduced a Spectrum version called Meteor Storm. It has the added attraction of speech before play. It is difficult to hear the words but we are informed by the authors that it says "Meteor Alert... Meteor Alert...". Meteor Storm is a novel version of Asteroids and costs £5.95. Sinclair Research has a good game of asteroids, called Planetoids, in its new Spectrum Software library. The asteroids are in 3D and much careful design work on both the asteroids and the player's ship seems to have gone into the game. Planetoids costs £5.95. Artic Computing seems to be the only company to have produced a version of Galaxians for the ZX-81. ZX-Galaxians looks like Space Invaders but the invaders are 'V'-shaped and are supposed to be inter-galactic birds. The birds swoop from formation and bomb the player's laser base. ZX-Galaxian is slow in action but can still be a very addictive game. It costs £4.95. Defender is still a much-sought-after game in the arcades and Artic Computing took advantage of that early by producing a version for the ZX-81. The graphics are not particularly interesting and the spaceship which the player flies across the landscape is made up of a series of blocks which look only slightly like a ship. Despite those criticisms, the original idea behind the game is still there and the Artic version can be exciting, as you see the enemy ships rushing at you from the other side of the screen. With the arrival of the Spectrum, many manufacturers found an interest in the arcade game Scramble. The best and fastest version so far is from Mikro-Gen. In the game you have to go through caves which become smaller and smaller as it progresses. The game becomes progressively more difficult and can be run in slow, normal and fast modes. It costs £3.95. Silversoft has a Scramble-type game called Ground Attack. It works on the same principles as the Mikro-Gen game but is much slower. There is a good deal of blank screen between game rounds and the average waiting time between rounds is 15 seconds. Ground Attack costs £5.95. The range of arcade-type games on Sinclair machines is always increasing. Manufacturers seem to feel safe in producing standard arcade games such as Space Invaders and Scramble. Those games, especially for the Spectrum, are becoming more imaginative and the graphics and sound more impressive. Manufacturers have to be careful about copying ideas from other games but with the imagination of some of the firms in the Sinclair market, children and many adults will be kept happy with arcade-type games on the ZX-81 and Spectrum for a long time. Space Invaders games have now been overtaken by Pacman in popularity. Bug-Byte, [redacted]. Quicksilva, [redacted]. Artic Computing, [redacted]. Sinclair Research, [redacted]. Mikro-Gen, [redacted] RG12 2BK. Silversoft, [redacted].

C&VG (Computer & Video Games)

Getting Started 5/10

Value 7/10

Playability 8/10

Mark Eyles

Meteor Storm is a close copy of arcade asteroids for the Sinclair Spectrum. The asteroids were represented as geometrical-line drawings drifting weightlessly towards your ship. The game displayed clear instructions on the screen and also showed you the value of the various asteroids and flying saucers on the screen. The game kept a running total of the high score and also allowed you to enter the initials of the top 10 high scores of the session on a hall of fame chart - in true arcade style. You are also provided with a keyboard overlay which, although it seems just like a gimmick, is actually quite useful in Asteroids where you have five controls to concentrate on. A most playable and authentic version of the hit arcade game. The game runs on the Spectrum and is available from Quicksilva at £4.95.

FIRING TO ESCAPE Who can resist blowing up asteroids? To have them careering about in the privacy at your own home is sheer ecstacy! But what flavour do you prefer? This game has been multiplying at an alarming rate and with so many about how do you choose? The first consideration must surely be how fast, there is little point getting either a game that is so slow that it bores you to death or so last you find it unplayable. Next consider the controls you are offered, rotate lett, rotate right and fire are universal but what of hyperspace and thrust? Is the thrust of the move stop variety or a true inertial thrust (turn round and thrust to stop yourself moving). Then you may consider features: How many sizes at rock do you get? Two, three or more? How many saucers do you get, do they fire at you? Have you a wrap around screen? What does the game look like? Does it have hi-res graphics, colour? Does it have different attack waves (more rocks each wave)? Does the game have an attract mode, full scoring, high score, bonus ship? Finally, does the game have any special features such as particularly outstanding graphics, sound or speech? A game that has most of the above features is likely to be fairly close to the arcade original and give you hours of entertainment. MARK EYLES

GAMES GLOSSARY If you can tell a Pacman from a Defender and a Galaxian from a Space Invader you probably know your way around computer games. But if some of the game terms we have used in this supplement, or in the issue itself, are new to you, then this page should supply the answers. In it we take some of the best known types of computer game and describe how they are played and what features these games normally incorporate. So, if we claim that Penetrator is a "Scramble-type game" and that leaves you just as much in the dark about what to expect, then below there is a full description of Scramble to put you in the picture. ASTEROIDS The Asteroids came into the arcades courtesy of Atari. It features a small dart-shaped craft controlled by the player which can rotate left or right and thrust or fire in the direction it is facing. There is one further control, the panic button (hyperspace) which lets you travel to another part of the screen chosen by the computer. The enemy is mainly made up of large asteroids which sweep across the screen in large deadly groups of rock. When blown up these break into smaller fragments worth extra points. There is extra danger supplied by two UFOs. The first larger creature you'll meet fairly early on. It tends to spray shots in all directions and often crashes into an asteroid. The smaller variety is far more deadly in its own shooting and also more difficult to hit. Each cleared screen means you start again with extra asteroids. DEFENDER You can't expect to keep a finger on every control button in Defender or you'd end up in knots. The action, which takes place above an alien landscape, involves some seven control buttons and takes patience to gain proper mastery of your lone craft. That patience can be rewarded though, as Defender is challenging from the word "Go". The Defender craft can go: up, down, thrust forward, reverse direction, fire, smart bomb and hyperspace. Ten humanoids wander on the landscape and these may fall prey to raiding alien creatures known as Landers. Landers pick up the humanoids and take them to the top of the screen. If they succeed in getting there the Landers turn into fearsome mutants hellbent on your destruction. In all there are six alien opponents. On top of Landers and Mutants, these are: Pods are quite harmless but contain the small and persistent Swarmers; Bombers seed space with white bombs and Baiters only appear if you take too long clearing a screen of the rest of the aliens. If all 10 humanoids are captured, the planet explodes and all remaining alien life attacks your craft at once. Defender games usually feature a small radar screen which shows what is going on at all parts of the planet surface. FROGGER Frogger has spawned a whole host of computer games with a similar theme. This game features a frog hero who must jump across a road and make his way across a river torrent to five frog-holes in the bank. The busy road usually features live streams of traffic travelling in both directions at varying speeds, between which the player must hop his frog without wrapping it around any fenders. Once across the road, the river can be crossed by leaping onto floating logs and onto the back of swimming turtles, until our frog can enter a vacant spot in the far bank. Turtles have a habit of diving though so don't let a frog dally too long on one. Being carried off the edge of the screen (by log or turtle) also results in a note in the funeral column of Amphibians' Weekly. When all five frog-holes have been filled, the game becomes more difficult with extra traffic being added to the road, snakes traversing the bank between road and river and alligators appearing instead of logs in the river. A timer running down on each frog also adds to the difficulties. The arcade original also featured a small lady frog who could be "picked up" on the logs and offered a lift home for a bonus. Other bonuses can be scored by entering a frog-hole in which a tasty fly meal has come to rest. DONKEY KONG Donkey Kong is the strange name for a climbing and jumping game which features a starlet-grabbing monster gorilla. Often referred to as Crazy Kong or Crazy Climber in the computer circles, it has only just found its way onto the home screen. The game features a gorilla holding a girl captive at the top of the screen and an intrepid hero (Mario the carpenter), who starts at the bottom of the screen. Between the two is a connecting network of platforms and ladders up which Mario must run to achieve his rescue. Kong hurls barrels down the screen and Mario makes use of his "jump" button to leap over them. He can also grab a hammer and smash the barrels as they approach him. Once at the top of the screen a new complex is built with Mario, again starting from the bottom with a view to rescue. This time the screen features a series of conveyor belts and deadly fires which travel around on the ladders and belts. GALAXIANS The Galaxians were the sons of Space Invaders. Instead of proceeding down the screen at a leisurely pace, they wavered at the top of the screen before swooping down in batches of two or three (or more often on a solo mission) firing bombs. The player has the usual left, right and fire controls on his laser base and must take care not to get trapped in a corner. He scores double points for a galaxian hit in mid-swoop and there are bonus points for taking out the red fleet commanders, who usually descend flanked by their generals, dispersing bombs at such a rate that the first instinct is to flee for cover. That is the essence of Galaxians but with each destroyed platoon, new waves appear at screen top and their attacks become more frequent, more accurate and, all too often, more deadly! PACMAN The ghostly world of Pacman is made up of a dot-filled maze, a hungry dot-eater and four pursuing spectres. Pacman variations can be found under a whole range of titles from Vic-men to Gobbleman, Snapper to Super Glooper and many others. Most dot-eating games are related to it. The main character is the dot-eater, which travels around the maze, eating every dot he touches. His objective is to clear the screen of dots. He is hampered in this by the four chasing ghosts whose touch is lethal. The Pacman's main defence against the ghosts, who usually number four, are energiser dots. These pulse in the four corners of the maze and, upon being eaten, reverse the roles for a short while. This means that Pacman can turn the tables on the ghosts and eat them for bonus points. He is allowed only a few seconds of dominance before the usual hunter and hunted rules come back into operation. It is also usual for fruits to appear on the screen occasionally and these too can be consumed by Pacman for bonus points. When Pacman has cleared the screen, it refills with dots and the game restarts except that this time the ghosts are a little livelier and a new fruit, worth extra points, appears at this level. SCRAMBLE Scramble should have a big one-way sign on its cabinet. The screen rolls from right to left, taking the player's craft along it into ever-increasing danger. Scramble variations often contain the word "Mission" or "Attack" but there are some weird and wonderful titles about. The player controls a craft heading right across the screen over hilly terrain His craft can never turn around and opt out of its mission but he does have some control over his destiny. His controls are up and down, fast and slow and he can both bomb and fire at his enemies. The Scrambler is not usually equipped with enough fuel to complete his task, but it is normal to obtain more fuel by bombing fuel tanks on the ground and so (mysteriously) replenish his own stocks. The enemies come in all shapes and sizes. Most common are missiles which fire up from the ground as your craft passes overhead and alien invader creatures which frequently inhabit caves and fly at the player's craft. The original Scramble game sent the player through a series of different terrains with new challenges in each section. And most computer Scrambles attempt to duplicate this with a number of different stages. Scramble requires a cool head which can find the right control in a crisis, but it makes an ideal computer game as success naturally leads to new and more difficult stages. INVADERS Space Invaders started the whole computer game craze back in 1977 and most gamers know the format backwards. Still, just a brief resume... The invaders come in waves above the ground and move in rows across the screen one step at a time, firing missiles earthwards. When one row of the aliens reach an edge of the screen, the whole platoon jump down a line and return back the way they came. When they achieve their slow progression to the bottom of the screen, the game ends. The player controls a laser base which moves left to right and fires directly up from its position. His aim is to blow up the entire fleet before it reaches the bottom of the screen. Flying saucers move across the top of the screen in both directions and can be hit for a mystery bonus score. In the arcade original, top saucer scores of 300 were achieved by firing 22 shots before shooting at the first saucer, then firing 14 shots in between each subsequent saucer. Some computer versions have copied this technique.

Sinclair User

John Gilbert

SINCLAIR BRINGS THE THRILL OF THE ARCADE INTO YOUR HOME With the Spectrum, program writers have been able to write more complex games. John Gilbert investigates this new move. Almost every major type of arcade game has been simulated on Sinclair computers. There are also new games which have an arcade format but have evolved on a microcomputer. The Spectrum is an ideal machine on which to play arcade games. The quality of them has improved substantially since the launch of the machine. Some of the first arcade games to be produced for the Spectrum were versions of Space Invaders, the game which started the arcade craze. Spectral Invaders was the first to be announced by Bug-Byte, which was already renowned for its arcade and adventure games on the ZX-81. So far it is the game which most closely resembles the original arcade version. Although it is slow it is difficult to score points, as you can fire only one laser blast at a time. By the time the laser bolt has reached the place where you wanted it to go, the target invader has moved on. That means that a great deal of anticipation and skill is required. Graphically, the Bug Byte Invaders is the best, with rows of different-colour aliens crossing the screen and large motherships moving from one side of the screen to the other at random intervals. Spectral Invaders is well-presented and costs £5.95. Another invaders game, Space Intruders, was launched at about the same time as Spectral Invaders. The game is much faster and is recommended for those who like to keep their fingers on the fire button and amass a big score. The only criticism is that the aliens and mothercraft are very small and the mothership is blue on a black background and so is very difficult to hit. Apart from that Space Intruders from Quicksilva is good value at £5.95. Namtir Raiders, for the ZX-81, is a space invaders game from Artic Computing with a difference. The player still has to face the hordes of aliens which come down the screen but the laser base can be moved up and down as well as left and right. The greater movement permitted to the player is compensated by the hail of bombs dropped by the aliens and the size and power of alien ships. There are four waves of aliens and as the game progresses the ships get bigger until the giant mothership arrives. The player has five laser bases during the game and they can take only five hits from alien bombs. There are three levels of difficulty - easy to impossible. The game, costing £3.95, is addictive and the graphics are neither awkward in design nor jerky in movement. The game which is gaining popularity with 48K Spectrum owners is Time Gate, from Quicksilva. The authors claim that it is the ultimate in 3D arcade space action. The game is loaded in two parts, the first being a lengthy instruction manual. After the manual has finished you can load the game. The object is to destroy a race of aliens called the Squarm who are trying to colonise Earth. To do that the player must fight the enemy in space and go through time by locating a series of Time Gates to find the Squarm's base. The pleasant thing about the game is its graphics. The player is at the controls of a space fighter and look out into a 3D representation of space. The enemy fighters are also seen in 3D and so are the planets on which the player can land to refuel and repair the ship. It is by far the best arcade action game so far for the Spectrum and costs only £6.95. Asteroids is also becoming popular on Sinclair machines. One of the first companies to launch a version for the ZX-81 was Quicksilva. It was a good version on such a small machine and is still proving popular. Quicksilva has also introduced a Spectrum version called Meteor Storm. It has the added attraction of speech before play. It is difficult to hear the words but we are informed by the authors that it says "Meteor Alert... Meteor Alert...". Meteor Storm is a novel version of Asteroids and costs £5.95. Sinclair Research has a good game of asteroids, called Planetoids, in its new Spectrum Software library. The asteroids are in 3D and much careful design work on both the asteroids and the player's ship seems to have gone into the game. Planetoids costs £5.95. Artic Computing seems to be the only company to have produced a version of Galaxians for the ZX-81. ZX-Galaxians looks like Space Invaders but the invaders are 'V'-shaped and are supposed to be inter-galactic birds. The birds swoop from formation and bomb the player's laser base. ZX-Galaxian is slow in action but can still be a very addictive game. It costs £4.95. Defender is still a much-sought-after game in the arcades and Artic Computing took advantage of that early by producing a version for the ZX-81. The graphics are not particularly interesting and the spaceship which the player flies across the landscape is made up of a series of blocks which look only slightly like a ship. Despite those criticisms, the original idea behind the game is still there and the Artic version can be exciting, as you see the enemy ships rushing at you from the other side of the screen. Now that the Spectrum has arrived, many manufacturers have found an interest in the arcade game Scramble. The best and fastest version so far is from Mikro-Gen. In the game you have to go through caves which become smaller and smaller as it progresses. There are four sectors to the game, including Missiles, UFOs and Meteors. The player has to destroy the missiles which are fired from the ground at the players' ship, destroy UFOs with a laser blaster, and dodge the meteors. The game becomes progressively more difficult and can be run in slow, normal and fast modes. It costs £3.95. Silversoft has a Scramble-type game called Ground Attack. It works on the same principles as the Mikro-Gen game but is much slower. There is a good deal of blank screen between game rounds and the average waiting time between rounds is 15 seconds. Ground Attack costs £5.95. The range of arcade-type games on Sinclair machines is always increasing. Manufacturers seem to feel safe in producing standard arcade games such as Space Invaders and Scramble. Those games, especially for the Spectrum, are becoming more imaginative and the graphics and sound more impressive. Manufacturers have to be careful about copying ideas from other games but with the imagination of some of the firms in the Sinclair market, children and many adults will be kept happy with arcade-type games on the ZX-81 and Spectrum for a long time. Space Invaders games have now been overtaken by Pacman in popularity. A number of them have been produced for the ZX-81 and several companies are producing them for the Spectrum. It looks as if Pacman may provide the next boom in Sinclair software - but that is another story. Bug-Byte, [redacted]. Quicksilva, [redacted]. Artic Computing, [redacted]. Sinclair Research, [redacted]. Mikro-Gen, [redacted]. Silversoft, [redacted].

'With the imagination of some of the firms in the market, users will be kept happy with arcade games for a long time'

Your Computer

Simon Beesley

SPECTRUM SOFTWARE Simon Beesley brave attacks by trolls, bombardment by meteoroids, alien invasions and even English literature to bring you up to date with Spectrum software. The quality of Spectrum software has improved since our last survey but originality remains in short supply. Most of the programs looked at are games programs and the bulk of these are modelled on the arcade classics, Space Invaders, Pac-Man, Defender and Asteroids. Perhaps this is because the games-buying public is only interested in games that fall into a recognisable category. Some of the programs are written entirely in Basic. This need not count against them unless the program displays moving graphics. The Spectrum's keyboard is not very suitable for fast-moving games although Quicksilva and Softek offer a joystick option on some games. Sinclair has released a large range of programs written for them by ICL and Psion. By and large the ICL programs compare badly with those from Psion and have a rather amateurish look to them. Each of the tapes in the ICL games series, Games 1 to 4, contains four short Basic programs with titles such as Galactic Invasion, Skittles and Train Race. These are the sort of programs a reader might like to key in from a listing in a magazine. They are fairly simple and afford a limited entertainment for a short period. In view of their variety each package represents reasonable value although they are perhaps more suitable for young people. ICL has also produced five titles in a Fun to Learn series covering Music, History, English Literature, Geography and Inventions. They present a variety of quizzes on their respective subjects. Players can compete against each other in a race in which correct answers send them further along the track. It is difficult to know who these programs are aimed at. One soon runs through the stock of questions and the same names appear in different types of question. Some of the information presented is too obscure or eccentric to make the programs suitable for schools. In the English Literature quiz, for example, Ian Fleming rubs shoulders with Shakespeare and little-known seventeenth century playwrights. Psion's collection of programs is far more satisfactory. Hungry Horace is loosely related to Pac-Man but has a number of original features. Horace has to eat the flowers in a park while avoiding the park guards. Sinclair gives a fair description of Horace as a subtle and amusing cartoon-style game. Psion's 48K chess program was written in conjunction with Microgen. It plays a remarkably strong game even at the lower levels. As an averagely competent player I found it quite hard to beat at level two, although its play seemed to come adrift under pressure. The program's response time is quick and the pieces are quite easily distinguished. Space Raiders and Planetoids are Psion's versions of the arcade games Invaders and Asteroids. Anyone who still has an appetite for these games will find the Psion products more than adequate. With Vu-Calc, Psion has scaled down a Visi Calc-type program to the dimensions of the home micro. These programs, which are commonly used on business micros, are usually described as providing a financial spreadsheet. They enable the user to lay out financial data in rows and columns and enter formulae to run calculations on parts or all of the table. Vu-Calc supplies a range of commands for entering data, text or formulae and performing calculations. Basic programs which have been compiled by Softek's compiler, Super C, run - typically - 10 times faster. The compiler sits at the top of memory above RAMtop and is unaffected by a New command. It leaves room for a Basic program of up to 8K and a further 10K for data. The present version cannot cope with decimals, arrays or string variables. These limitations need not be too constricting. Strings, at least, can be stored in the data areas as ASCII codes and accessed through Peeks. At £14.95 this is good value; particularly since it enables people to write commercially respectable programs without having to master machine code. However Softek insists that anyone planning to sell programs created with the compiler should negotiate for the rights. Softek claims that trace elements have been included to detect code written with Super C. The arcade game Asteroids crops up on almost every micro. Softek's version Meteoroids is one of the fastest for the Spectrum with good colour and sound. Softime supplies the Spectrum with a digital clock and alarm at the top of the screen which remains there while other programs are loaded and running. The last program in Softek's list is Zolan Adventure, a standard text adventure game which has the merit of fitting into 16K. Quicksilva gave Time Gate considerable advance publicity claiming it would make as great an impact on the computer games' world as had Atari's Star Raiders. As it turns out the game closely resembles Star Raiders. Given that the Atari is a rather more sophisticated computer it is not surprising that the Spectrum version of the game does not match the original. Time Gate presents a view from the cockpit of a spaceship. An instrument panel below contains a long-range scanner and a variety of other indicators giving information on the ship's position and damage incurred. Your mission is to clear 18 galactic sectors of enemy craft. The business of locating and firing on enemy ships is not as interesting as attending to all the other procedures. The controls are not as responsive as on the Atari. Nonetheless this is an elaborate game with excellent graphics - certainly one of the best so far for the Spectrum. In an impressive piece of synthesised speech Quicksilva's chess program announces itself at the beginning with 'this is the Chess Player'. Rather startlingly the packaging relates how the Chess Player, an Evil Being, has called for a challenger from Earth. The planet's survival hangs on your game - and you thought you were just going to have a quiet game of chess. In the event the program plays quite a strong game with the option of six levels of play. The board is clearly displayed and the pieces are well designed. Psion's chess program, however, is probably the better player. Meteor Storm, another version of Asteroids, also announces itself but rather indistinctly. There is not much to choose between this and Planetoids or Meteoroids. The major problem for software companies writing an Asteroids-type game must be in finding an alternative title. Spectres from Bug-Bvte gives a novel twist to the Pac-Man concept. Eddie the electrician has to rewire a haunted house. Instead of eating or picking up objects in his path he lays down light bulbs. Reaching one of the four power generators enables him to illuminate the house and drive off ghosts. The game has a highly individual flavour. The characters which glide around at a fairly leisurely pace, are engagingly different from the standard Pac-Man figures. This is one of the more original games yet to appear for the Spectrum. Gulpman from Campbell Systems is also based on Pac-Man but refreshingly breaks away from the standard format. It offers a choice of 15 different mazes and allows the speed of play to be set. At the highest levels your little man dashes around the maze at quite a pace. By contrast Jega's Specman, written in Basic, is dismally slow. Sometimes the ghosts seem to be stricken with paralysis and unwilling to take up the chase. Escape from New Generation Software is a variation on the maze theme which involves escaping from dinosaurs. The dinosaurs - brontosauri, pterodactyls and such like - pursue the player's character with considerable animation through the maze which is shown in bird's-eye view. Silversoft's games Orbiter and Ground Attack are probably the best Spectrum versions of the arcade games Defender and Scramble. Ground Attack requires the player to fly a plane through a series of caverns and avoid or destroy missile attacks from the ground. Scramble from Work Force is similar but marginally slower. Likewise Avenger - Abacus' version of Defender - is competent but not quite as accomplished as Silversoft's. MYSTERY MEETING A gold sundial worth £6,000 is the prize for the first person to solve all the clues in the adventure game Pimania. As in Kit Williams' book Masquerade, deciphering all the clues will lead the winner to a meeting at a specific time and place with representatives from the authors of the game, Automata Ltd. The other side of the program tape contains a disco single. Automata say that the clues are scattered in the music, the program and the graphics. Although we did not proceed very far with the quest the music and opening graphics seemed to bear out Automata's claim that the world of the Pi Man is totally bizarre. Melbourne House has based The Hobbit, on the novel by Tolkien. It helps to have read the book in finding your way about. The Hobbit is claimed to be an advance on other adventure games because it introduces other characters from the book who react to the player in the role of Bilbo with an independent life of their own. It also allows you - in a limited fashion to enter sentences rather than single words as commands. In practice these extra features do not amount to much and give the program greater scope for the sort of inconsistencies adventure programs are prone to. Thorin, for example, repeatedly enters the scene and tells you to hurry up. This is irritating because you were unaware that he had left and he seems to be totally devoid of constructive ideas. It is not a good idea, however, to kill him off since he sometimes proves too strong for your attack. Furthermore the manual suggests that you should stay on good terms with the other members of your party if you are to succeed in your quest. Many of the locations in the adventure are illustrated by some excellent graphics. We only managed to complete 7.5 percent of the game during which the text was accompanied by six different pictures. The graphics coupled with a more varied plot than usual make The Hobbit superior to any other adventure games available for the Spectrum. Both the assemblers tested, from ACS and PI software, require Z-80 mnemonics to be entered in Rem statements and both allow addresses to be replaced by labels. The ACS assembler, Ultraviolet, costs twice as much at £7.50 but offers several extra features. It allows multiple statement lines and provides five pseudo-instructions such as DEFS, which inserts a string of ASCII characters at the current assembly position. ACS also supplies a disassembler, infrared. Like the assembler this has two different versions for 16K or 48K machines. The program is easy to use and docs all you might expect from it. Company: SN Program Name: Games 1-4 Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: SN Program Name: Hungry Horace Memory Required: 16K Price: £5.95 Company: SN Program Name: Fun to Learn Memory Required: 16K Price: £6.95 Company: SN Program Name: Chess Memory Required: 48K Price: £7.95 Company: SN Program Name: Vu-Calc Memory Required: 48K Price: £8.95 Company: SN Program Name: Space Raiders Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: SN Program Name: Planetoids Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: QS Program Name: The Chess Player Memory Required: 48K Price: £6.95 Company: QS Program Name: Time Gate Memory Required: 48K Price: £6.95 Company: QS Program Name: Meteor Storm Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: SF Program Name: Super C Memory Required: 48K Price: £14.95 Company: SF Program Name: Meteoroids Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: SF Program Name: Softime Memory Required: 16K Price: £3.95 Company: SF Program Name: Zolan Adventure Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: SS Program Name: Orbiter Memory Required: 16K Price: £5.95 Company: SS Program Name: Ground Attack Memory Required: 16K Price: £5.95 Company: MH Program Name: The Hobbit Memory Required: 48K Price: £14.95 Company: AU Program Name: Pimania Memory Required: 48K Price: £10 Company: WF Program Name: Scramble Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: AB Program Name: Avenger Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: CS Program Name: Gulpman Memory Required: 16K Price: £5.95 Company: JS Program Name: Specman Memory Required: 16K Price: £5.95 Company: AC Program Name: Ultraviolet Memory Required: 16K Price: £7.50 Company: AC Program Name: Infrared Memory Required: 16K Price: £6.75 Company: PI Program Name: Assembler Memory Required: 16K Price: £3.75 Company: NG Program Name: Escape Memory Required: 16K Price: £4.95 Company: BB Program Name: Spectres Memory Required: 16K Price: £8

C&VG (Computer & Video Games)

Getting Started 5/10

Value 7/10

Playability 8/10

MASTERING THE ROGUE ROCKS Asteroids became one of the craze games of the early 1980's after the worldwide successes of such mega-games as Space Invaders and Galaxians. It is considerably more difficult than those earlier games, where you had really only two controls to worry about. Asteroids added hyperspace, thrust, rotate left, rotate right and fire. The game places you in control of space ship being bombarded by a shower of meteorites that come at you relentlessly from the four corners of the screen. Using your controls you must spin your ship around to shoot the asteroids. You can also dodge in front or behind the rocks using the thrust button. If things get a little too hot and a collision seems certain the hyperspace button will make you momentarily disappear and then replace you at random on the screen. But this could prove as dangerous as blasting away at the oncoming role! Extra points can be earned by shooting down the mystery flying saucers which spin in and out of the asteroids. We tested versions of the game so far available for the Sinclair Spectrum. Meteor Storm was the closest to the arcade version of the three games we tested. The asteroids were represented as geometrical line drawings drifting weightlessly towards your ship. The game displayed clear instructions on the screen and also showed you the value of the various asteroids and flying saucers on the screen. All three games kept a running total of the high scores but Quicksilva's Meteor Storm took you a stage further than this enabling you to enter the initials of the top ten high scorers of the session. This version also provides you with a keyboard overlay which, although it seems just like a gimmick, is actually quite useful in Asteroids-type games where you have up to five controls to concentrate on. My main criticism of Meteor Storm is that the thrust button has inertia, causing you to drift helplessly towards an asteroid, frantically rotating and thrusting. Sinclair's official software writers, Psion, entered the field with Planetoids. This is not as close to the arcade game as the Quicksilva version though the graphics are no less impressive for this. Planetoids had the best fire mechanism of the three games tested. The missiles could be fired in quick succession and reached their targets swiftly. The final version tested was Meteoroids from the new software writers - Softek. This was not as good a version of the game as the others played. An admirable attempt had been made to simulate the rock-like texture of the asteroids but this did not work. They looked more like chewed up pieces of bubble gum. There was really not much to choose between the other two - though for my £5 the Quicksilva version is marginally better because of its extra facilities and graphics.

ZX Computing

Phil Garratt

NOT ALL THAT HAS COLOUR, GLITTERS. In their haste to get Spectrum software on the market, it appears that some companies have simply decided to recycle their ZX81 stuff, adding a few little squeaks from the sound, and an INK or PAPER or three. Phil Garratt takes a close look at some of the material available, and notes that among the dross, gold still shines. METEOR STORM Quicksilva The second of Quicksilva's arcade games for the 16K Spectrum is "Meteor Storm", their version of Asteroids. If you're one of those who belittle the "beep" on the Spectrum, this program will make you sit up and listen. Never mind the Japanese fifth generation computers, the Spectrum does it already - it talks to you! Admittedly it helps if you amplify the sound and you know what it's going to say ("meteor alert!"), but it is intelligible and a remarkable feat of programming, even if it does sound like a Dalek with a sore throat. There are three sizes of meteors, the smaller ones worth more points, and if you clear one lot even more appear. Your controls are "6" for anti-clockwise and "7" for clockwise, "8" is hyperspace (a random jump to somewhere else on the screen, which can be used repeatedly). "9" is thrust and "0" is fire, which has no auto-repeat, so fortunately this game also has the "hold" and "start" feature on "Intruders", allowing you to rest your finger. Bonus points can be won by knocking out the enemy saucers which appear from time to time and start shooting at you. There is a slow moving large one and a quicker small one, both of which look remarkably like raspberry pies! Every 10,000 points scored results in a noise which sounds like someone treading on a piglet's trotter, and more importantly you get a bonus ship. On-screen scoring, high score table, good sound effects and demonstration mode complete another winner from Quicksilva. But watch out for low flying raspberry pies! "Meteor Storm" is £5.95 from Quicksilva, [redacted] Reviewer: Phil Garratt Overall: Not Rated

Sinclair User

Gilbert Factor 7/10

STORMING METEORS The meteors are rushing thick and fast in the new Quicksilva version of Meteor Storm for the Spectrum. The player has three ships with which to wreak havoc on the screen. There are three types of asteroid to avoid or crash into, depending on how the feeling takes you. Once hit, the asteroids break into smaller versions of themselves and can still be dangerous. Two types of enemy saucer fly across the screen at odd intervals, giving the space pilot even more about which to worry. The game is similar to the one produced by Quicksilva for the ZX-81 some months ago. The difference is that the screen display is in high-resolution graphics and the player's ship can move around the screen and go into hyperspace if it is in trouble. As with the other Quicksilva game for the Spectrum, Space Intruders, Meteor Storm has an attract mode which informs the player of the points system and the play keys. It also provides a sample game to get the player used to the display. Another interesting feature of this game is its capability for speech. This is from the Spectrum speaker during the game. It is not really loud enough to be intelligible. Meteor Storm is produced by Quicksilva, [redacted], and costs £5.95.

Read it at Sinclair User Magazine Online