City Patrol

Sinclair User

Gilbert Factor 7/10

GERONIMO'S REVENGE Fort Apache Memory: 16K Price: £3.95 Sabotage Memory: 48K Price: £4.99 City Patrol Memory: 16K Price: £4.99 With the rapid approach of school holidays, games software is in even greater demand. For those unfortunate people who are not visiting the sunny beaches there are still many games on the market for the 16K ZX-81. The Siege of Fort Apache is a strategy game in which you take the role of a general with 300 men at his disposal. You must launch an attack on a fort in an attempt to destroy its walls and gain entry. On each day of the siege you must assign your men to such tasks as building battering rams and ramps, manning cannons, collecting spare ammunition and fetching rations so that your troops can survive. You must then decide your plan of attack. You can move in on the gate, try to bring down the walls or burrow your way underground. At the end of a day the computer will give you a status report on your situation, which includes how many casualties you have suffered and how many rations have been stolen. If you lose more than half your troops during an encounter with the enemy you are outnumbered and lose the game. Your should keep an eye on the positioning of your soldiers, as you must leave sufficient men at your base camp to protect it from the enemy which may invade at any time. Another reason for keeping an eye on the troops is to make sure nobody deserts. If they have insufficient supplies your valiant men might do that. Fort Apache has a simple presentation and lacks graphics. The range options and the results of the decisions you make in the game make it an absorbing strategy game, original and inventive in its use of subject. The siege can be continued for several days if you keep your food supplies stocked and your men happy. You might also like to try to increase the life span of your armies through a series of games by trying various battle tactics. The Siege of Fort Apache is produced by Contrast Software, [redacted]. It costs £4.95. Sinclair Research is retaining its collection of ZX-81 games tapes, the most recent of which are Sabotage and City Patrol. Sabotage is a novel game in which you take the role of one of two people, either a saboteur or the guard protecting some highly-explosive material. If you choose to be the guard you must corner the saboteur before he can plant his bomb in a secret place. If you take the part of the saboteur you must plant your bomb without being caught. Your score is determined depending on which role you take. The guard's points decrease the longer he takes to reach the bomber. The saboteur scores his points by being destructive. City Patrol is another destructive game, but in 3D. You take the part of a policeman moving round a city trying to destroy the alien invaders who try to raze tower blocks to the ground. At the very least you must prevent the destruction of as many skyscrapers as possible. The 3D representation of the city is impressive, since producing 3D effects on the ZX-81 is difficult. Many hours of thought went into the screen display and, although the plot is a little weak, people who like out-of-the-ordinary games should be satisfied. Sabotage and City Patrol can be obtained from Sinclair Research or from some W H Smith and Boots.

ZX Computing

THE ZX81 SOFT SELECTION In which Nick Pearce scrutinises the latest software packages for the ZX81. CITY PATROL/SABOTEUR Macronics 'City Patrol' is a superb high speed action game set in a futuristic city which you have to defend from alien suicide ships. The moving screen display is first class. The city consists of four streets of skyscraper blocks giving a 3D effect, and judicious use of the control keys allows you to move slowly, or at breakneck speed, in either direction as you search out the aliens. They are tantalisingly difficult to capture as they pass behind buildings and descend to ground level. If they reach the ground, their mission is accomplished and they set off a series of explosions which can destroy a large portion of your beloved city. There is a scoring system, but I was usually too absorbed in chasing the aliens to worry about my score - more often than not it seemed to be negative. All in all, 'City Patrol' is a very impressive game. 'Saboteur' is another novel game from Macronics for the ZX81, but not in my opinion as absorbing as 'City Patrol'. Nevertheless, it is based on a good idea and runs faultlessly. In this game the screen represents a plan of a compound containing randomly placed boxes of ammunition. You can either be the guard, who has to protect the ammunition, or the saboteur who must blow up as much of it as he/she can, with the computer taking the opposing character. Your character is moved around the compound in the usual way. If you are the saboteur, you must find a suitable place to plant your charge and retreat a safe distance before it explodes. If you opt to take the role of the guard, you can adopt one of two alternative strategies: try and guess where the saboteur will go, and get there first; or attempt to trap the saboteur in a corner. Both 'City Patrol' and 'Saboteur' are written largely in machine code, but the programs can be LISTed; indeed the parameters of Saboteur can be altered using POKE commands to make the game more difficult - I must admit I found it hard enough as it was. Both games require 16K of RAM. These Macronics cassettes are attractively boxed and well presented with full instructions on the cassette insert cards. City Patrol and Saboteur cost £5.00 each from Macronics Systems Ltd, [redacted].

The opening display from the game City Patrol.

C&VG (Computer & Video Games)

Getting Started 8/10

Graphics 8/10

Value 8/10

Playability 8/10

PANIC IN THE CITY AS ALIENS ATTACK Suddenly a million voices cried out for help at once. Then silence as the holocaust swept across the helpless city! Can you save the day? You are the supreme commander of a laser ship. Your task is to intercept and destroy all alien suicide craft. Your rank will be raised depending on how many aliens you destroy in relation to the amount of destruction being caused in the besieged city. The city consists of four layers of buildings which all move independently to each other at differing speeds in relation to the viewing angle, creating a 3D effect. The eight way direction is controlled by keyboard which I found took a long time to master. The all character graphics scroll in four directions producing a realistic flicker free flying simulation. Alien space ships appear near the top of the screen and keep a constant direction thereafter. When an alien stops, it automatically goes into its search and destroy mode! You will be destroyed if it hits you five times. Two quite frightening features are the hidden aliens located elsewhere in the city - off screen. These may fire their laser demolishing a building. All you will see is a brief flash in the sky. Also if - by unfortunate means - an alien completes its mission and reaches Ground Zero the game freezes for a second followed by a series of large explosions that blow a large chunk of your city to smithereens! You also have the useful option of flying at maximum speed by holding two keys down simultaneously, this results in the buildings wining past you at tremendous speed! By touching any key except the directions keys or 'A' for surrender, you will activate the ships lasers. Trapping an alien in your sights is not at all easy. First you must wait until it isn't behind a first row building, then when you are level with it, advance over it keeping equal speeds and quickly fire! A steady hand and accurate eye is needed, not as easy as it sounds. The city is made up of several types of buildings all differing in shape, size and design. If you accidentally fire on a building it will be destroyed. Every layer one building you hit loses you ten points, and up to 40 points for a layer four building. This stops you demolishing the city to find aliens. There are three levels - average, difficult and impossible. I did try the impossible level and found that about twice as many buildings have been added, all much taller which cuts down your view of advancing aliens! Yes... it was impossible. Despite some very nice graphics and realistic simulation, I thought that the game could have incorporated more interesting characteristics though it did possess a surprisingly addictive quality. It's a good addition to games software for the ZX81 - a micro that's rapidly being left behind in the rush to bigger and brighter machines. For those with a bit of warrior in you, City Patrol - by Macronics - is available at W. H. Smith for the Sinclair ZX81 at £4.95.

Sinclair User

USER-UNFRIENDLY GAMES GUIDE Sinclair Research has launched two new games, Sabotage and City Patrol, for the 16K ZX-81. Sabotage is a game in which you must take one of two roles, either the guard or the saboteur. If you choose to be the guard you must protect the randomly-placed boxes of ammunition which litter the compound. If you are the guard, you will have to corner the saboteur before he can plant explosives in a secret place. If you are not quick enough, the explosives will detonate and you will lose some of the boxes of ammunition. Your score will decrease depending on how many boxes you lose. If you capture the enemy, the points added to your score will, of course, be unaffected by the number of boxes blown-up. You may want to take the role of the saboteur. In that case the game changes and you must evade the guard, played by the computer, and plant your explosives. Your score depends on how destructive you can be. The program has an original games concept and the action is reasonably smooth. The only problem occurs in the instructions which are printed on the cassette insert card. The game is explained in simple fashion and the movement keys are shown. The difficulty is that Sinclair Research seems to have taken it for granted that the user will know which key moves the figure which way on the screen. The W and S keys move the character up and down respectively and the H and J keys move it left and right. Sinclair may be correct in thinking that most users will know which keys do what but many users will certainly be beginners who have just become accustomed to the keyboard. In City Patrol, a city is on the verge of destruction as enemy lighters zoom in and try to raze buildings to the ground. It is your task to take on those Invaders and destroy them. At the very least you must prevent them destroying the skyscrapers. The game produces a 3D view ofthe city on the screen. There are four levels of the city and you can select which one you want to enter at the start of the game. We rate the game highly because of its depth of graphics and plot. It is difficult to produce such a smooth 3D effect on the ZX-81. The instructions are easy to understand but, as with Sabotage, they could be more clearly set out on the cassette insert. We found it difficult to keep track of the instructions because they were cramped into such a small space and, in certain parts, were too verbose. Each instruction insert starts with a story line and if that was abbreviated, more room could be allocated for the playing instructions. Sabotage and City Patrol are available separately from Sinclair Research, [redacted].