Spectipede

Crash

Use of Computer 75%

Graphics 66%

Playability 78%

Getting Started 55%

Addictive Qualities 75%

Value For Money 82%

Overall 72%

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Producer: Mastertronics Memory Required: 16K Retail Price: £1.99 Language: Machine code There's little to surprise in this game - the name says it all. Spectipede offers the full scope of the arcade original with centipedes, spiders, fleas, scorpions, mushrooms and poisonous mushrooms. On higher levels there are two centipedes to contend with. The players may move the firing base upwards for the traditional tour squares to avoid segments of pede which make it to the bottom. Segments will also fall straight to the bottom if they pass over a poisonous mushroom. Spectipede may be played by 1 or 2 players. COMMENTS Control keys: CAPS/Z left/right, K/M up/down, L to fire; or cursor keys and 0 or 9 to fire Joystick: Mikrogen, Kempston, Cursor type Keyboard play: sensible keys and responsive Use of colour: very good Graphics: small, one-character size, but detailed and fast Sound: very good, continuous Skill levels: progressive difficulty Lives: 3

Sinclair User

Gilbert Factor 5/10

NEVER MIND THE QUALITY GNASHER Memory: 16K Price: £1.99 Joystick: Kempston SPECTIPEDE Memory: 16K Price: £1.99 Joystick: Kempston BULLSEYE Memory: 48K Price: £1.99 Cut-price software inevitably begs the question of whether the games are any good. Mastertronic produces what, at £1.99, are the cheapest so far. Gnasher is a Pac-Man derivative. The graphics are the conventional ones of maze, yellow Pac-Man and multicoloured ghosts. All the usual features are included - power pills, bonus fruit, two- player option and so on. The joystick response was slightly slow and sticky but if you must have Pac-Man in your lounge, you might as well save a few pounds and buy Gnasher. Spectipede is rather more exhilarating to play, although that might reflect the virtues of the excellent arcade game Centipede rather than those of Mastertronic. Again, there is little of originality but the game is a fast version of the standard, with spiders, toad- stools and multiple levels. Also available is a darts simulation, Bullseye. The game is slow to play, much of it being written in Basic, and it is not very user-friendly, as it is possible to get into Basic by making a mistake when pressing the wrong keys. That said, the game provides five versions of darts including Cricket, 501 and Killer. There are also three ways of playing a shot; you can either state what you are aiming at, position a cursor on the appropriate part of the board, or enter the angle and distance of your shot. The cover picture shows three dart-shaped spaceships homing-in on a red star, When you realise the nature of the game you can understand the point of the cover but it might well tempt the incautious lover of space games into buying something unwanted.

Read it at Sinclair User Magazine Online

Crash

Producer: R & R, 16K £5.50 A diet of scorpions, fleas, spiders and worms in addition to the ubiquitous centipede. Three skill levels and hi score. A well rounded version.

Read it at Crash - The Online Edition

Crash

Producer: R & R, 16K £5.50 A diet of scorpions, fleas, spiders and worms in addition to the ubiquitous centipede. Three skill levels and hi score. A well rounded version.

Crash

Producer: R & R, 16K £5.50 Author: K Allison For my money, the best Centipede game around, and for a number of reasons; the use of colour's excellent, the graphics are great with the beast even looking like a centipede for once, the sound is fun, you can fire and move in eight directions simultaneously, and everything moves fast. The usual rules apply, vertical movement is limited to the lower quarter, there are scorpions, spiders and fleas, mushrooms disintegrate with four shots. Joystick options: Mikrogen and Kempston. Good keyboard layout, and for its price, excellent value. Recommended. One or two player games.