Spectrum Safari

Crash

Use of Computer 65%

Graphics 50%

Playability 68%

Getting Started 68%

Addictive Qualities 69%

Value For Money 69%

Overall 65%

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Producer: C.D.S. Microsystems Memory Required: 48K Retail Price: £5.95 Language: BASIC Author: A.J. Rushton Spectrum Safari isn't exactly a new game. Its author, A.J. Rushton, originally marketed it under his own name when it was released last summer, but now it has been repackaged by CDS and given a new lease of life and better marketing, which is good, because this original and entertaining game deserves it. The basic aim is to escape from a tropical island with as many of your exploring party alive as possible. Besides yourself, there are two others in the party. The centre of the island is a large swamp surrounded by six native villages. Your party starts off in the north-west, and the only boat to use for your escape is in the south-east. Movement is accomplished by entering in the direction you wish to travel. You need plenty of food as each man eats one pack per move. To get more food the villages may be visited where the villagers will offer to bargain for food (watch your money supply) and you can add to your team or replace lost members by bartering for one of the villagers. Pitching a bid too low may upset them and they won't deal with you. This is sad because, once visited, a village can't be returned to again. The major problem to be encountered on your safari is the island's wildlife. Almost every move made will result in your party stumbling upon some creature or other. Some of these are virtually university educated and ask mathematical quizzes of you. Some demand that you tell them their name. Others ask memory questions, but some are downright mean and force you into an arcade sequence. Should you fail the test, one of your party is killed off (hence the value of buying more men from the villages as these represent your lives!). On the other hand, a correctly answered test will give you 500 more 'Rubloons' of money for bartering with. Running out of food will also kill off a member of your team, the boat may only be bought at one village, which you must reach, and to succeed in escaping you must have sufficient food with you. COMMENTS Control keys: vary from sequence to sequence but prompted on screen Use of colour: good Graphics: varied, amusing although a bit small. The hi-res drawings work well Sound: mostly beeps Skill levels: 3 Lives: three to start, then depends on your bartering skills

Crash

Producer: A J Rushto, 48K £6.95 I've been told that this game is now marketed by CDS Micro Systems. In any event it is a jolly and original mixture of arcade bits with text/graphics adventure which should keep you on your toes unless you're a D&D purist. The idea is to take your party of stranded explorers across an island infested with highly intelligent wildlife with university degrees, and beset with natives who want to barter away their food and men to replace that eaten by the men or the intelligent wildlife. Once you have visited a village it disappears forever, presumably wiped out through lack of resistance to some vile white man's disease, but it teaches you caution in your bargaining, if you're getting short of explorers (lives) in your party. Losing them all means death to the player. The main object is to find the only boat, buy it and sail away from this Magnus Magnusson madhouse. Every animal encountered has some problem for you; sometimes its an arcade style situation, sometimes they want to know the answer to a difficult mathematical problem. If you fail a member of your party gets eaten. Nice clear graphics and a veritable MGM musical score makes this a very enjoyable game. Recommended.

Read it at Crash - The Online Edition

Crash

Producer: A J Rushto, 48K £6.95 I've been told that this game is now marketed by CDS Micro Systems. In any event it is a jolly and original mixture of arcade bits with text/graphics adventure which should keep you on your toes unless you're a D&D purist. The idea is to take your party of stranded explorers across an island infested with highly intelligent wildlife with university degrees, and beset with natives who want to barter away their food and men to replace that eaten by the men or the intelligent wildlife. Once you have visited a village it disappears forever, presumably wiped out through lack of resistance to some vile white man's disease, but it teaches you caution in your bargaining, if you're getting short of explorers (lives) in your party. Losing them all means death to the player. The main object is to find the only boat, buy it and sail away from this Magnus Magnusson madhouse. Every animal encountered has some problem for you; sometimes its an arcade style situation, sometimes they want to know the answer to a difficult mathematical problem. If you fail a member of your party gets eaten. Nice clear graphics and a veritable MGM musical score makes this a very enjoyable game. Recommended.

Your Spectrum

Peter Shaw

Stephen Cathrall

Stewart McPherson

SPECTRUM SOFT Starting this issue Your Spectrum will be touring computer clubs up and down the country in an effort to find dedicated games enthusiasts who will give us their impressions, thoughts and feelings on the current selection of new releases. Little do they know it, but these unsuspecting souls will be contributing a large slice of our regular review section in the future. This month we visited the Stanwell Computer Club (which meets weekly at the Stanwell School, Short Lane, every Friday evening from 7-10pm). Five of the resident 'freaks' were enlisted to tell us (and you) what was good or bad about the programs we gave them to play around with. In some cases comment was justifiably harsh, and in others they could hardly contain their glee at coming across a really well thought-out game. The guinea-pig five whose comments appear below, are all members of the club, and they are (in alphabetical order): Corrie Brown, Stephen Cathrall, Ryan Davis, Stewart McPherson and Peter Shaw. Peter, by the way, is also Secretary of the Stanwell Club. Them we do thank. SPECTRUM SAFARI CDS Microsystems £5.95 A semi-adventure where you wander round the screen coming across various animals which all ask you to play games, or solve riddles. Really, a sort of compendium of games rolled into one.

Read it at Your Spectrum Unofficial Archive

Crash

Producer: A J Rushton, 48K £6.95 I've been told that this game is now marketed by CDS Micro Systems. In any event it is a jolly and original mixture of arcade bits with text/graphics adventure which should keep you on your toes unless you're a D&D purist. The idea is to take your party of stranded explorers across an island infested with highly intelligent wildlife with university degrees, and beset with natives who want to barter away their food and men to replace that eaten by the men or the intelligent wildlife. Once you have visited a village it disappears forever, presumably wiped out through lack of resistance to some vile white man's disease, but it teaches you caution in your bargaining, if you're getting short of explorers (lives) in your party. Losing them all means death to the player. The main object is to find the only boat, buy it and sail away from this Magnus Magnusson madhouse. Every animal encountered has some problem for you; sometimes its an arcade style situation, sometimes they want to know the answer to a difficult mathematical problem. If you fail a member of your party gets eaten. Nice clear graphics and a veritable MGM musical score makes this a very enjoyable game. Recommended.

Personal Computer News

Lasting Appeal 4/5

Playability 4/5

Use Of Machine 4/5

Overall Value 4/5

Steve McClure 4/5

NAME: Spectrum Safari SYSTEM: Spectrum 48K PRICE: £5.95 PUBLISHER: AJ Rushton, [redacted] FORMAT: Cassette OUTLETS: Mail order SUFFERING SAFARIS! Safaris are dangerous enterprises, and A J Rushton's Spectrum Safari is no exception. The game's appeal lies mainly in its perverse (and sometimes irritating) wit. While many other computer games revel in violence and death, there's enough of an element of black humour in Safari to make it a healthy exercise in pure fun. OBJECTIVES The objective of Safari sounds simple enough. You and two other intrepid explorers must reach the southeast corner of an island on which you are trapped, starting at the northwest corner of said island. On the way you and your fellow worthies must trade with members of various native villages for food and the boat you need to leave the place. Only one of the villages has the boat, however. Sounds easy, right? Wrong. This island has more tricks up its figurative sleeve than Mandrake the Magician. The game's real challenge lies in trying to outwit a variety of nasty creatures that pop up on screen with alarming regularity. Unless you perform the tasks outlined by those beasties you're dead meat. You must also be able to make canny deals with the natives for food. Otherwise you can lose members of your party through starvation. FIRST IMPRESSIONS This is a game with any number of possible courses of action. But at the same time Safari's opening set of instructions are clear, concise and relatively free of mumbo-jumbo - a pleasant relief. The game's witty style is apparent from the beginning as the instructions flash on to a decidedly off-beat musical accompaniment. The cassette sleeve gives no indication of Safari's high quality. Rushton and friends should have been a little more market conscious, perhaps, and designed a more visually appealing package. IN PLAY You move your exploration party north, south, east, or west by hitting, logically enough, one of the N, S, E or W keys. But there's not a lot of moving about in Safari. Before you've moved more than two or three steps in any direction you're likely to meet one of the animal challengers. Before moving anywhere it's important to remember that each time you move, each man uses up one food pack. So it's best to try to walk in a straight line towards your goal, the southeast corner of the island. The island is divided into open country, with a lake surrounded by a swamp in the centre. As the game's instructions make clear, it's wise to avoid the swamp as much as possible, despite the fact that native villages are located just inside its boundaries. It was my bad luck to fall victim to the dreaded swamp, and I found my party had been reduced by one man even without the intervention of an animal. About those animals. The difficulties posed by these critters vary widely. For example there's a lion whose purpose if, life is to try to get you to remember his name. This he does by flashing his name on the screen ever so briefly. If you type his correct name into the computer good for you. If not, you become Leo's (or Herbert's or Chris's) dinner. It should be mentioned that the lion announces his presence with a tasteful electronic version of the opening bars of The Lion Sleeps Tonight. Similarly, animal challenger Bruce the Koala's arrival on the scene is heralded by a brief rendition of Waltzing Matilda. Unfortunately cute little Brucie is quite likely to bring tears to the eyes of the unsuspecting Safari player who must guess which of 100 eucalyptus trees Bruce is hiding behind. You've six chances, and should you fail, another explorer bites the dust. Bruce is rather sporting, though, and gives you clues like 'Pretty Good For A Pommy' when you're hot on his trail. Less wonderful is the arcade-style Maze of Crocodiles,which is much more a test of skill than friendly Bruce amid the trees. Negotiating this takes some quick thinking and a fair degree of manual dexterity. Should you fail, that awful Funeral March comes on again. Other animals the intrepid Safari player will encounter include the Mathematical Marmosets, who are displayed in alarming profusion on screen in just a few brief seconds. If your estimate of their number is off, then it's goodbye to you. There is also the snake shoot, in which you have a set amount of time to shoot off a series of arrows at the dreaded snakes, who will reduce you to so much adder fodder should you fail to kill enough. But the award for Safari's most frustrating foe goes to the Kicking Sheep. Here you've got to guess which of the sheep's legs will kick next. If you don't obtain a score of at least five correct guesses in the ten chances you have you're out. This is one of the few weak areas of the game, as it's well-nigh impossible to guess correctly. Should you be skillful - and lucky - enough to get past all the other animal menaces you'll eventually reach the edge of the sea and make your escape. But since that's rather hard to do, Rushton has thoughtfully provided a practice mode that enables you to hone your skills against any of the various animal challengers. VERDICT An excellent game, well thought out and beautifully executed. Safari has great sound effects and graphics that are neither gimmicky nor confusing.