Tomb of Syrinx

Sinclair User

Overall 7/10

Label: Power House Author: Ayyaz Mehmood Price: £1.99 Memory: 48K/128K Joystick: various Reviewer: This game has been written by a chap called Ayyaz Mehmood, who penned Hercules, a game that I thought was quite fun. Tomb of Syrinx is along similar lines, and chronicles your efforts to find five keys from within its mysterious walls, whilst avoiding a motley collection of monsters that seem to just appear precisely when you don't want them to. It's a tried and tested maze-scrolling game, with some very clean graphics that are not only colourful, but distinctly atmospheric.

Sinclair User

Overall 3/5

Andy Moss 3/5

Label: Power House Price: £1.99 Joystick: various Memory: 48K/128K Reviewer: Andy Moss This game has been written by a chap called Ayyaz Mehmood, who penned Hercules, a game that I thought was quite fun to play. Tomb of Syrinx is along similar lines, and chronicles your efforts to find five keys from within its mysterious walls, whilst avoiding a motley collection of monsters that seem to just appear precisely when you don't want them to. It's a tried and tested maze-scrolling game, with some very clean graphics that are not only colourful, but distinctly atmospheric. He's also built in some pretty tasty sound FX for the laser gun, almost the same sound and power as the cannon Defender. All games have flaws, and I suppose if one was to criticise Tomb of Syrinx, it would be the lack of real excitement in the gameplay. There isn't really a lot to do except zap a few nasties and wander around the place looking for those wonderful keys. What the monsters do though, is to spin and weave around in a very smooth fashion, and there seems to be a wide choice of the little beasties to home in on.

Your Sinclair

Graphics 5/10

Playability 4/10

Value For Money 3/10

Addictiveness 4/10

Overall 4/10

Tony Hetherington 4/10

The Power House £1.99 Reviewer: Tony Hetherington If it wasn't for the fact that The Power House is the new budget label from CRL, I would swear on my aardvark's life that this was an old game that had been hanging around for years. It has the same style of graphics as the old 16K games, and the screen scrolls jerkily, two spaces at a time, so that you have no idea what's ahead and you die - very quickly. The idea is to collect five keys. If you don't get killed, mangled or mutilated in the process, you're lucky. The nasties you meet are nigh-on invincible, needing hit after hit to be disposed of, and they cunningly appear out of nowhere, usually exactly where you're standing. At one point I stepped on one (well, I think I stepped on one, if I didn't...), lost all my lives in one fell swoop and the game crashed, leaving me with an empty screen. Yep, folks, Bernie the Bug strikes again! A free audio recording has been added to the game, for some strange reason. As far as I could tell, this sounded like two cats - one being throttled and the other being forcibly fed through a mangle. Not a pretty sound, and unnecessary as far as the games concerned. Come on CRL! With Mastertronic, Firebird and Codemasters producing some high quality budget games, this doesn't have a chance. Any more like this and they'll be sealing your tomb!

ZX ComputingZX Computing Glob Senior

Overall Groan

Powerhouse £1.99 Tomb of Syrinx is a sub Jet Willy game in which you are trapped in the aforementioned tomb and have to find the five keys of Syrinx in order to escape. You've got a laser to kill the Guardians (a load of blocky little sprites) with, and you move around the maze simply by moving up/down, left/right, without even the blessing of a jump button to liven things up. The graphics are state-of-the-art circa 1983, and the maze scrolls jerkily as you move from one room to another. There's a bit of 'House' music included on the tape, and the game crashed thirty seconds into my second game so I had to reload and start all over again.

Crash

Presentation 40%

Graphics 24%

Playability 25%

Addictive Qualities 22%

Value For Money 26%

Overall 26%

Ben Stone

Paul Sumner

Producer: The Power House Retail Price: £1.99 Author: Ayyaz Mahmood The Tomb of Syrinx is an ancient and deadly place which no man has ever attempted to explore... until now that is. With the chance to finally show your true bravery you find yourself alone in the horrid mausoleum, armed only with your laser gun. There is only once chance of escape from this foul place, the five keys of the Tomb must be found and collected. Perhaps an easy task, if it was not for the strange Immune Guardians. On entry to the Tomb, these Guardians give a few moments of grace before attacking. Resembling a collection of sour-faced suns, rotating crosses and gangrenous hands, they bounce off walls to attack with increasing ferocity. Contact results in a loss of life. To avoid them you are able to move the left and right, or up and down, through the maze of corridors and rooms. The laser gun is used to destroy Guardians, but some are resilient, and several shots have to strike home before these meet their maker. Points are awarded for each kill, the score being displayed at the bottom right. But Immune Guardians are not the only enemy encountered. Snakes, scorpions wait to bite or sting, and bandaged mummies kill. Five lives are available to you, the number remaining being shown at the bottom right corner of the screen. COMMENTS Control keys: Z/X left/right, P/L up/down, zero to fire Joystick: Kempston, Interface 2, Cursor Use of colour: poor Graphics: small and simple Sound: limited spot FX Skill levels: one Screens: scrolling play area