Escape from Pulsar 7

Crash

Difficulty 7/10

Atmosphere 6/10

Vocabulary 7/10

Logic 5/10

Debugging 10/10

Overall Value 6/10

Derek Brewster 6/10

DEREK BREWSTER'S ADVENTURE TRAIL AC/DC AND BARRY MANILOW Many adventures I received this month are similar in style and presentation to the companies' last efforts, e.g, those from Level 9 and Digital Fantasia. One might expect some advance with each new adventure, perhaps an improvement in presentation or programming. How to cram as many locations as possible into the 48K of the Spectrum, for example, while retaining some useful graphics. Since their initial releases Phipps Associates have made improvements to their games by taking the graphic routines and machine-coding them for a faster response. Some houses produce too many games churned out on a modular basis. This weakens the impact of each adventure such houses release since it is originality and uniqueness that marks the successful adventure. Quilled adventures clearly reduce the opportunities for original programming leading to flat-footed structures and storylines. For the companies themselves it may be a better marketing ploy to go for the one big, original game for it is difficult for any adventure to chart high and make an impact. Now that I've mentioned the rather prosaic world of marketing, I've always wondered why there is such a poor selection of adventures in the high street shops. To make matters worse for the consumer several of the so-called specialist computer shops, often just off the high street, don't fair much better - it's a case of The Hobbit, or an Artic adventure or leave for home empty handed. The Hobbit is a good adventure but along with the Artic games they can now be considered a little dated if for no other reason than most committed adventurers will have by now completed them. If the record buying public were confronted with the same dilemma it would be a case of choosing either AC/DC or Barry Manilow! ESCAPE FROM PULSAR 7 Producer: Digital Fantasy Memory Required: 48K Retail Price: £9.95 Author: Brian Howarth, Wherner Barnes The space freighter Pulsar 7 is returning from an exploratory flight to the outer regions of the Xanotar system, delivering the precious are Redennium to the minor planetoids that have evolved beyond primitive nuclear power. As part payment you take on board a strange creature for the intergalactic zoo that grows too quickly for its cage, breaks out and is now concealed somewhere on the ship. The creature eats the entire crew but you have been shrewd enough to avoid a similar fate until now when you must abandon the freighter and make your escape in the frail shuttle craft. The game has a layout now familiar to the Digital Fantasia Mysterious Adventures. A picture can be switched out from the top half of the screen to reveal the objects and exits while the lower half of the screen accepts input and puts up an occasional comment. A click accompanies all entries including the space key. You find yourself in the freighter's social room where you can see a sign and a closed steel door - and a couch. I wonder if this couch has a key in it as in Waxworks? On examining I do indeed find the key and a less than useful crumpled note. Well this is believable enough since there's probably about ten pounds worth of change down the side of my couch and no doubt keys and crumpled notes. As is the norm with Mysterious Adventures you're told in the bottom half of the screen that 'I'VE FOUND SOMETHING!' and you must look within the list of objects at the top to find out exactly what it is you have found. A related report 'SOMETHING HAPPENED!' greets you when you turn the dull illuminant rod. Unfortunately you are not told exactly what has happened although to be fair you are told when you look at the inventory - you carry a glowing rod. Moving south you enter a crewman's cabin and through another door (GO DOOR) into a similar crewman's cabin, but if you try to return to the first cabin you are greeted with the report WHERE?'. It appears to be a one-way door - strange if not incredible. I don't know about you but I'm no fan of the oneway door. Further on, when travelling from the Captain's Cabin to the Workshop you find your way back blocked, a ploy to force you down into the maze. At times like this you become more aware of the program in the computer and the adventure is that much less convincing. At other times it is the logic of the game which stretches your ability to believe. Would you normally find a circuit board beneath a pillow in a bunk? You are allowed to move the pillow but not to take it - clearly the program is telling you the pillow isn't necessary when it might have been better to find this out for yourself. The more things you can do, whether useful or otherwise, makes a better adventure. This game has two features which, unfortunately, have become standards. Unfortunately, because adventuring should be an actively developing area and not a stale, stuffy one. I refer to the maze and the small rucksack phenomena. I gave hints on how to tackle a maze last month so perhaps that will reduce the niggle here. The small rucksack can only carry five or in this case six objects and perhaps it's time for a new angle on this one. Continually dropping and picking up objects can get laborious while often adding little to the game. For example, is the assumption that it's just as easy to pick a long heavy floorboard as to carry a small key justifiable? On loading this program you are asked 'Resume play on game?' and there is an ugly little bug associated with this. I was at the Vent and pressed N to go north but the computer did not respond; instead I was killed by the dust here and since the program then asks 'Play again Y/N?' the previously entered N NEWed the computer leaving me to reload a rather long program. It would seem sensible to have a double check where programs might be lost in this fashion. In case this all sounds a bit too damning I must say that the vocabulary has a powerful EXAMINE which isn't always the same as SEARCH. I would like to see all adventures make use of these words and reserve EXAMINE for examining an object which should return a detailed description, and SEARCH for searching an object to reveal anything concealed about or in it. EXAMINE in this sense may tell you how an object might be used or how it may prove useful later on. Escape from Pulsar 7 has a very fast response time, has good well-designed graphics that can be easily switched on and off and features 42 as opposed to the Spectrum's more usual 32 characters per line. However, the game lacks that spark of originality and leaves you with the feeling you've seen it all before.

C&VG (Computer & Video Games)

Logic/Difficulty 5/5

Vocabulary 5/5

Plot/Theme 5/5

Keith Campbell

This is the fifth in the Mysterious Adventures series and is loosely based on the box office smash hit horror film Alien. After delivering some Redinium ore to a nearby planet, you are heading for home, complete with a playful little creature, for Earth's intergalactic Zoo. But the creature escapes, plays in the remains of the ore and turns into a savage and bloodthirsty beast, devouring the rest of the crew. You must find your way to the frail shuttle-craft and escape. It is difficult to solve - I managed to complete it in one sitting, starting at 6 o'clock one evening and finishing at 3am the following morning. I played the game on a TRS-80 as my Spectrum version had not yet come through. The Tandy version is text based, where most of the others, including the Spectrum, have graphics. The program does have a large vocabulary and the response times are almost instant! I vote this game as one of the best in the series (second only to Circus). It is difficult in places and I wouldn't recommend it for a novice. Escape from Pulsar 7 from Digital Fantasia for the 48K Spectrum, BBC, Atari, Commodore 64, Dragon 32 TRS-80, Colour Genie. Price varies depending on the machine.