TI99/4A - Munch Man Video Review

TI99/4A - Parsec Video Review

Commodore Amiga - Yo! Joe!

Commodore Amiga
Yo! Joe!

Y'know, some things I'll never understand. The popularity of retro gaming, for instance. No, I understand why retro gaming is popular, but there's certain games I've either never played or never understood the hype behind them. Take Head Over Heels, for instance, or the original Batman game. I've just never got into them as much as apparently most people did.

Then there's the games that I really liked that no-one ever mentions. In all my time of retro-gaming, I haven't heard a single mention of Yo! Joe! for the Amiga, except by myself, and I don't know why. Me and several other of my friends loved the game, having originally been hooked on a playable demo of the first half of the first level... and that's not as bad as it sounds because the levels were HUGE.

Basically, then... you, with or without a friend, must make your way through some big levels of various designs, beating things up along the way. Animation is wonderfully smooth, the graphics are highly detailed, and the controls are simple and easy to learn.

The reason you're in this situation isn't abundantly clear. All you can tell is some evil magic circle wants to cause Joe and Nat (the playable characters) pain and suffering, and so make you fight your way through their domain. Well, it's easy enough to just say "Whatever" to the plot, it could be about being pulled up for not scooping the poop for all I care, as long as the main game mechanic remains as it is, because this is one enjoyable experience from beginning to end.

It wasn't particularly difficult, but you did need to exercise a little brain power here and there and choose when to back off a bit. Attempting to simply plough forward was just a little too dumb and would cause you to die fairly readily. Ducking and weaving a bit delivered far better results.

Magazine reviews were mixed, public opinion was and still is mixed. I would be very interested to know what other people think about this game, so please post your comments below. If you haven't played before I'd say it's worth hunting down for a quick blast.

TI99/4A - Munch Man

TI99/4A
Munch Man

Pac Man has been cloned in many different ways. It’s often said, however, that despite all the different versions, the original remains the best and nothing’s going to top it. One thing’s for sure, the new “DX” version of Pac Man certainly doesn't.

Anyway, that’s a whole different article and story and in no way helps set the scene for Munch Man. Munch Man was the TI99/4A’s version of Pac Man, and is, in my humble opinion, just as good as the famed game, although in quite a different graphical style.

First off, gone are the dark backgrounds of most games of this genre, and in comes a bright white background. Gone are the dots to eat, instead you have to make a chain round the maze (until later, anyway). You still have your power pills, though they're shaped like Texas Instruments logos. The ghosts are replaced by "Hoonos", baddies that come in a variety of shapes and speeds.

Graphics are colourful, and the animation is simplistic yet effective. The sound effects are marvellous, especially the satisfying "crunch" as you eat one of the Hoonos. As far as gameplay goes, it's no more complicated than Pacman, but just as fun. The speed of the game starts off alright, but increases steadily to a stern test of nerve, especially when you reach the last couple of levels in the loop... rather than having your visible maze and filling it with chains, now the walls are invisible, but paths are marked by tiny TI logos that you must eat. Unfortunately, as you eat these logos, you take away your map, leaving you reliant on your memory as to where the paths are.

Let me be honest... if you're a Billy Mitchell type who can deliver a perfect high score on PacMan, you're NOT going to find this overly challenging. However, a regular everyday joe like most of us will find Munch Man a refreshing and fun alternative to everyone's favourite yellow ball. The further you get, the faster the game is, so the challenge is constantly increasing.

One last thing... the game contains one of the earliest known "Cheat" modes. At the start screen, before the title animation begins, if you hold the Shift button and type "838", you can select what level you want to start on and how many lives you have.

Thanks to emulation, you can get hold of this game to play within moments, which I've tried, but I have to be honest... I still prefer the real thing every time.

Sinclair ZX Spectrum - Batman: The Movie

Sinclair Spectrum
Batman: The Movie

Ocean software were, for a very long time, considered quite rightly to be one of the best (if not THE best) software houses for converting a movie licence to a more than reasonable game.

Sure, they missed the mark every now and again, but usually they delivered the goods with alarming regularity. And the good thing was they stuck to a simple formula, where they would take certain key scenes from the film and base a level on each one, creating a multi-level multi-style extravaganza (unfortunately occasionally leaving out 48K owners).

During one of their most awesome phases, Ocean produced licensed wonders such as Robocop, The Untouchables, and the subject of this review, Batman: The Movie.

Distancing itself from the original Batman isometric 3D adventure and the “Batman: The Caped Crusader” game, this game was divided very simply into 5 levels, with you donning the cape and assuming the eponymous hero’s role.

Levels 1 & 5 are superb platform levels, the first in the form of the Axis Chemical Plant, where you had to basically defeat many of Napier’s thugs (armed with guns or grenades) by means of Batarangs and your Bat Belt, avoiding natural(ish) hazards such as long falls and chemical drips. The level is pretty big, and to get to the end you’ll need to get the hang of using your Bat Belt (and Bat Rope) to swing and hoist yourself up to platforms above. Once at the end of the level, you must knock Napier from his platform into a VAT of chemicals (much like the film), turning him into The Joker.

The player and enemy sprites are large and detailed, and, remembering you lose a third of the screen with the score panel and energy meter, it did make things a bit “Close Quarters”, as in you didn’t necessarily see an enemy until they were upon you. However, minor gripes aside, the first level was a nicely balanced affair, with enough challenge for first-time players to come unstuck, but not overly difficult.

Level 2, then, and it’s into the Batmobile and one of the more challenging and frustrating parts of the game. Viewed from the side you must drive through the streets of Gotham city, avoiding other cars on the road and blockades, occasionally turning left (and left only) to get to the Bat Cave. Getting to the end within the time limit is no problem, but without careful maneuvering your energy level wouldn’t last the distance.

You had two choices at turning left, either fire the bat rope to the lamppost on the corner and swing round (the fastest and most stylish way), or skid sideways and attempt to drive through that way. Whilst I preferred to skid, it was definitely cooler to use the bat rope.

Reach the Bat Cave, and it’s onto the puzzle mini-level. Several products are in front of you, 3 of which are contaminated by the Joker’s evil poison thing. You select 3 products and are told how many of those are contaminated. From this you must use logic to determine which three are the correct answers.

It’s a simple enough problem, made more difficult by the (very tight) 1 minute time limit. Of course, you could be lucky and pick all 3 right answers first time.

Onto level 4, then, and probably the most difficult part of the game. The Joker has decided to release his poison in the form of Gas, and to do so has staged a parade with lots of balloons, all filled with the poisonous gases. Taking control of the Bat-Wing (Seriously, was EVERYTHING in Bat Man some form of “Bat”-thing? Need a shower? Use the Bat-Gel. Bad case of diarrhoea? You’ll need Bat-Roll and Bat-Suppositories. Anyone for Cricket? I’ve brought the Bat-bat), your job is to fly through the parade, cutting the connecting cables of the balloons, releasing them into the air and away from the city.

No doubt you’re saying “That doesn’t sound so hard!”. Wait until the helicopters come along, matey. One touch equals death, so you’d better be good at manoeuvring past them, or you’ll soon end up as Bat-Soup.

To finish, then, it’s a final chase of the Joker up to the roof of Gotham City Cathedral. This time, you’ve got spiked floors to contend with (instant death!) and also crumbling floors, so you’ll need to be on your guard all the way through. Taking the Joker out at the end is slightly different, but I’ll not spoil that for you. If you got that far, you deserve to discover it for yourself.

So is the game any good?

Yes.

OK, so that was a bit of a short, to-the-point answer, but this is a short, to-the-point game. Even with the time limit of 10 minutes on the platform levels, you’ll easily do that once you know where you’re going. But even so, it’s a highly polished product with some superb graphics, and lots of nice touches, so it’s certainly worth hunting down and playing through.

Among my favourite of the touches is the energy bar, something that was used in The Untouchables, too, where the energy bar is in fact the picture of Batman at the bottom of the screen. As you lost energy, Batman’s face was replaced by The Joker (In the Untouchables, they used Al Capone, obviously). This was probably why Ocean’s games often had a big status bar, to fit in the score, number of lives, time limit AND A GREAT BIG BENKING ENERGY BAR PICTURE!

Whilst it is a nice touch, sometimes you did wish the play area was a little bit bigger.

Finally, it’s also worth mentioning the music. Whilst I don’t know if it’s based on music from the movie (I’ve not really watched it that closely to be fair), the 128K soundtrack is most enjoyable, and suits each level REALLY well. In fact, it’s so good, I have the Batmobile level music on in the car sometimes.

So yeah, I’d advise you to check out this little gem of a game, you may well finish it in one sitting, but you’ll have fun doing it, and maybe you’ll want to check out Ocean’s similar movie tie-in licences such as Robocop and The Untouchables.

Magazine - Your Sinclair

Magazine
Your Sinclair

Whilst we’re off the topic of video games themselves for the moment, why not turn our attention to one of THE most popular and influential magazines of the Spectrum era, the amazingly spectacularly crap (in a funky skillo sort of way) Your Sinclair.

Your Sinclair, or YS as it was affectionately referred to, started life as a slightly more technical affair called Your Spectrum, however due to the QL launch (and much hyped potential), the magazine closed and relaunched as the Your Sinclair we knew and loved so well.

Unfortunately for myself, I missed out on a lot of the “Golden days” of Your Sinclair, only beginning my collection from issue 49 (with N.O.M.A.D. and Bilbo and the Lizard King on the covertape), but straight away YS had its impact on me. The way the reviews were written, the way the letters were answered, just about everything in there really, all contributed to the way I spoke and talked about things.

Stuff wasn’t “rubbish” anymore, it was “crap”. If something was good, it was “Brillo”. Scary statements could be proceeded with “Yikes”.

Sarcasm and humour were key ingredients to most articles, which is probably why it was such a cult smash magazine, outlasting both Crash and Sinclair User by a long margin. Among the regular sections were the usual “Tipshop” and Letters pages, supplemented with columns from the Pico family (long story), Marcus Berkmann’s clinic, the Trainspotter award, Around The World (a section where people from foreign lands could write in with profuse amounts of Engrish). Other regular features included Program Pitstop (type-in listings and hexadecimal machine code), Input Output (Classifieds), Pssst (latest industry news and sneak-peeks), Megapreviews (first in-depth look at forthcoming games) and more. Some features ran for a limited time, such as Spec Tec (Technical queries answered), the Programming Launderette (spawning the amazing game, The Pathetic Pablo Brothers), Crap Game Corner (Readers’ games reviewed, some were actually pretty good!), Haylp! (problem page introduced to TRY and pad out the dying mag with the distinct lack of reviews forthcoming) and “Complete Guides”, which covered whole genres of games such as Beat ‘em-ups, Shoot ‘em-ups or platform games (and the rest), giving a humorous look at the essential ingredients for each genre, and a run-down of the best and worst examples.
Occasionally we would be treated to a photo-love story, or the brilliant “Competition on every page” (issue 50!) or some other wonderment of one-off article (Rich Pelley’s Guide to YS-Speak was particularly enlightening).

Blessed with a covertape practically every issue (certainly from when I started reading it), some fantastic full games were given away over the years, from N.O.M.A.D. on issue 49 (a game I would have hunted down from playing in Comet), including Chaos (twice due to popular demand, and stretched tapes from the first time round), Dizzy, Ninja Hamster (eventually), Captain Blood, Advanced Lawnmower Simulator and many MANY MANY more.

Advanced Lawnmower Simulator - The original "Crap Game".

The magazine writers (Joystick Jugglers, as they were known) were a varied bunch, the first lot I remember included Matt Bielby as editor, Dave “Whistlin’ Rick” Wilson, Marcus Berkmann (who I think went on to write for a major national newspaper), and Johnathan Davies (famous for owning a pet Warthog called Farty). Other faces to come and go included the hippy Andy Ide, Jon Pillar, Maryanne Booth, Andy Ounsted, Rich Pelley, Duncan MacDonald (Yibble), Jon Nash, my teenage crush Linda Barker, and freelance/regular contributor Stuart Campbell (whose crowning achievement was probably the all-time top 100 games article).

It got that even regular readers became well-known through the letters/tips pages, including the Ellesmere Port Elf, Leigh Loveday, (who put together the Complete Guide to Your Sinclair for the Big Final Issue), Stephen “Not Sven Andersson” Anderson, and the comic-strip by Phil McCardle that became a regular feature, Ernie the Psychotic Madman.

Being a Your Sinclair reader was like being part of a special club, I felt it a great privilege to be a reader, in the same way a regular watcher of Monty Python’s Flying Circus felt it a privilege to see that particular form of comedy.

When I read that Your Sinclair was closing down, and there was to be a big final issue, no matter what the cost, I wasn’t going to miss it. I had to hassle the newsagent I usually bought the magazine from to get it in (they were reluctant, but finally convinced), and despite the slightly high price tag it was absolutely worth it, and is still a treasured possession today. No matter what, I won’t be selling it for many years to come. Seeing the page numbers (which counted down to the end, a great touch) and the back cover (2 cowboys riding into the sunset, with the slogan “Your Sinclair… our work here is done”) still brings a lump to the throat, because, quite simply, no other magazine has come close to reviving the feel and spirit of YS. No other magazine (with the exception of Retro Gamer) has made me want to purchase it month after month. No other magazine (even with old YS writers) has been able to nail down the persistent entertainment that YS sustained to the end.

One of the final articles in the Big Final Issue was a Chaos battle between some of the editorial team. That was truly a fantastic article, and worthy of the price tag alone.

Fortunately for everyone, the World Of Spectrum archive has preserved Your Sinclair in digital format, and with a site like the “Your Sinclair Rock and Roll Years” keeping us up to date with the old writers and anything new that might crop up in the world of Your Sinclair, or indeed the Spectrum, rare as it may be these days. You can find that website HERE, and the World of Spectrum archive? Right HERE, my friend. 

With that in mind, it’s not too late to check out the glory of the perfect magazine. Believe me, I could write for hours about the content, quality and humour contained within the many pages of Your Sinclair. Even when they had to introduce pages like Haylp! and The World to pad things out a bit, they were still done in the YS way.

Their work here may be done, but their legacy will live beyond all expectations.

Board Game - Dingbats

Board Games
Dingbats

Some games are a stroke of genius. Others are more of a damp squib, cashing in on a licence or relying on a daft gimmick. This applies to board games just as much as computer games. Take Headache, for example, with the “pop-o-matic” dice system. It’s basically Ludo, isn’t it? Yet we own both. BOTH!!! Why?

One game has been copied by TV and the puzzle pages of many newspapers and magazines, but NOTHING holds a candle to the original and best version of the game.

That’s right, it’s Dingbats.

So what is a Dingbat? It’s a puzzle, essentially, based on word play. There’s usually no pictures, however letters, numbers, mathematical operators and shapes might be used. Usually the position or size of the letters is important too. But the answer might be a little bit less straightforward than you’d like. The most readily available example of Dingbats is the popular TV quiz show Catchphrase, with the motto “Say what you see”, but they’re usually blindingly obvious. A true Dingbat is slightly trickier than that. For example, what’s this one?

OK, so you’ve got the word “Grass” there, in the middle is a plus sign. The only clue I’m going to give you is… WHAT is a plus sign, and WHERE is it? Think about it, I’ll give the answer at the end.

The board itself is nothing too exciting, however the two piles of cards are the genius behind the games. Like most board games, you’ve got to get from the start to the finish, solving puzzles on the way (if you land on a puzzle space). There are two types of Dingbat puzzles, the Standard or “easy” ones, and the Diabolical, or “Stupidly obscure”. Like all puzzles, you’ll find there’s many that can be identified/solved in the blink of an eye, others that you’ll never get in a month of Sundays, but when you hear the answer you’ll be kicking yourself.

Solving Dingbats is done against the clock, 1 turn of a 30-second egg-timer for the easy ones, 2 turns for the hard. Some Diabolical Dingbats are played as  “All-plays” where everyone tries to guess the Dingbat in competition.

And… erm… well… that’s basically it. The winner gets to wear the “I’m a Dingbats Winner” badge, and there’s not much more to be said.

Except, of course, you are in for hours of fun and laughter as you try to reach the end of the board. Those fiendishly difficult Diabolical Dingbats will have you shaking in fear, praying you get one you’ve seen before (but there’s a lot to get through!), although we deliberately didn’t share the answer on those that weren’t guessed correctly.

The concept of the Dingbats puzzle has been copied in magazines and puzzle books everywhere, however compared to the slightly off-the-wall nature of the true dingbat puzzle, they’re often far too easy, requiring 5 seconds or less to solve.

Dingbats – The Board Game… the original and best.

Oh, the answer to the above Dingbat… “Snake in the grass”. Did you get it?