By Steve Broad
Genre: Arcade: Catch the
crisps.
Crisp Snatcher was apparently created in 1984 with
the intention of setting the blossoming games market on fire. Steve presumably just never found the right
software house, but perhaps he should have sent a copy to The Power House, the
company that saw SQIJ fit to unleash on the world because Crisp Snatcher is a
confusing buggy howler of a game!
Once we start the game we
are assaulted by a gaudy display that would have William Burroughs running from
the telly, and we encounter the first bug .
Like SQIJ, Crisp Snatcher has a keyread bug! They are supposed to be 6,7 and 0 but for
some reason occasionally they just don’t register - Excellent work!
Once you manage to engage
with your rubber keys you can begin.
Yellow crispy like blobs descend from the sky and you must catch them in
your bag, but beware the green errr thing, that travels from left to right
occasionally dropping crystals of glass.
Of course it does. The crisps
fall too quickly and you move too slowly to be able to catch them, and it’s not
clear what the laser even does!
Or am I doing something
wrong?
A really nice touch is that
after the inevitable GAME OVER message, when you try to restart the game
crashes!
A superb piece of
crap gamesmanship.
Well done and thankyou
Steve!
Download here.
By Rebelstar without a
cause
Genre: Adventure sauce
Mountains of Ketchup (a pun on the ZX Spectrum adventure classic
Mountains of Ket of course) marks Rebelstar’s 15th entry to this
year’s CGC. First impressions suggest a
rather simple poorly presented BASIC adventure (though is faithful to Ket’s layout) but don’t be fooled – still condiments
run deep.
I like the use of action
keys instead of typing commands, and the fact there is no limit on how much you
can carry (though I’m not sure if I could
carry a lawnmower and a mine detector at the same time in reality).
I’m not going to spoil the surprise
but in addition to the simple text puzzles, there are some built in arcade style
mini-games embedded in MOK which brought the biggest smile to my face.
Mountains of ketchup is
tinged with tripe but is an excellent kernel of an idea that I’d love to see
expanded upon. I have to say I was disappointed
it finished so quickly!
It’s crap, but play it,
really – it’s great.
Thankyou Rebelstar!
<What the hell are the
slippers for?>
Download here.
Download Game Map.
By MykeP
Genre: Arcade: Wear you
down.
It’s fair to say we have a
game here of epic proportions. In part
it is a rework of a game written in 1998, and with its 2 sided tape,
introduction, great graphics and numerous characters with backstories it’s
going to have to try bloody hard to be crap.
Thankfully it doesn’t disappoint.
You start naturally enough
with side 1, which following an excellent loading screen (with some more chortleworthy easter eggs) gives us game and character
info. You may notice that SUFTT bears a passing resemblance to some classic coin
op beat ‘em ups like Street Fighter, and like most of them it continues the
tradition of barmy backstories and stupendous mismatches (a cowboy versus an alien?).
The 10 characters weave a tangled web of various grudges of one type or
another, and the only solution is obviously
to have a fighting contest where you kick and punch each other into submission.
It’s worth mentioning that
SUFFT pushes the spectrums memory to the limits (which the total of 9 minutes loading attests to), and Myke had to
drop 2 characters and the redefine keys option to save memory.
Onto side 2 and the game
itself. There are so many nice touches
here, great graphics, logos, menu screen – so good that it nearly doesn’t belong in the competition. But like so many other games it comes good (well, crap) when it comes down to the
gameplay. We can probably get Myke on
the trades description act for having the audacity to have the words ‘turbo’ in
the title!
Once you have selected your
character you have to win 3 bouts each against 2 randomly selected opponents,
then you fight your nemesis. If you
make it that far, win or lose you get a victory or failure message specific to
the character.
The fight is a fairly
simple affair, and the same graphics are used every time (though there is a lovely detailed backdrop). The moves available are flying kick, punch,
kick and block. Which move is successful
depends on how many character cells you are from your opponent. Like a lot of beat ‘em ups there are certain
moves that do more damage than others and the player can easily win if relying
solely on them. The AI is actually quite
good so if you play ‘properly’ you will find the game surprisingly challenging,
and dare I say it – enjoyable (especially
if using an emulator you crank the processor up to 14MHz).
So, Super UDG FighterZ 2
Turbo is definitely worth a go, but steel yourself for a potential physical and
psychological beating, especially if you get to hear the deadly putdown by
ZX-8100.
“It looks like you’ve got jam all over your face”
Ouch.
Thankyou Myke!
Tipshack: win every fight – walk into your
opponent and hold down ‘P’, you will take some hits but will always land more
yourself.
Download side 1 here.
Download side 2 here.
By Steve McCrea
Genre: Text: typing pirates
Garrrr! Come ‘ere Jim laaaad, come sit on Cap’n Long
John Silver’s knee, I ahhzz a deal for ye.
See this in my chest me hearty?
That be a ZX-Spectrum, the finest booty I’ve ever swagged during my
sweet trade, from a bald pated lubber while aaat port o’ Cambridge. Let’s be playing a grand game, called dearest
urinals – that be an anagram of the finest story evarrrr told me hearty. This cassette I be holding here has but one
and twenty kilobytes of text from it, some fine graphics to boot and makes fine use of the F, the Z and the X.
Now then matey, here’s what
we do. Said Speccy be quoted a passage
from said book and you must unjumble them there letters as quick aaaazz you
can, the longer you wait the further me and my gen’lmen o’ fortune go. First one to treasure island wins, or rather
Jim laaad, if the jolly roger gets thaaar first, the squiffies aboard your
swaggy will experience a keelhauling they’ll never forget.
Thankyou Steve! (Now pass the grog)
Download here.
EDIT - reading that back I realise at some point I lost 'Pirate' and took on 'Cornish'
By MykeP
Genre:
drop ‘n’ don’t hatch
This
is more, or less, based on the modern game character of a similar name.
Those familiar with it will know it involves button (or pad) mashing in order
to lay as many eggs as possible, and that this version bears little to no
resemblance whatsoever! The ever increasing number of sprites to be drawn
on the screen presents a problem for the spectrum coder: how to maintain game
speed and keep pushing those pixels around? Well, with some lightening
fast machine code, clever game design and general use of nifty tricks it is
more than possible to make a playable version for the good old ZX-Spectrum.
But
this is the CGC, and thankfully MykeP has used none of the above!
Fans
of loading screens be sure to turn off turbo load and appreciate the lovely
easter eggs hiding under the attributes. This chicken based game is
programmed in BASIC and marks an excellent first entry from Myke.
I've
not played any modern version, but I think I've got to grips with the
gameplay here. Press the any
key and the chicken lays an egg, fail to press a key before a random counter
winds down and they hatch. It is not actually so much about button
mashing, as button holding, as that suffices to keep the game going! The number of eggs on the screen is your
score. So naturally it is fairly easy to accrue a large number of eggs,
and equally naturally the spectrum slowly grinds to a halt giving S.N.A.I.L a
run for its money! I suppose in this sense the biggest challenge is one
of inner strength, how long can you bear to keep mashing a key and
watching your poor spectrum get tortured?
Nice
presentation, lovely beeper music, and an unplayable load of old carp that is
most welcome in the competition!
Thank you Myke!
Download TAPE here.
By Retromad
Genre: Arcade: Fruit flinch
This ace BASIC game
features Monkey Doo, remember? Everyone’s
favourite t-shirted manky, mange ridden Monkey puppet from the 80’s? No, well maybe that’s because Retromad failed
to keep copies of his earlier C15 tapes, or one of the big software houses
failed to spot a smash hit when it dropped on the doormat. No matter, as Monkey Doo is now available
again for the ZX-Spectrum, and this time it’s the full package – game, inlay and hit single, yes, I said hit single.
Monkey Doo’s Fruit Salad
gets off to a great start as it is supplied as a z80 file on which you have to
type RUN to start. Then follows a
loonnnnnggg intro with piccies, beeps, references to the Grattan catalogue, and
some instructions along the way. The aim
of the game is to make Monkey Doo 8 fruit salads, not just any old fruit salad
mind – it has to be composed of an apple and a orange and a banana and a
cherry (different to the one on the inlay which appears to be festooned with Monkey stools, or perhaps blackberries). There must be no fruplicates (that’s shorthand for fruit duplicates in
order to save time) and you have to think quick – if you don’t press the
right key in time the game is over and all the fruit salads are lost. 1 fruit salad is manageable but each time it
speeds up. Press A for Apple, B for
Banana, C for Cherry and O for Orange, when a fruplicate appears press D to discard.
Sounds complicated? Don’t worry if so, because Retromad has
supplied a catchy hit single to help you remember what to do.
MDFS is both crap and
brilliant. It encapsulates a lot of
emotions, it looks and sounds like an early 80’s bit of homebrew but there are
no bugs and it’s addictive to play. I
found myself wanting to get to the next level, but mind and body don’t always
seem to collaborate fast enough, each time I read the words “HERE COMES THE FRUIT”
I was genuinely nervous about completing the level.
So far I can only make a
pathetic 5 fruit salads (poor Monkey Doo), but for the person who completes the
game there is a prize – just jot down the London phone number and give the
code. Yes I’ve peeked at the program to
see that, and yes I was tempted to ring the (probably made up) number and give
the code. I could of course be wrong and
there is actually an amazing prize – but there’s only one way to find out – GET PLAYING!
Thankyou Retromad!
Download game here.
Download Inlay here.
Download ‘hit’ single here.
By Steve McCrea
Genre: Arcade: Rickets
Firstly, congratulations to
Steve on his world record 22nd entry to the CGC.
This entry takes us all the
way back to 1971, and you are a primary school teacher trying to evade the milk
snatching talons of Margaret Thatcher.
It’s actually a pretty nice
maze game, the object of which is to run around the school desks collecting
milk and giving it to the pupil most in need.
Instead of the traditional symptoms of malnutrition, this game
demonstrates need for milk by the sprite flashing on and off! Once delivered, another carton appears
elsewhere in the maze (you can only carry
one at a time naturally) and you continue until you’ve done 12 pints or
Maggie gets you. The further you progress
in this maze Maggie seems to become better at chasing you, to the point that it
does get pretty frantic toward the end of each level (Steve informs me Maggie uses A* pathfinding!).
MT:MS has plenty of crap
qualities but I must confess to being disappointed to have completed it so
quickly, so it can’t be that bad eh?
The game is silent, apart
from when Maggie does catch you, and
you hear her utter those terrifying words… “I
want milk”.
(either
that or ‘I like pomme frites’, I can’t quite tell).
Thankyou Steve! There’ll be an appropriate prize with your
name on it at the end of the year.
Download here.
