Acorn User
1st July 1986
Author: Bernard Emblem
Publisher: Beau Jolly
Machine: Acorn Electron
Published in Acorn User #048
A Jolly Collection
I suppose it's wrong to complain when you're offered ten games for under a tenner, but when you've already bought one, two are virtually identical and two more aren't worth playing twice, you begin to wonder...
10 Computer Hits gets off to a flying start with Chuckie Egg, one of the classic games for the Electron and BBC Micro.
For newcomers, the plot is simple - run round eight screens avoiding birds and collecting eggs, then do them again, but this time there's a big duck chasing you. Hilariously funny, incomparably addictive, 10/10.
Game two is Ghouls, a neat implementation of a standard plot. You have to find your way to the top of the screen, avoiding ghosts and spiders and the like, balancing on wobbly floorboards and moving platforms, jumping over deadly spikes, eating power pills, the 'just one more go' instinct given that extra edge by a wicked laugh from the ghost as each life is lost.
You really can't help taking it personally. It's funny, smooth-moving, and frustratingly difficult. 8/10.
The third game is Gisburne's Castle - it's an arcade adventure which has potential that it doesn't fulfill.
As Robin Hood, you wander around Sherwood Forest and environs, attacking people and being attacked in turn, picking up stray objects along the way.
What annoys me though is that the game was so obviously written to run on the BBC Micro, and not adapted in any way at all for the Electron.
It's the title page which is the dead giveaway - mode 7 double-height characters on the Beeb; on the Electron, though, everything appears twice twice. I wonder if this is really a 'computer hit'? 3/10.
Game four is Guardian, an excellent implementation of the arcade classic Defender.
It has a simple enough theme - you fly your plane as horizontally as you can, shoot at everything in sight, and rescue your pals if at all possible. Very smooth, colourful, fast and noisy. 8/10.
Special Operations from wargame specialists Lothlorien is the fifth game. It involves picking a team of tommies with a suitable balance of skills, parachuting into a forest (quote: "The map is not accurate"!), then negotiating a safe passage through a total of eighteen maps, trying to complete seven objectives.
This is a game which is sufficiently sophisticated to keep most wargamers out of the way for quite a while. 7/10.
Game six is Arabian Nights. It's awful. 1/10.
The seventh game is Eddie Kidd's Jump Challenge. This was a bestseller but I can't imagine why. The programming's fine, but I could only take so much of jumping over endless rows of vehicles. Still, it sold well, so someone must like it. 6/10.
Killer Gorilla, a routine version of a classic is the eighth game.
Here's the plot (sounds familiar?): you're the gorilla, trying to make your way to the top of the screen, collecting objects on the way, as nasty things do their utmost to impede your progress. It's certainly nothing original, just good clean fun. 6/10.
Game nine is Night World. Some like it, some loathe it. It's a genuine arcade adventure, in which you explore lots of underground caverns and go around collecting things. In the daytime you're a mere humanoid, at night a mutant gargoyle, whose 'mysterious powers' mean you can jump further. I like it, but I'm thoroughly lost. 7/10.
The last is Gauntlet, an excellent implementation of the arcade classic Defender. A simple theme- fly your plane horiz... yes, it's just like Guardian. What a cheek, putting them both in! But, as a game, it's just as good as Guardian. 8/10.
10 Computer Hits does contain a reasonable balanced selection of game types, and would provide an inexpensive introduction to computer games for the novice. Owners with an established collection could be tempted too, as will Beeb owners, since most of the games run as well as, or better, on the BBC Micro than one the Electron.
