Sinclair User


Blinky's Scary School

Author: Jim Douglas
Publisher: Zeppelin Games
Machine: Spectrum 48K/128K

 
Published in Sinclair User #101

Blinky's Scary School

Mind the blood pressure! They should have games like Blinky's in high level executive stress management courses. If you can keep a civil tongue in your head for more than a few seconds of Blinky activity, you're obviously Trappist monk.

Apprentice ghost Blinky must earn his spectre stripes by succeeding in his first mission; to spook Hamish McTavish - arch ghostbuster - out of his castle. Bit of a tough assignment for a novice spook, and should he fail, it's back to scarey school for another century.

B.S.S. is essentially another runny-jumpy object collecting game. The only features which set it apart from a million others are Blinky's surprising cuteness and the frustration factor. Blinky half glides, half waddles along looking very appealing. Unfortunately the slightly exaggerated inertia effect causes Blinky to skid off countless tiny platforms and plummet into the umpteen chasms of filled with sharp spikes.

Blinky's Scary School

Far from being a lonely old castle, it's positively bustling with activity. Deadly spiders bounce up and down. Deadly flying things swoop around the castle battlements. Deadly snails (?) protect useful objects.

So far as I could gather, there's nothing you can do about these lurking fiends. Since virtually all of them cover an area precisely the length of Blinky's optimum jump, you inevitably lose a degree of energy every time you pass them.

The preamble to the main mission is the collection of the necessary ingredients with which to make a flying spell. Once you can fly, the remaining parts of the castle are open for investigation and exploration. Frankly, by the time I'd battled through the aforementioned Deadly Things, my energy was so low that I only had the briefest chance to explore.

Despite some excellent graphics and some slick coding, I'm afraid it's simply too difficult. Nothing to do with intricate puzzles, but the ferocity of the creatures you encounter and Blinky's inability to stand still when you want him to. Pity.

Overall Summary

Technically okay but too annoying for me, I'm afraid.

Jim Douglas

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