C&VG
1st January 1987
Publisher: Hewson Consultants
Machine: Spectrum 48K
Published in Computer & Video Games #63
City Slicker
Urban terrorism is a dodgy subject for fun computer games. Bombs in the heart of London have in the recent past been all too real. People died - horribly. So to make the centrepiece of your game the blowing up of the Houses of Parliament could be seen as - at the very least in very dubious taste.
And that's exactly what the normally ever so tasteful Hewson has done with City Slicker.
Anyway, enough of the moralising and down to the game.
City Slicker is the latest offering from the minds of Technician Ted authors Steve Marsden and David Cooke. It is set in London where an evil Arab Abru Cadabbra has planted a bomb in the Houses of Parliament set to explode at midnight.
You play the part of Slick, who's been called in by some mysterious department to defeat his fiendish plot.
So what you have is an arcade adventure set across more than 50 or so screens in which Slick has 16 hours in which to find and make a Bomb Disassembly Unit and dismantle the bomb.
The backdrops range from the Tower of London, Trafalgar Square, British Museum, Buckingham Palace and, of course, Parliament.
Slick moves around London by using the tube. All he has to do is find a station, get onto the tube and select his required destination. This is a very nice touch.
The game is packed with problem solving. You know the type - put the top weight over the trapdoor to open it or ring the telephone to distract the guard.
There are many characters who drain your energy, including pigeons who's personal habits when flying above your head leave much to be desired.
And there's Abru who crops up all over the place bringing a somewhat lethal touch with him.
Graphically it's very slick. There's also what Hewson term the "half flip" feature which moves the screen image a half width, extending the play area into the next room.
If you ignore the background to the game, City Slicker is excellent fun. As it is, it should be renamed City Sicker.