Your Sinclair


Legend Of The Amazon Women

Author: Rachael Smith
Publisher: U. S. Gold
Machine: Spectrum 48K/128K

 
Published in Your Sinclair #7

Legend of the Amazon Women

Here it is.... that game! The one with the scantily clad females on the cover that's been corrupting our morals with its advertising for months! Ed carefully wraps it in plain brown paper to spare my blushes and I rush home, filled with trepidation. Will the on-screen Amazonians show the same disregard for basic anatomy as their paper peers?

Fear not. For the first time in history the pixel outperforms the pencil. In fact your heroine, Lady Wilde and the inimical Amazons are well animated (animazonated?) in the style of Dun Darach. The only possible complaint is that, even with such a determined tread, the bits you'd expect to bob up and down don't - hair, silly!

Which is just as well as there isn't too much of a game behind the creepers and carved stones of the jungle. Here Lady W. finds herself stranded (plane crash, don'tcha know?) in search of a lost carrycot - which I admit doesn't sound so hot as an ark, though it does contain her daughter.

Legend Of The Amazon Women

Luckily her path lies left to right as that's the only direction in which she can steadfastly stride. Unluckily she's going down a one way street of (gasp!) Amazon Women who recognise this representative of the ruling classes as an enemy of women's solidarity, trapped by the role model of mother.... (Fire extinguisher! Rachael's going to burn her bra again - Ed). So they try to clobber her!

Pretty soon the jungle has become the scene for another combat game but one with only three attack moves! There's a jab to the stomach, a slice at the ankles and a chop to the head.

The other main jungle trouble comes from dragons who've dug in for the duration but emerge every so often to make life a misery for visiting British peers. Attacking them is tricky and you can't just walk on by - with only four minutes to complete each section you've got to be aggressive. Dragons don't appear on your radar either.

Radar?! This being a hi-tech tropic there's a scanner above you, to warn of approaching Amazons, Spikers - which are deadly flying conkers - and stray arrows from the local darts team's practice session! Assorted airborne menaces can be jumped or ducked, depending on their height but be warned that they're rather advanced too.

All of which is slightly less credible than Tarzan and slightly more exciting than watching paint dry. Apart from the smooth scrolling and neat animation the game lacks variety. The blow to the midriff every time your opponent advances is slow but effective and though you can enliven the catfight by shouting insults ('Fat bitch, your mother wears army boots!' being a favourite) the fun soon passes. I think I'd rather leave the sprog to a decent Amazonian upbringing.

Rachael Smith

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