Previous Next

Would you like to be an explorer? Risk life and limb for fame and fortune? So play Lost Caves, a game that combines elements of Skweek and Rick Dangerous - and gives you the chance of becoming rather wealthy into the bargain...

Your explorer gets around by digging his way through mud, and jolly fast at it he is too! But care must be taken, as suspended in the mud are huge boulders that have a tendency to crush hasty explorers flat. Many of the rocks are positioned around the diamonds you've come to collect, so excavate around them and get them to fall out of your way. Of course, if a diamond falls on you that too is fatal.

There are no points in this maze adventure, just fantastic wealth - and every diamond has to be found before you can progress to the next level. For that reason you must avoid trapping the jewels behind the boulders! Of course, these inanimate objects are the least of your worries, as also hiding in the caves are a bunch of kamikaze joggers - little guys in white headbands who run around aimlessly until they spot you. All you can do is push rocks onto them - ideally from a great height.

Thrown in to make life even more interesting - if shorter - are lava flows, bombs, one-way doors, fake walls and all the other everyday tricks, traps and trials one associates with ancient temples. The fun emanates from the mad charge through a sea of mud never knowing what you'll find until you've found it!

Lost Caves is no beauty to look at. Its use of colour is limited in the extreme. Sprites are unsophisticated but humourous.

As a maze game, it's spiced up with a liberal dash of tongue-in-cheek fun - cartoon explosions from huge joke bombs and a truly weird theme tune - and given pace by the falling boulders and joggers. Sixteen levels of controlled panic are the result, and that's a sound foundation for any game to build on.

Reach Level Four.

Lost Caves is quite simply the best game I've ever prog... er, played. Do me, er, yourself a favour, go out and buy it today. Go on, boost my bank bal, er no, boost your collection with this classic gem, which at the ridiculously cheap price of only £2.99 you can't afford to be without.

Perfect.

Graphics 56%
P. Limited but jolly.

Sonics 64%
N. Strange music.

Grab Factor 76%
P. Attractive to games players of all ages.

Staying Power 79%
P. Some very tricky puzzles to solve.
N. Possibly too tricky.

Overall 71%
A possible Dizzy basher.