Crash


Sam Stoat Safebreaker

Author:
Publisher: Gremlin
Machine: Spectrum 48K

 
Published in Crash #15

Sam Stoat - Safebreaker

More alliterative arcade adventure from Gremlin. In this one you play Sam Stoat, a cunning cat-burglar (or stoat-burglar if you prefer).

The object is to enter one of the four houses on the start screen (house 1 easy, house 4 hard), then locate the bomb and the match to blow the safe, and escape. Escape is only possible if you have collected the diamond necklace carelessly left lying around on the floor. On finding the bomb it will follow you around. Points are awarded for picking up any other valuables you may come across.

Each house has a series of rooms interlinked with each other, but as usual there is a lot of nightlife in them, vicious gnomes, drunks, bouncing bed springs, spiders, bats and more. These tend to eat away his energy, indicated at the bottom of the screen by a 'Bloodometer', but it can be replenished by finding Stoat Healing Elixir.

Once the diamond has been collected, Sam can leave the house through the mousehole, which turns out to be a large lake with five pillars standing in it. The three middle ones rise and fall in a rhythm which makes leaping from one to the other rather difficult. Falling into the water is fatal of course. The game is played over 80 screens, twenty per house.

Comments

Control keys: Q/W left/right, P/L up/down (L is not mentioned on the inlay) B to SPACE to jump or enter a house
Joystick: Kempston, Sinclair 2
Keyboard play: simple layout and responsive
Use of colour: good
Graphics: very good, some excellent animation and drawing
Sound: good start tune, lacking in spot effects
Skill levels: 4 selectable by house choice
Lives: it says 4 on the inlay, but this seems a little silly as you have one life and an energy (Bloodometer) level
Screens: 80

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