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Prospector Jake has found 24 areas rich in gold mines, and to claim these he must surround them with a fence. The local Indian tribe is very upset by this intruder and attempts to tear down all Jake's fences.

Once Jake has completely surrounded his mine with a fence, it is his to keep. The Indians are busy ripping down the fences. If he collides with them he may lose one of his five lives. The only tool Jake has is a reuseable stick of dynamite which, when it explodes, leaves a pile of rubble blocking the path. One Indian patrols the perimeter fences and clear the rubble. Jake must drop the bomb while on the move as contact with the cheapgrade nitro is fatal for him (not so for the Indians).

The instructions need a third reading to make total sense. Movement around the maze needs very accurate manipulations of the joystick. There are 24 levels of play which can be directly entered at the start of the game.

Levels 13-24 are identical to levels 1-12 but the Indians now have bows and arrows. 1 or 2 players can play.

The graphics used are quite simple. The lettering and blocky scenery imply standard graphics but there are six Indian sprites, an arrow sprite, and Jake and bomb sprites. The fence consists of a rather unimaginative row of '+' signs. User-defined graphics such as a bag of gold and the pile of rubble do inject a little into the presentation.

With the flavour of the Gold Rush of '86 and sounds of the war dance, the effects are a real audiovisual minestrone. More thought should have gone into the sound and graphics. A cactus here, a little fiddle music there would have helped.

Onto idiot-proofing. The STOP key is disabled, but the RUN and RESTORE sequence causes my C64 to refuse to obey Basic, and one simple poke can fix that. After the crash I had to power down and wait another three minutes to load the game.

California Gold Rush is a very enjoyable game with a few pitfalls. It is original and reasonable value for money. It beats hell out of some rubbish I've seen for the Commodore 64. There's no mindless mayhem and anybody can play it. With a few changes it could become another Pacman.