Commodore User


Herbert's Dummy Run

Publisher: Mikro-Gen
Machine: Commodore 64

 
Published in Commodore User #22

Herbert's Dummy Run

Baby Herbert was just an extra in Everyone's A Wally. Now he's grabbed the starring role in his very own game.

The screenplay goes like this. Wally and Wilma have taken our little starlet to a department store. Herbert toddles off by himself and gets lost among the merchandise. You've got to get him back to Lost and Found, where mom and pop are biting their nails, before the store closes at 5.30.

Some screens are actually games themselves. One, for example, involves Herbert playing Breakout with a tennis ball. Another finds him zapping daleks with dummies.

Herberts Dummy Run

To proceed through the various departments, he must complete the games and pick up a variety of objects - some of them he'll need to actually start playing. But what he needs and what he must do with them is not all that obvious. What do you do with a brick and even a bomb? True Wallies will struggle.

To make matters worse, there's a whole load of 'things' that Herbert must avoid. Bump into them and the tears start flowing. But bags of jelly babies and goodies are sprinkled around and Herbert's progress is rewarded with them - never mind the tooth decay.

Despite the well-worn structure, the game is very good fun: plenty of variety, lots to do and think about, and deceptive levels of difficulty. Better still, the graphics are bold and very well designed. The programmers have avoided the trap of cramming the screen with vague graphics - Herbert is no fuzzy mass of pixels. There's music too: "Baby Face" - only a wally would think of that.