Commodore User


Trivial Pursuit

Author: Bohdan Buciak
Publisher: Domark
Machine: Commodore 64

 
Published in Commodore User #63

Trivial Pursuit

Here's a trivial tip for Arctic explorers: a polar bear is more likely to hit you with its left paw than with its right. Groan. To my mind, a polar bear should have walloped Domark to stop them producing this revamped version of its original game-of-the-game. I mean, why bother? Nobody plays Trivial Pursuit any more - or nobody admits to playing it.

This new version does away with some of the trivia (the board, the cheeses, the dice) and replaces them with something even more trivial -a hurriedly thought out intergalactic space travel scenario. The questions, though, haven't changed. The same six subject categories remain, and so does the rule that you carry on answering questions until you get one wrong. Up to six people can play - the more, the nastier.

Now for the space travel stuff. All players start on earth and must answer the first question correctly in order to get into the rocket and blast off into space. Once in space your ship must visit six galaxies; an object must be found in each one before you're able to travel to the planet Genus II, your final destination.

Trivial Pursuit

Once in a galaxy you choose a planet to land on. The native of that planet then asks you a question chosen at random from one of the six subjects. If you get it right, you pick another planet in that galaxy and answer another question until you find the necessary object. Answer that correctly and you go into hyperspace and travel to the next galaxy. An incorrect answer passes the game to your opponent.

Once all six objects have been collected, you travel to the planet Genis II where a team of elders ask you even more questions. Trouble is, only one of them has the ace question up his sleeve, so you must carry on choosing and answering questions until you get the one that wins you the game.

So why should this lot be better than playing the board game? Graphically, I suppose, it's more interesting. The players and the planets' inhabitants are all 'cute' little characters. You get to fly around a little in the spaceship, choosing which planet to land on, and there's information to be had on what questions you got right and wrong. But the graphics are nothing special. Most of the planets look alike and the view through the spaceship window isn't exactly stunning.

Trivial Pursuit

One plus for the computer game is the wider scope for questions. In some of them you hear snippets of music, and in others you're asked to identify an object or a picture - you couldn't do that with the original.

To its credit, the game is well programmed and works smoothly enough. It's very simple to operate and lets you get going immediately without having to read too many instructions.

Domark did very well with its first Trivial Pursuit game because it coincided with the trivia mania. What actually made it a mania in the first place is anybody's guess - it's like trying to divine how Rick Astley became a pop star. Anyway, trivia is dead, trivia is boring. In short, it's dead boring.

Amiga

Amiga Trivial Pursuit is almost as the C64 version. The graphics are slightly better defined, though the styles and routines remain the same. The questions are the same, the planets, and the features.

Even the sound fails to inspire. Not so much a new beginning, more hopefully a final ending.

Bohdan Buciak

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