Reviews

I really wanted to like Emlyn Hughes Arcade Quiz, but due to inconsistencies within the game's code I cannot.

It looks like your fairly standard quiz game, like a board game almost. You have squares with various things on it, like fruit and coins to collect, question marks for questions to be asked, squares you that act like barriers that prevent you from moving, squares that steal money from you, all those sorts of things. And the idea of the game after all that is fairly simple and straightforward, from the start you have to go across the screen to reach win and avoid going too far back to allow the lose to catch up, for if it overtakes you, well you lose.

So it sounds like a good game, well as I said at the start of this review the game suffers from a major case of inconsistency, a massive flaw in its code, which makes this impossible to fully enjoy. And it lies in its questions.

You see you will get a question like 'What is Neil's surname in The Young Ones'? The right answer is Pye and when you answer it, it's the wrong answer. After about six more games and again you get this question and again you answer Pye, you are right.

Basically the game has a horrible memory and genuinely doesn't know what a right answer or a wrong answer is, it's pot luck. You can get a really tough question right and think it was a lucky guess, only to get that same question again, think to yourself "I know this one now" and give that same answer, and it's wrong. It's very confusing.

And that is what prevents this game from being good, it's terribly spoiled by inconsistent questions. This could have been a really enjoyable quiz game if not for that.

This could have been a great game but the answers are too random, questions you know are right are given wrong anyway. Plus you may not be able to progress to the next level anyway if you don't have enough money, forcing you to collect your winnings which doesn't carry over to the next game meaning you start again. It's a shame that this turned out to be such a flop because it certainly looked the part but it's pretty poorly implemented.

I also want to mention loading the game on Spectaculator since I've read about people having issues loading this game from side B for the questions. For Spectaculator you load the game on side A as normal, then after you press fire when commanded you need to turn off Auto Play/Stop before you load side B, then when you open the file again and select side B you have to highlight the first turbo loading block and then manually press play, the game should then load.

Loading the game is a bastard but look at Jordy's review and it will show you how its done, on Spectaculator anyway, other emulators are available. But is it worth the effort to load it up? Heck no. Emlyn Hughes' name is on one of the greatest football games in gaming history, but his name is also on this joke of an arcade quiz game. As the others state, the game has a habit of giving right answers incorrectly, I got one asking for Yogi Bear's companion, which is obviously Boo-Boo which the other alternatives being Jerry and Goofy, I answered Boo-Boo, wrong. Also, when you are wrong the next question takes forever to load, which doesn't help when you are about to lose. The facial expressions of Emlyn, who bless him isn't alive anymore, are quite alright but really add nothing of real quality to the game. And that's all I need to say about this game, it's shit, purely one of the worst quiz games you'll ever play.

Poor Emlyn. As well as bearing his name on the greatest soccer game on the ZX Spectrum he also bears his name on this really poor quiz game. It doesn't look too bad but it's poorly coded with correct answers counting as incorrect.