Producer: Virgin Games
Memory Required: 48K
Recommended Retail Price: £5.95
Language: basic with some machine code
Author: Roy Poole & Terry Murray

The authors of Virgin's Yomp have again come up with a quasi-military theme. The object of this two-part game is to parachute into enemy territory (you're an agent from MI5) and land on a motorbike, then escape on the bike, checking out the enemy's mined roads. You do this by weaving in and out of the mines which fortunately still have their markers on so you can see where they are.

A sensible menu appears, towed on behind a plane which lets you choose between one and five players, and skill levels ranging from 001 to the coveted 007! The game commences with the plane roaring across the screen and you falling out. It then cuts to a second screen where you are seen floating erratically down under your parachute. Along the base riderless motor bikes slowly pass by. These have been provided by the Resistance, although how they get so many riderless bikes to move along and without the enemy seeing them is not explained! The idea is to land neatly on one of the bikes.

This isn't as easy to do as it sounds. At the last moment, just when you think you've got yourself lined up, the harness is released and you drop. If you miss a bike it's back to the top.

The second part starts immediately you land on one. Here you get a head on view as the bike with 'you' on it races down the heavily mined road. You can swerve left and right, accelerate or brake. If you hit a mine, that's it. On the higher level of difficulty the speeds increase and more of the mines are live. Although the patterns of mines remain much the same from game to game, the mines which are active are never the same.

COMMENTS

Keyboard positions: reasonable
Joystick options: none
Keyboard play: responsive but you can't brake or accelerate while veering left or right
Use of colour: average
Graphics:average
Sound: continuous but unadventurous
Skill levels: seven
Lives: one

Both sections contain large graphics, although I'm sure a much better job could have been done with the clouds which resemble those you used to get in old Atari combat games. Landing on a bike is less a question of skill than luck and only having one life is extremely irritating as you have to go back through the menu again.

Although the rider veers across the road, nicely, banking on the turns and so on, it seems silly having a brake and accelerate key which can't be used while you're pressing left or right. In the end this isn't very playable and I can't see anyone coming back to it after the first time.

The graphics are reasonably drawn but overall the colours aren't pleasing. There's quite a lot of jerkiness to the movement, and despite all those bytes on the loading one wonders why they had to put a self-destruct in the program if you try to break in. Would we see more BASIC than code?

An MI5 agent parachutes into enemy territory, collects a Resistance motor bike and checks out the mined roads ready for the invasion - ta-rah and toodle-pip!

Brian: Good colour and graphics throughout. The game also improves in speed after you've managed to get over the first stage - watch out for the sound effects too. 7/10

Gerralt: The parachute bit at the beginning is too slow and long, especially when you consider this game's meant to be about riding a bike- which, by the way, is by far the most interesting bit. 6/10

Dilwyn: This one really wasn't my cup of tea at all. I think it was the long intro that put me off the most. There's some you love and some you don't. Say no more. 4/10

Producer Producer: Virgin Games, 48K
£5.95 (1)
Authors: Roy Poole & Terry Murray

The writers of 'Yomp' have come up with another quasi-military theme game in two parts. First screen you leap from a plane on a parachute and try to land on one of a stream of riderless motorbikes below. These have been supplied by the resistance movement of the occupied country you are spying on. If you succeed in landing on one it cuts instantly to the second screen. This is a 3D view of a country road, heavily sowed with visible mines, down which you must guide your careering bike. Although the details and large graphics are quite good the game ends up being unplayable. You can't brake and turn at the same time for instance. It all palls very quickly and ends up being much slower than it should. Reasonable control keys, seven skill levels, no joystick option. Only a fair game. Overall CRASH rating 50%. Mixture of BASIC and M/C.

Producer Producer: Virgin Games, 48K
£5.95 (1)
Authors: Roy Poole & Terry Murray

The writers of 'Yomp' have come up with another quasi-military theme game in two parts. First screen you leap from a plane on a parachute and try to land on one of a stream of riderless motorbikes below. These have been supplied by the resistance movement of the occupied country you are spying on. If you succeed in landing on one it cuts instantly to the second screen. This is a 3D view of a country road, heavily sowed with visible mines, down which you must guide your careering bike. Although the details and large graphics are quite good the game ends up being unplayable. You can't brake and turn at the same time for instance. It all palls very quickly and ends up being much slower than it should. Reasonable control keys, seven skill levels, no joystick option. Only a fair game. Overall CRASH rating 50%. Mixture of BASIC and M/C.

EXTRA LIVES WOULD MAKE A MORE ExCITING RIDE

Two recent releases from Virgin Games are Rider and Angler, both for the 48K Spectrum. In Rider, you are an MI5 agent charged with a two-part mission. Stage one consists of parachuting into enemy territory and attempting to land on a moving motor-cycle. Thus mounted, you then move to stage two, which entails riding through a minefield to check the terrain prior to invasion.

You choose any level of difficulty from 001 to 007 and must avoid not only randomly-placed mines but obstacles which may cause you to crash. If you manage to stay the course you will be promoted.

The graphics in both stages of the game are lively and the second stage promises a fast and challenging ride. A major fault, however, is that if you crash during stage two, you have to go back to your original parachuting exercise. Extra lives for the motor-cyclist would have made the game more satisfying, as the second part is the more exciting and difficult to master.

Angler could help confirm the low status of fishing as a spectator sport. In it you are at sea with your trawler, attempting to catch a variety of fish, all gaining different scores according to their type.

The trawler moves left and right and pressing any key casts the fishing line. According to the instructions, the length of time you keep the keys depressed determines the length of the line but, in the reviewer's experience, the line showed an infuriating tendency to stop short of any fish at which it was aimed.

The game features a scoreboard so that you can compete against your friends and a high score earns a certificate of merit. Fairly rudimentary graphics and slow responses, even if you choose an advanced level of difficulty, do not make it wildly exciting.

Rider and Angler are produced by Virgin Games, 61- 63 Portobello Road, London W11 and cost £5.50 each.

MACHINE: Spectrum 48K
JOYSTICK: No
CATEGORY: Arcade
SUPPLIER: Virgin Games
PRICE: £5.95

Players of Rider will be taken for a ride in more ways than one. It is based on the premise that, as a British agent, your mission is to find the location of mines on the roads of a country the UK is about to invade.

The first ride is a parachute one. You're dropped into the country above a line of motorbikes provided by the Resistance.

By manoeuvring left and right as you descend, you must land on a bike, different coloured bikes being worth different points. Once on a bike, it's off down the mined road, avoiding the mines as long as possible.

The game ends when you either explode on a mine, or crash into a bollard.

There's a lot of bollards to this game, starting with a ridiculous scoring system.

Landing on a bike gets anywhere from 19 to 900-odd points. Landing on a red bike when red bikes are worth only 19 points means a brilliant ride score far less than crashing a good bike immediately.

Another thing is that the location of mines and bollards is the same every time, and soon becomes familiar. In programming terms, the RANDOMISE function is screamed for.

Rider is brought to you by the same programming team that did Yomp. Like that game, Rider has a military flavour, and one of its two stages is remarkably like Horace Goes Skiing - swinging left and right to avoid obstacles.

This is a widely used theme, so its probably coincidental that the best parts of Yomp and Rider are available with more charm and smoothness on Horace's Holiday.

However, to be fair, Rider offers seven speed levels and a score table for up to five players, which Horace doesn't.

Perhaps these will go down well at the barracks.