Reviews

A game my brother hated.

Back in the eighties that alone would be good enough reason to be playing it whenever I got to the computer first. Luckily it is also a classic spectrum game with some of the finest cartoon graphics ever to be seen on the spec.

This was pretty much the first time I ever saw full colour graphics walking around the screen. Graphics that looked and behaved in the way the characters on the cartoons did.

Well … every one except the title character of course. Because in this game Popeye was to be blunt a bit of a wuss. Spinach didn't enable him to escape from irons, knock Bluto senseless and rescue Olive Oil in time for the end credits. No in this game Popeye was devoid of any offensive moves whatsoever. Pretty much anyone including the birds could beat him up.

It could be a little frustrating at times. Due to the timing of Bluto and those birds it was sometimes easy for Popeye to lose a life, eat his spinach, then stand up just in time to be knocked down by something else. The game also played rather slowly.

But given the amazing graphics on the screen, it was just great to play this. There wasn't a lot to explore but each screen had layers of complexity and usually a puzzle or two to solve before bringing all those hearts back to Olive Oil that were needed to complete the game.

Definitely worth a go on the emulator if you've never tried it. Though it might be worth turning the cpu speed up slightly!

1985 - DK'Tronics (UK)
by Don Priestley

One of the best games ever produced for the spectrum. And nothing else could be expected from the great Don Priestley, a most prolific and inovative programmer.
Popeye will always stand as one of the most beautifully designed games, full of colour, action (a bit slow, true) and with great puzzles on each screen.
A true classic.

This game looks absolutely fantastic. Those huge colourful graphics - wow! It still impresses me today. All this would be pointless if the game wasn't very good. And as luck would have it, it is. The aim of the game is to collect hearts for Olive Oyl. This would be simple except In a bizarre twist of fate, Popeye is unable to beat up Bluto or any of the creatures that are intent on doing Popeye harm. This means you need to avoid enemies by moving into or out of the screen or sometimes just running away! It can be rather frustrating at first but after a while you can start to make some progress and the game becomes a lot of fun.

This game is surreal and I don´t know how to take it ... !!!

Too slow , over-sized graphics , mad colors , atrocious movements , no sound ,,, need I say more ? ? ?

Still , in spite of all its faults , I understand people who like Popeye out of its sheer originality and its cool presentation .

(My review from PSJ's Speccy Years (1985) book)

Popeye is one of the Spectrum's more famous releases due to it's pioneering graphic technique developed by programmer Don Priestley. Never before had a Spectrum game featured such huge and colourful sprites and interestingly this was down purely to Popeye's owners, King Features Syndicate, insisting that Popeye be as near as dammit replica down to the colour of his clothes. After careful consideration, Don Priestley, calculated that the only way this was possible was to make Popeye sixteen characters high, at which point he almost gave up.

But give up he did not and Popeye surprised many people on it's release, first and foremost due to the graphics, but secondly, it was a pretty decent game to play. Shifting that huge sprite around over three levels of depth and behind (and inside) buildings was great fun. The object of the game was to collect the hearts dotted around the screens and take them back to the love of your life Olive Oyl. Hindering this task were Popeye stalwart enemies, Brutus, The Sea Hag, and The Bird. There were other non-Popeye enemies such as a UFO(!)

Coming back to Popeye 23 years later it's apparent that the game has aged moderately well. Obviously the graphics cannot hope to compare with today's HD behemoths and the frame rate and animation don't seem as smooth as they did back in 1985. Once you get past this, Popeye is a very decent arcade adventure, with some interesting (and difficult) puzzles it and stands up well to some of the higher-acclaimed and so-called better Spectrum games.

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