Reviews

1992 Ocean Software (UK)
by Andrew Deakin, Ivan Horn and Jonathan Dunn

One of the best loading screens in the history of the Spectrum and one of the best theme songs ever played in a Spectrum.
Graphically the game is very good, very playable with very fluid movements but not easy to perform your job. It takes patience to learn all the traps of the house and not fall into them, which makes the game little spontaneous, in my opinion. Nothing new or original but still nicely done.

I hate the controls in this game. One minute you're walking like an arthritic old man and the next you're acrobatically leaping 10 feet into the air! I haven't much else to say about this game, it's platforming by numbers really. It's not bad but you'd expect better from a major software house in 1991.

Despite the colourful graphics and the amazing music but the gameplay is ineffective. It's very difficult even on easy as the controls are very awkward. The jumping doesn't quite work well plus I hate the way Gomez moves so slow at first and then suddenly picks up his speed, making things more difficult than it should be. For me this is a very overrated game.

The rich, colourful graphics are one thing, the painfully difficult gameplay is another, why does Gomez's speed have to be so confusing? It makes his movement and jumping so needlessly complicated. I've never been able to progress very far in this game and would give this a 2 but I'll be kind and give it an extra point for the graphics alone.

I have to say I too found this to be an overrated game. Sure, it looks superb, but it's a very difficult game and even with 9 lives I struggled with this game. You need patience, lots of it, and I don't have a lot of it anymore. But I can see why it was a popular game with many. It's brilliantly programmed, it's just too tough for me.

Tem um bocado de jogos de Spectrum que tentam um estilo gráfico com muito detalhe, movimento e cores, e dá errado, e fica parecendo vômito. Eu quis pegar um jogo desses pra testar. Será que esse jogos são realmente tão feios (eu só tinha visto vídeos e fotos)? E será que não tem solução, usando um filtro, ou uma paleta diferente?

Sim, realmente é muito horroroso. Testei umas paletas ULAPlus e continuou horrível. E uma outra do meu emulador que deixa o jogo 100% preto no branco, e devo dizer que melhorou, mas ainda ficou ruim.

Não tem como botar isso de lado, já que os gráficos horríveis justamente atrapalham a jogabilidade, dão um visual muito sujo e confuso. Mas fora isso, o jogo também me irritou. O cara pula tão alto, mas anda tão devagar! E é tanta coisinha na tela!

This game has all the makings to be a classic. Stunning colourful graphics, pure platforming gameplay and excellent music and sound all stand out to make this an exceptional title.

There is just one problem, it's really difficult. Too difficult.

The controls are a pain and controlling Gomez is the catalyst of its faults. If you look at most other platforms games the main character usually moves at one speed most of the time, but for some reason Gomez moves at an accelerated pace, which while realistic doesn’t go well with the game and only makes things more confusing that it needs to be. His jumping is a pain also because he jumps so high.

This drawback is a significant one because it largely affects hows the game plays and how you play the game, for the most part badly. It’s one of the most important elements of a platform game and on this occasion Ocean got it badly wrong. As a result of this I did not see a lot of the game until I saw a walkthrough.

This could have been one of the finest games on the Speccy and from Ocean if not for the awkwardness of controlling the main character. Instead it is a classic case of what might have been.