Monty on the Run (Switch): COMPLETED!

Another Monty game. It’s very similar to the first one, really, but with the added feature that you have to collect five specific items en-route to the exit or you can’t escape. I think I was lucky in that I found them automatically or accidentally, because I certainly remember when I’ve played this previously a very long time ago I must have missed some. It wouldn’t surprise me if backtracking to find them again was impossible too. The jumping physics …

Wanted: Monty Mole (Switch): COMPLETED!

The Monty Mole games were always Too Hard. You only have to look at the random nature of the instant-death Crushers to see that. I sort of liked them at the time, but not enough to struggle through with not-my-fault deaths threatening to cut my play short – it was just too frustrating. Plus on the Spectrum I had a million other games I could play instead. So, why I bought The Monty Mole Collection, a set of three Monty …

Action Biker (Spectrum): COMPLETED!

Another game I really enjoyed, but rarely completed, back in the day. Some people suggest that the C64 version of Action Biker is superior, but they’re wrong. It’s a totally different sort of game, for a start! This version involves you riding around a town, searching houses for parts for you bike to enable you to travel underwater and in an area which is pitch black for some reason. You need to find your friend Marty (for some reason you …

Big Ben Strikes Again (Spectrum): COMPLETED!

Way back when, this was one of my favourite games. The main reason being that it had a built in level editor, but the catchy music has remained in my head for decades. My copy was one of four games in a compilation, the other four being Panzerdrome (which was impossible), Tidy Tony (which was a bit like Atic Atac only rubbish), and Steelyard Blues (which I liked until many years later when I found out it was a hacked …

Castlevania: Spectral Interlude (Spectrum): COMPLETED!

That’s right, folks – I’ve completed a Spectrum game. But not a Spectrum game from 30 years ago – one from last year. Or this year. It’s new, anyway. And it’s also really good. A new Castlevania game (a fan one, not a Konami one) that manages to fit into the Castlevania canon, with astounding graphics and sound considering the hardware it’s on. And it’s a full adventure experience too, like Castlevania II was on the NES, which abilities you …

Things I’ve been playing recently

Roundup time! Yakuza 4 (PS3) It’s been a while since I played Yakuza 3. I did really enjoy it, but never got round to picking up Yakuza 4, probably because it was a PS3 game and I don’t really like playing PS3 games, however good they are. However, for reasons I won’t explain, I got a PS+ subscription and with it came Yakuza 4. I’m a few hours in, and have spent most of the game so far watching cut …

Fish! (Spectrum)

Hurrah! I managed to melt the disc and make a ring in the mould without Micky finding me, and so the three warps were complete. The three artifacts found in each, however, opened up another warp, and so it was off into the next bit of the adventure. I’m now in some sort of fish-universe version of London, where everyone is a fish, there are fish puns a-plenty, and there’s even a version of the Tube to ride around the …

Fish! (Spectrum)

I’m stuck. I’ve entered the final warp (unless there are more later), and I seem to be in a forest near a smithy. I’ve figured out that there’s a mould in a birdcage in the smithy, and the parrot in the cage is actually a bomb (so you have to let him out and run away). There’s a clearing in the forest where a guy called Micky hangs around, but he randomly kills you. He also randomly leaves, meaning you …

Fish! (Spectrum)

Well, that’s another warp done now. I was stuck on the bit with the gargoyle for ages as I didn’t know how to get it as wrapping the cord round it and pulling did nothing… until I realised you had to pull it from another location.

Fish! (Spectrum)

OK, so it’s not on an actual Spectrum. I’m playing Fish!, a text adventure co-written by ex-YS chap Phil South on Fuse, a Spectrum emulator. On my Mac. Yes, it is complicated. So far, I’ve become a goldfish (or perhaps I’m a fish all along?), spent ages trying to figure out how not to be swimming upside-down (“turn upside-down” seemed to do the trick), and completed the first of three “warps”. How about some screenshots to show you, eh? Amazing …