Spectrum 2.0

Ah, Turmoil. An absolute, bona-fide classic. A Crash-Smash, this is a devious single screen platform game a la Manic Miner. It is _much_ harder than Manic Miner later on. This is the kind of game that you can complete now due to snapshots, but back in the day - no chance, unless you were Julian Rignall. There are 26 screens, all given a level with a letter from the alphabet. There is no jump action, just up, down, left, right and activate oil can (or pick up / put down item.) It reminds me of a cross between Donkey Kong / Manic Miner / Jet Set Willy, as it features elements from all three games, but preceded Jet Set I think. Another reviewer has mentioned about how hard it was to time jumps onto the springs, and that is fair comment, it can be very hard to get it right, and when the bad guys are chasing you and it has to be right or you will die, it can be very frustrating. In fact, the gameplay can be rewarding but it is a very high difficultly level right from the early screens. It is worth perservering though. As you progress through the game, dripping oil through a grid to form the vehicle, so many drops are needed to successfully form the vehicle and progress to the next level, the level designs become more difficult, and judicious use of oil as a hazard to kill a nasty (albeit temporarily) is needed. It does have quite a lot of substance to the gameplay once you start to see some of the subtleties in it. You can turn the in game music off if you like, but as I say, this is a game that has really come into its own with emulation and snapshots, because now you can get to play all the levels by saving. I won't tell you what happens after completing the last level, level Z, but you probably will be disappointed. I expect that the author, David Turner, never expected anyone to get that far. It is a brilliant game though, if I compiled a top ten Spectrum games of all time it would most definitely be in it, it is something both different and yet immediately recognisable as a platform game. The closest equivalent on the C64 would probably be something like Bounty Bob Strikes Back, another classic. The graphics are very good too, with no end of variety in the solid brick designs utilised, and for me, although another reviewer slated the in game music, it provides a ryhthym almost to playing the game. I don't know what David Turner went on to do after this game, nothing on the Spectrum it appears, but no matter because he left us with an all time great, very much underrated when compared to other classics like Manic & Jet Set. This was in my opinion superior to them technically, and I love it and have completed it several times. Controls are good and responsive and a standard keyboard layout means you can play it instantly. I would have loved to see a sequel with a Willy style flick screen play area. Oh well. David Turner - take a bow.