Three Weeks in Paradise

FINE YOUNG CANNIBALS

Prepare for a taste of Paradise - only trouble is the Weeks family is on the menu. But rather than make a right Wally of yourself, read Rachael Smith's review of Three Weeks in Paradise, the new feast from Mikro-Gen. Dinner is served!

FAX BOX
Game: Three Weeks in Paradise
Publisher: Mikro-Gen
Price: £9.95
Joystick: Sinclair, Kempston
Keys: Alternate, Top Row; Left/Right, Bottom Row; Jump, Middle Row; Go Into Screen/Swim/Shoot/Climb/Use Object, 1/2 Pick Up/Drop Object, 1/2

Every year thousands of wallies go on their hollies, but there's only one Wally and neither he nor the mussis nor even Herbert, the nipper, come within that notorious 18-30 age range. So Wally, being wally, decided on a pleasure cruise... on the HMS Pedalo!

Eventually the gormless mariner was washed up on a desert island, and when the natives said come to dinner he was thrilled. But he didn't realise that the first course was to be Boiled Baby followed by Sautéed Spouse. And as Wilma's always been a game old bird they were keeping her hanging around first. Her parting cry was to call her hubbie a stupid pudding, but that was the last thing he wanted to be - and he was already hot-footing it into the jungle.

And that's where this episode in the Wally saga begins. You're helping him rescue his family and stopping him getting... sorry, becoming somebody's just desserts. You just have the man (man?) himself to control this time, but other features make the game an advance.

Instead of just swopping objects you can now choose to pick up and drop things as well as having to use them in the right places. That means Rambo-wally's rescue mission calls for even more ingenuity. There's also a nice selection of puzzles, from the fairly obvious to the maddeningly difficult, but they all depend on acute lateral thinking and horrible puns.

In return there's less of the arcade element this time with fewer things to dodge. But the thing I liked best about Three Weeks was its humour. There's a speech bubble Ouch as he rubs his behind. And look out too for the scrolling message line at the bottom of the screen that conveys some screamingly cryptic clues, as well as the family's cries of help.

And finally fed up with reviewers' constant grumbles about attribute problems, Mikro-Gen has included the option of switching off Wally's colouring. A word too for the music - it's great, and it adds a lot to the humour. A great game that just goes to show that even if he's too old for Club 18-30, Wally's not past it yet.

128 GAMES

And so they came - the first trickle of 128 games. Sinclair cleverly made sure that the software was there, ready for the new machine. But most of the first releases have been expanded versions of existing titles, and we all know, don't we, that bigger doesn't necessarily mean better? After all, it's what you do with it that counts. So here it is - the highly personal, Rachael J Smith guide to those first ten releases.

Mikro-Gen
£10.95

What sort of person is going to want this? A bigger Wally, I fear. Generally agreed to be the best Wally game ever, and containing some hilariously devious visual punning, it now boasts a secret missile base and a load of unlikely new objects. It was great before and it's even more fun in this version. Don't miss out on those new locations though, because they're to be found in a previously unexplored backwater... or underwater more like. After you've pulled the plug and descended into the cave with the rock fall go left, but you'll need a way through the door before you can get all high tech.

So there they are, ten offerings for the 128. All benefit from having their amplified sound blasted out through the TV, and where the new sound chip has been used to full effect it's like suddenly being able to hear after years of deafness. But while there are things here to appeal to the person who's never owned a Spectrum before, I can't see much point in duplicating a game unless you were a big fan of the original. And that means that we're not yet in a position to say whether the 128 itself is worth buying. We'll have to wait until games that make full use of that extra memory - that do things that can't be achieved in 48K - appear before we all decide to trade in our old machines.