Home Computing Weekly


Bonzo

Publisher: Audiogenic
Machine: Commodore Vic 20

 
Published in Home Computing Weekly #3

This is an original game with some of the flavour of Panic. A small man has to be moved down a series of levels linked by ladders, using either a joystick or the keyboard.

On the various levels are boxes which the man picks up by moving over them. Each box yields points to the player. But, to make life difficult, the levels are inhabited by green nasties called Bonzos, whose greatest delight is to leap on the man if they can.

If the screen is cleared, it is refilled with higher scoring boxes. but an extra nasty is supplied. This is repeated three times before returning to the first screen. The player has four lives, and at the end of the game there is a high score table for successful players.

Technically the game is excellent, using both sound and colour to the full. An extra large screen is used, and the figures, because they consist of six redefined characters, are brilliantly animated. The author has put a lot of effort into designing the characters and giving them an endearing quality. I particularly liked the small man, who with his bald head and dungarees; he looks rather like the hero in Krazy Kong.