Personal Computer News


One Hundred And Eighty

Author: Piers Letcher
Publisher: A 'n F
Machine: BBC Model B

 
Published in Personal Computer News #039

Target Practice

This game comprises every version of 301 you'd like (even 101, 201... 901), a noughts and crosses game, round the clock and Shanghai. And the aim is, of course, to beat your opponent.

In Play

It is difficult to come up with a really captivating game that emulates darts.

The feel of the dart in your hand, poised for flight, is missing for a start. It is possibly daft to try, in fact, as any attempt to recreate the atmosphere of live darts is lost the moment you touch the keyboard.

180 Darts

The game does call upon certain skills however. The ability to judge where you are in three dimensions is essential, and you have to guide your dart on its flight.

The screen is split into several sections. The dominant one is the darts board from a frontal view. The BBC's high resolution gives it a welcome clarity.

The next part is the throwing area seen from the side, and it's interesting to see that if you throw your dart a long way above the board it ends up in this area.

180 Darts

The screen also shows the two players, one sitting and the other standing. They don't seem to do anything else.

Talking of two players brings me to one of my most serious criticisms of the whole game: this is that you can't play against the computer.

If you don't happen to have a friend around, you can only use the game for target practice if you play for both people. And when each part of the game is finished, you go back to the start. Not quite the start though, as it comes back asking for the second player's name only. ESCAPE will get you right back.

180 Darts

Other aspects are quite unusual too. The dart is lined up first of all in the horizontal plane, and then you loose it off. At that point, you start controlling its up and down progress. Tricky, but more irritating than fun.

The horizontal control has a built in shake that is quite hard to master, and the skill level simply determines how bad your shake is. The glide is quite amusing in its own way.

Verdict

I'm a little bit disappointed with One Hundred And Eighty, particularly as the BBC Micro has so much potential than is used here.

180 Darts

The graphics are not particualrly wonderful and the resources of the machine aren't that well used.

To add to my own particular problems, I've got a disk operating system. To load the program type:

*TAPE
PAGE=&E00
CHAIN""

and the best of luck.

Piers Letcher

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