We did promise something special this month — and here it is!! All of your senses are under attack as we present the CRASH Entertainment System! The mag’s as groovy as ever, there’s the Powertape with another set of four complete games, not one but TWO free chewy bars stuck to the cover and an exclusive audio sensation — Uncle Mel Croucher’s Computer Fun Line (don’t load it — listen to it!) on the tape too! Read, play, eat and listen! There’s never been a more happening time to have a Speccy or SAM — it’s completely swingorilliant!
Crazy arcade adventure from Atlantis!
Fast thinking, planned decisions, speedy reactions and a good memory are just some of the qualities you’re going to need to succeed in Atlantis’ maddeningly addictive arcade puzzle game Survivors. Don’t worry if you don’t possess those qualities already — but the time you’ve completed Survivors you’ll be an expert on all fronts!
Your mission is to rescue almost 1000 survivors from a hibernation dome damaged in a recent nuclear war. To complete the task you must guide your three droids through the seven levels of the dome and teleport the survivors to safety.
Each of your three droids has a very special function. Droid One (the blue chap) can tunnel through tons of earth at high speed, the highly advanced yellow Droid Two’s function is to teleport the survivors to safety and Droid Three (the red chap) is a droid of immense strength who can move fallen boulders, though only one at a time.
The damage to the dome is so severe that the slightest mistake can result in falling boulders. If one of your droids is hit by a falling boulder it results in a serious power loss. Beware of the Guardian Droids left in the dome to maintain the life support system, their circuits were damaged by nuclear fall-out and are now hostile. Contact with any proves fatal. With a bit of planning, you can squash a Guardian by dropping a boulder on it.
Every move must be planned to ensure that your Droids do not get trapped, failure in your mission results in certain death for all survivors!!
IF YOU WANT TO SURVIVE... ... you’d better learn the controls, which are on keyboard: Q/up, A/down, O/left, P/right and ENTER/pause. Keys 1, 2 and 3 to gain control of one of your three Droids, 4 and 5 together to start a new life and BREAK and CAPS together to start a new game. Good luck!
Amazon antics from Elite!
It’s a jungle out there! It is y’know. A jungle infested with trouble (hence the title)! Could you become the brave adventurer, tough enough to tackle the arcade action? Read on and find out!!
Jungle Trouble is one of those games which looks a bit naff and tricky to cope with — but you just won’t be able to stop playing it until you reach the end. It could drive you barmy! You start on the right hand-side of the riverbank; the first task being to successfully cross the river using the stepping stones without falling into the water where a furious croc swims. Before you start off, collect an axe by running to the far right of the screen, an axe icon should now appear at the bottom of the screen. Okay, here we go...
To jump onto the first stepping stone take the longest run possible and press the jump key just as you approach the water (the best time to jump is just as your man is immediately above and between the letters I and T in TIME).
If you jump successfully, release the jump key when in mid air, then to jump all the way across hit the jump key just as your foot touches the rock. If you’re skill, you should make it all the way across the river.
Once up the ladder it’s time to hack through the trees. Use the axe to chop at them but watch out for attacking monkeys! You can get rid of them by bashing them with the axe! As you chop your axe blade gets blunter so it takes a while to fell a tree, unless you return to the start and collect a new one. As the tree falls run away or be squashed.
Ready for the fire pit? You better be! Stand at the centre of the rim and press the jump key to grab the rope. If you catch the rope keep pressing the jump key to hand onto it. Release the key to swing off and land on the other side. As soon as you land start to run for home. However, somewhere along the home run a chasm will open up!! Just make sure you’re ready to jump at the last moment and keep running home!!
HAVING TROUBLES?
Well, check out the controls which are: (keyboard only) 5 or CURSOR LEFT/left or strike monkey, 8 or CURSOR RIGHT/ right or chop tree, 6 or CURSOR DOWN/down, 7 or CURSOR UP/up or jump.
Wreaking havoc through space with Michael and Craig Holdstock!
Cosmic Chaos takes you for a dangerous ride in space where wave after wave of mean, lean alien fighting machines attack! It’s cosmic! It’s chaos (hence the title)! And it only takes about 30 — 30!!! — seconds to load!!
CRASH seems to remember that Space Invaders verges towards the dull side of things. So, when we first saw Cosmic Chaos comments bandied about included ‘Blurrrgh!!’, ‘Oh dear’ and the like. And then we played it and — heavens above! — we were hooked!! Cosmic Chaos may look a bit stark and simple, but it’s a mean blaster of an invaders game — and soooo addictive, you’ve gotta keep playing just to see the next level!!
Invaders swarm down from the top of the screen — you’ve gotta blast them out of the sky. Your space ship remains at the bottom of the screen and can move left and right. Hit fire to unleash major death onto the alien scum. But avoid their bombs which hurtle down the screen towards you. Clear one wave and another, tougher set zooms into view! Can you survive all the alien attacks?!
IT’S CHAOS... ...if you don’t know the controls which are (keys only) Q/left, W/right and SPACE/fire. Full keyboard instructions on the title screen.
He’s mad, bad and completely dotty, it’s MEL CROUCHER’S COMPUTER FUN LINE!
Mel Croucher is a dotty old fellow. Author of endless CRASH features, he’s the jester of the computer world! And this special audio track is his latest venture. Normally, you can only hear his deranged witterings on the telephone, but now he has recorded a special Computer Fun Line for the CRASH cassette.
Remember, this is an audio track, you can’t load it into the Speccy — it’s for your ears only!!
A real challenge from Cult!
Ever fancied yourself as a hot-shot? Maybe running your own software house? It must be sooooo easy — all you do is get a game and sell it!! Easy. Well, not quite. With Software House you get a taste of the complications and hassles in running your very own software business.
Software House is a management game, and we’ve never had one of these on the Powertape before. There’s a lot of them around, most of them from Cult themselves, and if you have the brains they can be fun!
There’s no instructions — you’re on your own (what’s the point of a game like this if we tell you how to play it?). Once loaded up you get the main working screen. First type in the name of your software house and then your name. Off you go!!
Okay, okay — a little bit of help to get you started. Well, you’ll need some staff and then a game. So look at the main menu where you’ll see the Employ Staff option. The letter E on Employ is highlighted green to show you which key to press to select that function. Things should then start to happen on the communications window. Once you’ve read the communication press enter. If the interview has been successful you’ve got yourself a worker! Now follow the same pattern for buying up a game. That should get you started...
All the controls in Software House are on the keyboard. Type in your answers when the program prompts you, or if it asks a question type Y for Yes, A for accept, etc. Don’t expect to become an instant success, though hard work and perseverance will pay rewards.
Maybe your company will win a CRASH Readers Award sometime!