Elite - historické recenze
Producer: Firebird Memory required: 48k Retail price: £ 14.95 Language: machine code Athor: Torus Starting life on BBC, Elite was converted for the Commodore and, has just appearedfor the Spectrum, a mere three months late. It will go down in history as the first major piece of software to be supplied with the Lenslock protection |
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preventing piracy by suplying a plastic decoding lens wich is used to discover the encrypted access code for game. In essence, after loading you need to look through the lens onto screen in order to see the code letters which must be input before the program will RUN. The Cassette is also accompanied by a slim novella which sets the scene. Converted by Torus, creators of Gyron, Spectrum Elite follows a very similar format to its other incarnations. With stars in your eyes and a Cobra Mk III in your charge, you ve set yourself the task of bevoming Elite, a combateer of the highest ranking. To become Elite you'll have to rise through seeveral distinct stages starting wuth almost derogatory rating of 'Harmless'. The more ships you kill, the higher your rating will rise, though mindless violence is not the only aspect to the game. To become an efficient killer you must have a well equipped ship, repletet with weapons of destruction. When you start, the ship you' re given is pretty poor machine, not realy up to the rigours of deep space combat, so the best thing to do is to buy extra equipment from the space stations you' ll find in orbit around every planet. Most of the military hardware doesen't come cheap and seeing as how you only start with one hundred credits you will need to make some money. This is where the minworks comes into play. You will have to trade Every planet in the eight galaxies has a tech rating and some inforamtion detailing the world's economy. Using a trader's cunning, you can buy goods at one planet and take them to another and sell them fot profit. To be sure of making s profit it is wise to sell goods naturaly rare on the planet you'are trading with. For example a tech level 12, highly |
industrialised planet will
probably have to import food, making the market price quite high. If you
buy food from a low tech agricultural planet you can ferry it to the more
advanced planet for a good profit margin. Information about each planet's political state is available, witch will range from corporate state to anarchy. It is not wise to travel to an anarchic system with little in the way of weaponry as the place will be crawling with pirates. And pirates are doubly aware of you if you're carrying any cargo. Different cultures aren't too friendly with each - you can't land on planets. This makes trade awkward, so it's effected through a system of space stations. Each trading planet is orbited by a Coriolis space station which you need to dock with - a time consuming and awkward task. Once docked , you can refuel your ship and barter you wares inside the hanger. If you get rich, it's posible to buy a docking computer to make life easier. Fuel is only expended when you use hyperwarp for interstellar travel. Pottering around in planetary space burns no fuel and trips can be costed in fuel terms on a the short range chart. If you've bought some fuel scoops you can pick up free fuel by flying close and ranking energy from the a star's corona - sun skimming. Bounty hunting is lucrative and simple: jump into an anarchic system and blast away at everything. A kill point is |
awarded for each ship destroyed
and your credit status grows with the bounty. It is, however, best to go
in heavily armed, and with a fair amount battle experience. Other loot
gathering activities include asteroid mining, slave trading and drug
running - but the last two are ilegal and harm your legal
status. You se the action from the cockpit, viewing a 3D representation of space. Three other views are available through left, right and rear windows. The display is mainly monochrome: vector graphics represents ships and objects. Colour appears occasionally, in explosions. To keep track of ships and asteroids not in your immediate vicinty, there's an oval short range chart. Other ships, attacking and friendly, are represented as bar with small hook at the end showing the height above or below your ship and distance from it. A wealth of informative documentation comes with the cassette. A book commissioned from SF writer Robret Holdstock gives an interesting story plus a multilude of veiled hints for survival in rough galaxy. The Space Traders' Flight Training Manual is also included, an essential guide to survival giving hints on docking , trade and combat. You also recived a pretty wallchart to hang in your cabin! If you are doing well it's possible to save out your progress to tape. This will record all your status attributes including score and credits. |
Criticsm: 'Elite is one of the most imaginative games ever to be
designed to run on home computer and Spectrum owners should be pretty
chutfed that they've got a superb version. When a ship's destroyed, the
explosion looks like an expanding ball of gas and varporised metal. It's
higly effective. There are slighty fewer ships than on previous versions
but the graphics move quite fast considering their complexity - they'are
flicker free, too! All in all an excelent version of an excelent
game.'
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| 28 CRASH November 1985 |
| that little bit futher. Here
the SAVE ganes facility is agreat help, and means that ELITE is not
so much a game - more a way of life. That may sound corny, but for once it
realy is true1 No self - respecting Spectrum owner should be wthout it
because it's worth every peny of the £ 15 price tag.'
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Energy Bomb (W); ECM (E); Find Planet (R); Fire Missile (F); Target (T); Unarm (U); Galactic Chart (I); Local Chart (O); Data on System (P); Fire Laser (A); Dive/Cursor Up (S); Climb/ Cursor Down (X); Anti-clockwise Roll/Cursor Left (N); Clockwise Roll/Cursor Right (M); Distance (D); Hyperspace/ Intergalactic Jump (H); Torus Jump Drive (J); Prices (K); Status (L); Inventory (ENTER); Freeze (SHIFT); Docking Computer (C); Home Cursor (B); Save/Decrease (SYMBOL SHIFT); Continue/Accelerate (BREAK); Keyboard overlay provided Joystick: compatible with all joysticks Keyboard play: complicated ! Use of colours: sparce but highly efective Graphics: excellent, but occasionaly produces odd effects Skill levels: one Screens: not aplicable General rating: a first class absorbing, game
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| 30 CRASH November 1985 |