In this colourful arcade adventure, you control Phantomas, a cartoon-styled character who is a burglar! Unfortunately, his latest break-in doesn't go as planned and he finds himself trapped. Now it's your job to guide him to freedom! The graphics are very well drawn and are colourful, happy and detailed. The sound is very nice too; there are both effects and a cheerful tune. The gameplay is fast-paced, but the controls do not help a lot because the jumps are often difficult to execute with accuracy and the player's energy is easily depleted. Besides that, there are some dead ends, and when you walk into them you are 100% dead. As a result, the player may become frustrated. However, because the game itself is well designed, the grab factor does not suffer, and it is probable that most players will insist on completing it. In general, although there are some drawbacks, this game is worth playing and completing.

See also: Phantomas Tales #1: Marsport.

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7

Phantomas returns in a new arcade adventure game. This time his quest will be much more dangerous; it is a much bigger game than the first one. The graphics are more colourful compared to Phantomas Saga: Infinity and overall, they are very nice and detailed. The loading screen is wonderful. The sound is also improved, both in terms of effects and in-game music. However, the greatest improvement is in the controls. Phantomas now jumps with accuracy. This boosts the gameplay and grab factor, since inaccurate jumping was the major drawback of the first game. As a whole, this is a game worth exploring and completing. It would be very nice if Phantomas' adventures continue on the CPC!

See also: Phantomas Saga: Infinity.

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9

The Phantom Club's members are all superheroes – but they weren't super enough to resist the evil influence of their overlord, Zarg. Plutus is the sole remaining good member, and you play him in this game as he tries to defeat Zarg and his minions. Starting at the rank of Zelator, Plutus must explore the Phantom Club building, which consists of more than 550 rooms. To move up a rank, you must complete the mission associated with it – but to do that, you must find the right movie screen and collect 40,000 points, which is achieved by shooting globes, or psychic balls as they're also known. The action is viewed from an isometric viewpoint, although many of the colour schemes are horrendous. The balls are difficult to find, and there are so many rooms that the game quickly becomes rather boring.

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4

Pharaon
(Loriciels, 1987)

You are an eminent professor of archaeology at Washington University who has just discovered the secret of Acktheon, an ancient Egyptian god. You travel to Cairo in order to retrieve the formula for antimatter. However, a Bulgarian colleague, Yvan Skival, is also searching for the formula and is extremely determined to find it before you do... This is a French text adventure containing many rather nice digitised pictures. Commands can either be entered using the keyboard or selecting an icon with the cursor keys. There are also a couple of arcade-based sub-games that you can play, which adds a little variety to the game. Overall, it's fairly good and not too difficult, although a lot of the objects that you can use are hard to spot in the pictures, and being killed randomly by Yvan is annoying.

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7

Phileas Fogg has volunteered to undertake a dangerous mission, and enter a battlefield in his hot air balloon. While flying above the battlefield, you must drop bombs on the cannons, shacks and towns. However, your supply of bombs is limited, as is your supply of hydrogen gas and sandbags which are used to control the balloon's height – but if you can find a shack belonging to the allies, you can replenish your supplies. The main problem with this game is that your control of the balloon is severely limited; you have to let the balloon go in the direction the wind is blowing. There is also little variety in the scenery and the gameplay. Both of these flaws make the game quite dull and not something you'll play for very long.

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4

Pick balls of the same colour and pile them on top of each other to blow them up! You have to remove all of the balls on each level within the time limit. Extra points can be gained by using the multipliers and points blocks, and you get enough in one go, you'll get a gem, and once you've built up a bit of a collection, you'll get a huge bonus. Watch out for the monsters, though, who will eat away at your time limit if they touch the floor! It's easy on the first few levels, but later on, it becomes pretty difficult. With excellent graphics and a bouncy theme tune, this game is one of my favourites.

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10

Pinball seems to be more a matter of luck than skill for me, and the same is true of this game. There are twelve tables, and to complete a table, you must light up all the letters and then aim the ball at the exit hole. It's a pretty good simulation; the ball whizzes and zooms almost too fast for you to follow it! Unfortunately, the normal CPC version, while possessing some very detailed and well drawn graphics, is much too difficult for me; although the first screen is easy enough, the second screen is ridiculously tough to complete. The cartridge version has musical effects, is much more colourful and makes use of the Plus' extra facilities, and it's a bit easier than the normal CPC version as well. Not surprisingly, I think the cartridge version is the better one.

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7

Nearly all pinball games on the CPC show a top-down view of the pinball table. However, this one (also known as 3D Pinball) dares to be different, by showing you a perspective view of the table, the way you would see it if you were playing a real pinball machine. This level of realism is maintained when you start playing the game; the ball moves really fast, and you'll need to be alert! Unfortunately, there is only one table and you can't tilt the machine, but the graphics are excellent, and the sound effects are pretty good as well.

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8

Pinball Wizard is a conversion of the original ZX Spectrum 16K title. Before the game begins, you're asked to choose a speed setting from 1 to 5. The gameplay delivers an acceptable challenge which includes all of the usual hazards and bonuses. The controls respond well too, with a smoothly moving ball in play at all times. Graphically, it's a port, so the visuals pretty much match those of the original (with more than four colours used). Some dated sound effects work well and complete a game that's worth a few goes.

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5

Since the famous Pong, in the earlier days of video game history, few attempts were made to adapt this sport on our favourite computer. And then came this excellent game. Well, the graphics are rather poor (the crowd is ridiculous) and the sound effects are extremely irritating. But the gameplay is excellent. You begin at level 0 and each victory makes the game harder (at least until level 5). You must reach 11 points to win, which is a little too short (21-point matches would have been more interesting). Don't expect much realism; you only have three or four different ways to hit the ball. But it is fast and extremely fun to play.

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7