ZZAP!64 - Issue 3 - July 1985

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number of diamonds within a
time limit (which varies from
cave to cave and according to
the difficulty level), and then
escape through the cave exit to a
new cave.
The special appeal is that although
the game's riddled with
puzzles, there's no single solution
to each one. Different players
will develop their own
approach, and most caves
needn't be played the same way
fore very long, rather than having
to play all the way through
from the start. However levels 4
and 5 cannot be started part way
through. This is an excellent
game structure, offering enough
early encouragement while
holding out a long-term challenge.
The caves on Rockford's Riot
include some superbly original
new layouts. In general they
present more complex tasks,
with longer time limits allowed.
For example, on the very first
cave you have to sneak past fireflies,
then use one of them to
blast an entry into a sealed off
chamber, seal it again to keep
out the enemies, clear out the
space under an enchanted wall,
set boulders cascading through
it to turn them into diamonds,
each time. What is more, to get
anywhere you must exploit the
behaviour of the various
enemies. A firefly will explode if
hit by a boulder, offering you a
technique for blasting your way
into otherwise inaccessible
caverns. Butterflies, if lured into
contact with the amoeba, will
explode into jewels. Boulders
can be used to seal yourself off
from chasing enemies. And so
on.
Each cave covers several
screens of playing area, the pic-,
ture scrolling smoothly to follow
the action. There are 1 6 different
caves, all presenting very different
challenges and five difficulty
levels where the basic cave
structures remain unaltered, but
the position of individual items
within them is different, creating
new problems on each level.
As before, on the first three
levels you can choose to start at
cave A, E, I or M, which allows
you to see a lot of the game be-
and then dash to the exit past
any surviving fireflies.
But despite the extra complexities,
it doesn't seem any harder
overall — indeed, experienced
Boulder Dash players may be
able to plough straight through
level one at virtually the first
attempt. The higher levels are
another matter.
One very important point
worth taking into account in
judging this game is that
Beyond, having taken over the
rights from Statesoft, are putting
Boulder Dash itself on the
other side of the tape. This is a
shrewd move.
So far Boulder Dash has sold
surprisingly poorly, probably
because buyers have been put
off by the relatively uninspiring
screen-shots, and Statesoft's
somewhat lacklustre advertising.
But now, anyone who
hasn't got the original can go
ahead and buy this tape confident
of getting stunning value for
money. While people who
already have the original prob-
Here's what you
can expect to find
in Rockford's Riot:
CAVE A: See main
review.
CAVE B: An
amoeba growing
out of three walled
off silos. Trap it
(that's easy!), to
turn it into dozens
of diamonds, then
unplug the silos at
the bottom to reap
a rich reward.
CAVE C: Work your
way through a rock
wall spiral, past
scores of boulders
and an awful lot of
fireflies.
cave, but you can't
reach them
because a massive
amoeba is blocking
the way. So you
have to blow your
way through it by
releasing hordes of
fireflies. Great
cave.
CAVE E: See 'The
new features'.
— —
The contents of the caves
CAVE F: First you
must run a gauntlet
of fireflies (easy,
once you've
sussed the pattern)
to reach two
massive walled off
containers packed
with boulders and
diamonds. Careful
manoeuvring
required to get all
you need before
rerunning the
gauntlet back to the
exit.
CAVE G: Once
again, plenty of
fireflies
in
evidence, but this
time you have to
use them to blow
through a series of
four separate walls
before you can
reach the exit.
CAVE D: There's a
stack of jewels on
the right of the
CAVE H: Nice one,
this. On one side a
row of butterflies
rushing round a
square. On the
other side a
rowing amoeba,
he problem is
how on earth to
persuade the
butterflies to break
out of their square
and go and hit the
ably won't need too much convincing
to buy themselves
another 16 caves!
Meanwhile, we at Zzap, including
Rockford, are doing our
best to convince Beyond and
First Star to release a Boulder
Dash III complete with a facility
to design your own screens —
the lastability on that would be
mind-boggling!
Everyone here had a hernia
when it was revealed that
there was to be a
Boulderdash II. Except me.
OK, so Boulderdash is a good
game, but it's not that good,
is it? Anyway, this is very
similar to its predecessor and
could well be part of the
same game. If you liked
Boulder Dash you'llprobably
like this, if you didn't, this
won 't convert you.
PRESENTATION
Q r- 0/
Q^ /O anc/ 9ame structure.
GRAPHICS
Goodpackaging, options
mm w 4 Q/ Same as before, a bit crude
amoeba (where
they explode into
jewels).
CAVE I: A score of
walls, each topped
by a row of jewels
and earth and
patrolled by
fireflies. Grabbing
the jewels — you
need almost every
one — is just a
matter of sussing
the
fireflies'
pattern. Not our
favourite cave.
CAVE J: Has similarities
to the
amazing cave N in
Boulder Dash. No
jewels in sight. Just
eight pairs of
boulders each
sealing off a firefly
and a butterfly. So
how do you use the
boulders to smash
the butterflies
without being hit
by a firefly?
CAVE K:
Guaranteed to get
your pulse racing.
Plenty of diamonds
in easy enough
positions to collect.
Only trouble is you
can't start without
releasing a long
queue of fireflies
who stay on your
tail throughout —
there are no
boulders to use
against them.
CAVE L: Jewels
hidden in stacks of
boulders and
packed into a
network of
walled boxes
21
—
easy to get
boy is it
trapped.
CAVE M: See 'new
features'.
CAVE N:
Entertaining
screen featuring
jewels adjacent to a
firefly patrolled
passage, plus two
open spaces
teeming with the
evil creatures.
Plenty of scope for
firefly bashing.
CAVE O: See 'new
features'.
CAVE P: Classic
screen in which
you have to extract
the jewels from an
absolute mountain
of boulders. Very
tricky indeed.
Perhaps / was expecting too
but / came away after
much ,
a few games feeling
somewhat disappointed with
this follow up (or rather
follow on). / would have liked
to have seen some new
adversaries and maybe a
screen designer to make
things more interesting. Still
it's not a bad game but I ..
Ouch! Sorry Rockford!!
Don 't take it to heart, I .. !!
Alright, Alright, I admit it, /
like it
ORIGINALITY
0 vJ /O
B f /O ^Ut ^unct'onal. Q C" O/
SOUND
f— q
/ Tinkling ofgems, rumbling
°f boulders,
f
explosions and
w w / kj amoeba.
VALUE FOR MONEY
0 0 /
>< ft y°u baven 't got
/ v> /f% Boulderdash the VFMisout
KJ / U of this world.
Too dose to Boulderdash
f°r com^ort-
HOOKABILITY
X n /ri
LASTABILITY
Totally absorbing, unless
y°u ve bad your fill of
U Boulderdash.
O A O/ 16 ver y different multi-
^ ‘
/C\ screen caves, and five
f ^ difficulty levels.
V 11 1 q Goup MfcpqL,//
ZZAP! 64 July 1985 29