JBYML " Tour De Force uses portrait graphics where plan-view splodges could have been expected - but there still isn't enough displayed on each screen for you to avoid certain objects. You have to memorise the course, or go too slowly to get a reasonable finishing position. Still, there's something about collision with stationary obstacles that just boosts the addictiveness. "
68%
A countdown at the bottom of the screen shows how you're doing lor time.
I COMMENTS
TCLEVER & SMART Producer: Magic Bytes Retail price: £8.99 Authors: Volker Marohn, Olaf Marohn and Holger Ahrens
C
lever and Smart are two German cartoon
characters now on the Spectrum screen - a pair of private eyes, complementing one another with their multifarious talents. Clever is master of disguise and can slip into something a little more unrecognisable to complete his investigations. Smart, his everpresent chum, is the intellectual of the two.
they find of interest. There are numerous flats, restaurants, shops, the kindergarten, a prison, and phone boxes which can pass on useful messages. Clever and Smart get paid in advance, so they have money to purchase useful things and eat out in restaurants (hunger is an everpresent problem). The money won't last long, but they can live on the edge ofthe law. enter a flat
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" A nightmare Indeed there's one correct response to every situation, no variation is permitted, and the system of Knightmare soon gets too dictatorial. " 48% out what they do. One squashes the nasties, but not all are so useful: if things get really desperate, resort to hurling bricks at the goblins.
J COMMENTS
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Joysticks: Kempston, Sinclair Graphics: book-like presentation, 'turning pages' from one screen to the next, using isometric views of monochromatic rooms Sound: uninteresting General rating: beautifully presented, but too difficult to reward most players
Presentation Graphics Payability Addictive qualities OVERALL
CRITICISM
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67% 75% 56% 68% 62%
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• " Clever & Smart is one of the weirdest games I've had the misfortune to play recently. It's difficult to get into, because the documentation is so bad, and once you do work out what' s going on it's boring. The nice title is about all that Clever & Swart has got going for it - and that's a shame because the idea is fairly sound, albeit not original. " BEN 27%
Joysticks: Kempston, Sinclair Graphics: humorous and detailed monochrome graphics (avoiding clash) on a fast-scrolling road Sound: national tunes for each country, with crash'n'bang Ingame effects General rating: original and addictive gameplay
J BYM
worthwhile. Enter the sewer system, locate the telephone cables, and Clever and Smart can start listening to telephone conversations. Like any other sewer, this one has rats, and contact with rats makes the two heroes hungry (if not logical). They can deter rats by wearing rat suits, but if the cat comes they've got real problems. Locating a kidnap victim is hard enough at the best of times, and what with hunger, stolen chequebooks. sewers, and remembering the names of all Ariolasoft's labels (whatever happened to Viz Design?), Clever and Smart have a lot to contend with.
In this licence released by Magic Bytes, one of Ariolasoft's many new labels. Or Bacterius has been kidnapped, and the two have been hired to find him. You start off in the streets of a town. There Clever and Smart can move among the buildings, investigating and entering those •
Clever & Smart, neither
and steal a chequebook, forging the owner's signature to draw more cash. But there are hazards on the street, such as killer cars and the occasional bomb. Roaming around the town may produce valuable clues, but going underground may be even more
• " Clever & Smart is weird - It takes a while to work out what's going on and I'm not sure the effort is worth it. The graphics are colourful but on the whole very simplistic, and the animation of the two characters is unrealistic, though the sound is effective. Clever & Smart isnt too hard, but it's boring. " ROBIN 44% • "If you're a maze-minded maniac this is for you. Clever & Smart /'s totally maze-oriented, so it isn't Bym-compatible. and the hyperactive characters don't add any the enjoyment. I would find grovelling around in real sewers much more exciting than trying to take bearings on the blank wails in this game. ' 8YM 65%
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COMMENTS
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Joysticks: Cursor, Kempston, Sinclair Graphics: large, colourful and simplistic graphics Sound: no musk: but effective spot FX General rating: an odd and rather boring game, licensed from German cartoon characters whose twee humour may not appeal to the British market Presentation Graphics Payability Addictive qualities
OVERALL
58% 47% 42% 28%
45%
19 CRASH February 1988