| Manic Miner review, by Shaun Bebbington. [message #366539] |
Sat, 21 April 2018 04:25  |
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Originally posted by: Shaun Bebbington
For anyone who grew up with an 8-bit personal computer in the 1980s, you would have almost certainly known about the Miner Willy games, created by Matthew Smith. These games, Manic Miner, and Jet Set Willy I and II, are considered classics on the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, and one way or another, these were ported across to the more popular micros of the day. There was even an unofficial version for Sinclair ZX81 which sported high resolution graphics, and it's actually pretty good too. The poor Commodore VIC-20, however, was left out, and whilst Perils of Willy was okay for younger children and a reasonable effort all considered, it wasn't a patch of any of the Willy games for more powerful 8-bits such as the Speccy.
Fast forward to February 2018 and Kweepa has developed Manic Miner for the VIC-20 + 16K. For those who don't know, Kweepa is a rather prolific developer in what has become known as the 'home brew' scene. And I know from personal experience that even his crap games aren't that bad.
As a professional developer myself (albeit in the PHP world), and a former writer, and Commodore user/fan, I know when someone has put a lot of care and attention into something. And Kweepa's version of Manic Miner is outstanding on this level. There are a few differences with this VIC-20 version and the original Speccy classic, which I think is down to having fewer pixels to play with; for instance, it took me a while to get through the Central Cavern (level one) unscathed which I would usually get through first time. The conveyor belts work slightly differently that the original too, but as for everything else, it's as close to perfect as you could get or want. The graphics are really smooth, and unlike Perils of Willy mentioned above, this doesn't just look like a Miner Willy game, it feels like, and is, just that.
Kweepa has developed some of the best post-commercial VIC-20 games that I've seen. And this is one of them. This isn't just for Manic Miner fans either. If you enjoy 2D linear platform games, you will love this. It's brilliant.
Graphics: 9/10
Sound: 8/10
Playability: 9/10
Overall: 9/10
Links:
http://sleepingelephant.com/denial -> see the "VIC-20 Software Releases of 2018" topics in the "Announcements" board of the forums there.
http://www.kweepa.org/step/vic20/miner-20180201b.zip -> direct download
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| Re: Manic Miner review, by Shaun Bebbington. [message #366566 is a reply to message #366539] |
Sat, 21 April 2018 14:44  |
wwww.leser
Messages: 21
Registered: March 2013
Karma: 0
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Junior Member |
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On Saturday, April 21, 2018 at 10:25:47 AM UTC+2, Shaun Bebbington wrote:
> For anyone who grew up with an 8-bit personal computer in the 1980s, you would have almost certainly known about the Miner Willy games, created by Matthew Smith. These games, Manic Miner, and Jet Set Willy I and II, are considered classics on the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, and one way or another, these were ported across to the more popular micros of the day. There was even an unofficial version for Sinclair ZX81 which sported high resolution graphics, and it's actually pretty good too. The poor Commodore VIC-20, however, was left out, and whilst Perils of Willy was okay for younger children and a reasonable effort all considered, it wasn't a patch of any of the Willy games for more powerful 8-bits such as the Speccy.
>
> Fast forward to February 2018 and Kweepa has developed Manic Miner for the VIC-20 + 16K. For those who don't know, Kweepa is a rather prolific developer in what has become known as the 'home brew' scene. And I know from personal experience that even his crap games aren't that bad.
>
> As a professional developer myself (albeit in the PHP world), and a former writer, and Commodore user/fan, I know when someone has put a lot of care and attention into something. And Kweepa's version of Manic Miner is outstanding on this level. There are a few differences with this VIC-20 version and the original Speccy classic, which I think is down to having fewer pixels to play with; for instance, it took me a while to get through the Central Cavern (level one) unscathed which I would usually get through first time.. The conveyor belts work slightly differently that the original too, but as for everything else, it's as close to perfect as you could get or want. The graphics are really smooth, and unlike Perils of Willy mentioned above, this doesn't just look like a Miner Willy game, it feels like, and is, just that.
>
> Kweepa has developed some of the best post-commercial VIC-20 games that I've seen. And this is one of them. This isn't just for Manic Miner fans either. If you enjoy 2D linear platform games, you will love this. It's brilliant.
>
> Graphics: 9/10
> Sound: 8/10
> Playability: 9/10
> Overall: 9/10
>
> Links:
>
> http://sleepingelephant.com/denial -> see the "VIC-20 Software Releases of 2018" topics in the "Announcements" board of the forums there.
>
> http://www.kweepa.org/step/vic20/miner-20180201b.zip -> direct download
Fans of Edvard Grieg or Monty Python will be delighted to hear or see one thing or other that seems familiar. Btw., if you don't own a VIC-20 (I don't) and like me don't succeed immediately trying to get the game running in VICE, here's what I did:
- Create an empty D64 file (I used x64, but this should work with the VIC-20 emulator as well)
- use Starcommander in DOSBOX to copy (F5) the PRG to the D64 image
- enable an additional 16K of RAM in the emulator
- enable emulation of a 1541
- autostart/mount the D64 to run the game
Many thanks to Shaun Bebbington for bringing this newsgroup back to life!
Chris
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| Re: Manic Miner review, by Shaun Bebbington. [message #366567 is a reply to message #366566] |
Sat, 21 April 2018 15:30 |
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Originally posted by: Shaun Bebbington
On Saturday, 21 April 2018 19:44:41 UTC+1, ArcadeAge wrote:
> Fans of Edvard Grieg or Monty Python will be delighted to hear or see one thing or other that seems familiar. Btw., if you don't own a VIC-20 (I don't) and like me don't succeed immediately trying to get the game running in VICE, here's what I did:
> - Create an empty D64 file (I used x64, but this should work with the VIC-20 emulator as well)
> - use Starcommander in DOSBOX to copy (F5) the PRG to the D64 image
> - enable an additional 16K of RAM in the emulator
> - enable emulation of a 1541
> - autostart/mount the D64 to run the game
>
> Many thanks to Shaun Bebbington for bringing this newsgroup back to life!
>
> Chris
Thanks for the feedback. When I'm inclined to write reviews of Commodore games, I'll post them here for people's consumption.
Regards,
Shaun.
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| Re: Manic Miner review, by Shaun Bebbington. [message #366568 is a reply to message #366539] |
Sat, 21 April 2018 16:06 |
Andreas Kohlbach
Messages: 1456
Registered: December 2011
Karma: 0
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Senior Member |
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On Sat, 21 Apr 2018 01:25:45 -0700 (PDT), Shaun Bebbington wrote:
>
> For anyone who grew up with an 8-bit personal computer in the 1980s,
> you would have almost certainly known about the Miner Willy games,
> created by Matthew Smith. These games, Manic Miner, and Jet Set Willy
> I and II, are considered classics on the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, and one
> way or another, these were ported across to the more popular micros of
> the day. There was even an unofficial version for Sinclair ZX81 which
> sported high resolution graphics, and it's actually pretty good
> too. The poor Commodore VIC-20, however, was left out, and whilst
> Perils of Willy was okay for younger children and a reasonable effort
> all considered, it wasn't a patch of any of the Willy games for more
> powerful 8-bits such as the Speccy.
I saw Manic Miner first on the Commodore 64 port. I don't like
platformers, so didn't like it. Have to admit though it's cult game.
--
Andreas
My random toughts and comments
https://news-commentaries.blogspot.com/
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| Re: Manic Miner review, by Shaun Bebbington. [message #366579 is a reply to message #366568] |
Sat, 21 April 2018 16:52 |
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Originally posted by: Shaun Bebbington
On Saturday, 21 April 2018 21:06:15 UTC+1, Andreas Kohlbach wrote:
> On Sat, 21 Apr 2018 01:25:45 -0700 (PDT), Shaun Bebbington wrote:
>>
>> For anyone who grew up with an 8-bit personal computer in the 1980s,
>> you would have almost certainly known about the Miner Willy games,
>> created by Matthew Smith. These games, Manic Miner, and Jet Set Willy
>> I and II, are considered classics on the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, and one
>> way or another, these were ported across to the more popular micros of
>> the day. There was even an unofficial version for Sinclair ZX81 which
>> sported high resolution graphics, and it's actually pretty good
>> too. The poor Commodore VIC-20, however, was left out, and whilst
>> Perils of Willy was okay for younger children and a reasonable effort
>> all considered, it wasn't a patch of any of the Willy games for more
>> powerful 8-bits such as the Speccy.
>
> I saw Manic Miner first on the Commodore 64 port. I don't like
> platformers, so didn't like it. Have to admit though it's cult game.
> --
> Andreas
>
> My random toughts and comments
> https://news-commentaries.blogspot.com/
ZZap!64 wasn't exactly gushing about Jet Set Willy II at the time, I think they were lukewarm at best. But Speccy fans [mostly] love it. No game is for everyone though, I agree. I do like the VIC-20 version though.
Regards,
Shaun.
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| Re: Manic Miner review, by Shaun Bebbington. [message #366699 is a reply to message #366579] |
Tue, 24 April 2018 05:44 |
Mayhem
Messages: 108
Registered: March 2013
Karma: 0
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Senior Member |
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In Kweepa's earlier builds, he had it that you could stop on the conveyor belts, which is definitely wrong. After mentioning this to him, he corrected it and the last build put out fixes this. Not sure if that is what you were referring to here Shaun?
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| Re: Manic Miner review, by Shaun Bebbington. [message #368041 is a reply to message #366699] |
Mon, 21 May 2018 04:52 |
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Originally posted by: Shaun Bebbington
On Tuesday, 24 April 2018 10:44:46 UTC+1, Mayhem wrote:
> In Kweepa's earlier builds, he had it that you could stop on the conveyor belts, which is definitely wrong. After mentioning this to him, he corrected it and the last build put out fixes this. Not sure if that is what you were referring to here Shaun?
I was hoping that by now The Matt Mayhem(tm) would be self-aware. But apparently not.
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