THE SPECTRUM GAMES DATABASE



THE RATS



PUBLISHER

Hodder & Stoughton



AUTHOR(S)



YEAR

October 1985



CATALOGUE NUMBER



CATEGORY

Adventure



DESCRIPTION



CONTROLS

Kempston.



INSTRUCTIONS



ORIGINAL INLAY CARD TEXT



HINTS/CHEATS



SEQUELS/PREQUELS



SCORES RECEIVED



REVIEWS



Review of _The Rats_ from Sinclair User No.43, October 1985



MAN'S WORST FEAR waits eagerly in the darkness. The scent of

human blood is overwhelming and the taste of cool, moist, rubbery

flesh is still remebered and savoured. The time is near for the

invasion of _The Rats_.  The game, from Hodder and Stoughton

which publishes the book of the same name, is an experience as

well as being a menu-driven adventure with a touch of strategy.

It loads in sections, the first being a demo program with a nice

line in cellar graphics. The sound is not too hot, but the

excellent and superbly fast animation sequence, in which a torch

scans a watery cellar to reveal hundreds of the plague carriers,

is one of the best I have seen.  Once the demo is over, or if you

break out of it, the main game is loaded from random routines on

the first side of the tape. Loading is confusing as the main

operating system of the game chooses the section to be included

within the program at random. Therefore, some of the code on the

tape does not load and, if you are a first time user, you may

think that the tape is faulty. It is not an error, the tape is

loading in the random encounters for the game.  Once the game is

running you had better be prepared for some fast action.  There

are two levels of play, over which the computer has total

control. The first level involves a number of scenarios which

deal with minor characters. As in James Herbert's book, those

people are expendable and can be scrificed for information about

the mutant rats.  Those scenarios are heralded by a warning

siren. The screen then splits into three windows, the largest of

which displays the action as text. The long window on the left

provides command options and the one at the bottom of the screen

is your command window. Making your character act is simple -

just construct a command sentence at the bottom of the screen

using the options provided. The effect creates a feeling of

tension as you do not know what options are available until a

specific menu is displayed.  If you are unlucky enough to meet

a rat, it can kill you in a number of ways. First it might rip

through the screen and bite you or, alternatively, it could try

to rip you through the text with its claws. Once an attack is

made, a human face, full of terror, is shown fallinf from the rip

in the page.  It is possible to escape your fate as one of the

minor characters. For instance, the little girl doing her paper

round would be better off if she did not go into the house across

the road, but then you would not discover the rats' secrets.  The

major characters, including Harris and Foskins, are just as

vulnerable to attacks as the minor characters. In some

situations, Harris must be mercenary and let the rats kill

friends in order to gain information about their habits. For

example, when he goes to capture a rat he must make sure that his

companions leads the way - the leader becomes a rat victim.  The

other part of the game is a contest between the rats and

Government forces. You are in charge and must allocate resources

on a giant map which shows the spread of the rats through London.

If they go over the boundaries you have lost the game, just as

if you have lost if one of the major characters is killed.  You

use icon menus to allocate forces and resources. Those go into

action on the part of the map which you have indicated with your

cursor.  At the same time you must specify the researxh into the

rats' behaviour.  _The Rats_ is a complex and brilliant game with

above average graphics - if minimal sound. I can recommend it

without reservation to those with strong stomachs.



                                   John Gilbert



Publisher: Hodder and Stoughton

Price: 7.95

Memory: 48K

Joystick: Kempston, programmable

Rating: ***** (out of 5, meaning: 24 carat. Buy it.), and awarded

a Sinclair User Classic.





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