Ugh! vs. The Unicorn
Current Score: Old Games 9 New Games 11
UGH!
(Softek, 1984)
There are a few Spectrum games whose names you’d feel a bit silly saying out loud, and this is one. How about “Aaargh!” by Melbourne House? Or the similar “Ahhh!!” from CRL? It’s hard to talk about Ultimate’s “Pssst” without sounding like a doofus, and how can you keep a straight face when you mention “Yie Ar Kung Fu”? Yie Ar? It all sounds a bit silly nowadays…
But the thing is, this game sounds like an expression of disgust, perhaps at being dunked in a tank of insects or cleaning up baby sick. And that’s not really relevant to the game, for it is a game about a caveman. So I assume it should really be named after the most famous word in the neanderthal language – “Ug”. Come on Softek, you are/were (probably) better than this.
Before they turned into the guitarist from U2, Softek turned out quite a few early Speccy titles, often their versions of the usual arcade suspects, and they all seemed to reach a level somewhere between “alright” and “okay I suppose”. No huge hits and no horrendous flops, they were very much Steady Eddies, which may or may not have been one of their games, I can't remember.
Ug(h) has read in the Jurassic Times that the Ice Age is imminent, so he’d best fill his larder to avoid a grizzly demise. Local 4D pterodactyl Pterry (I see what they did there) has a nest full of eggs which look tasty enough as long as Ug(h) can avoid the rocks he uses as defence. Pterry’s mates Rex the T-Rex and Alison Allosaurus are on hand to assist Pterry, and Ug(h) can throw a spear at them if he chooses. He only takes one at a time, the berk, and has to return to his cave if he needs another one. Like duh, Ug(h) , it’s Jurassic 101. Collect 4 or 5 eggs and Ug(h) can move on to the next level. There are 5 subtly different layouts in total, of which I reached number 3 and still haven’t seen both of the other creatures, just a little fat dude who is probably Rex.
On loading the game up, we have some pretty decent music which ain’t bad at all for 1984. If you choose to change the skill level, there’s a muscly arm graphic which bulges to Arnie level at level 6, while if you stick sensibly to level 1, the computer chooses to mock you by playing derisory sound effects and claiming your arm has those (impossible) negative muscles. Bit rude, but I’ll try not to take it personally. There’s a nice colourful high score table too for your televisual delight.
Coldplay would love this game, as when you start playing proper, everything is all yellow. It’s quite the yellowest game I can recall, maybe even more than Tranz Am. And you have to say the little caveman and the tubby T-rex are both adorable, you could just eat them up. Well that’s what the T-Rex is trying to do to you of course. The pterodactyl isn’t quite as cute and is a pain in the butt as he lashes rocks down on you in just the wrong places, the clever bugger. The dino starts off going in fairly random directions, but since you only really have two possible routes to the eggses, he is still a frequent nuisance.
The main problem is that all of your movements are diagonal, so you’re constantly pressing two buttons at once, which isn’t ideal unless you've got a joystick you don’t mind breaking. And you have to get your caveman into exactly the right spot in order for him to turn a different way, which can be agonising. Movement is slow generally but things get more exciting when the dinos start to follow you. Throwing spears at them is quite fun though, just make sure you don’t hit them when they’re hanging around near their one regeneration point...
The third level introduces a third alternative path to liven things up, but there’s not a huge amount of variety otherwise. They missed a trick in not using a ‘night mode’ like in Deathchase, a simple but effective trick to keep people’s interest ticking over. Your lives do increase when you progress, so there’s added playability there, and to be fair it’s not bad fun for a while, until those diagonals make you swear excessively.
THE UNICORN (UriS, 2023)
The most infamous Speccy game about a unicorn has got to be the one that practically bankrupted Mikrogen with its extra 16K cartridge, Shadow Of The Unicorn. If only that game had been better, maybe the idea would have caught on, but in the end it was an ambitious project which proved an expensive failure. So let’s hope this game, The Unicorn, doesn’t prove quite so disastrous and kill anyone…
It was published by UriS from Russia and written by Yuriy Shapovalov, helped by Bulldozer and Crazy Fox, among other oddballs. It formed part of the Spectrum contingent in the most recent Yandex Retro Games Battle of 2023. It didn’t beat Seraphima, “but then again, what does?” That’s a bastardisation of a Blade Runner quote for you to enjoy. Well done for representing the proud nation of Spectralia in any case, I take my hat off to anyone who has the crazed single-mindedness to make a proper Spectrum game in this day and age.
The loading screen is nice, a lovely picture of a slightly undernourished unicorn on the right and some colourful medieval style text. “Once upon a time in a gal… sorry, forest far, far away…” it begins, starting a sweet little tale about a unicorn and a princess, the sort you’ll be all too familiar with if you have a daughter. The story progresses with each level completed, rather like Jumping Jack, but not quite as rhymey.
On the menu screen there’s a pleasant little tune which even seems to include some hoof clopping noises cleverly. It’s good once the first few bars are out of the way, as at first it sounded a little like My Little Pony, which again gave me scary flashbacks. It’s probably best it doesn’t play throughout the game itself.
Some good news for the gammy-handed is that there are only 3 keys – left, right and prance. You move the eponymous unicorn much like a knight in chess, 2 forward and 1 left. Or 2 left and 1 forward. Or 1 back and 2 right. Just like how unicorns move in real life. I wonder if Russian chess involves unicorns instead of horses then, sounds plausible. You usually have to land on a specific square to achieve your goal – on level 1 you have to land on the princess, kind of, who then mounts you. I’m going to end this paragraph now, I don’t like the way it’s going.
Over 6 levels you have a variety of humans and creatures to avoid and possibly smite yourself if you’re lucky. The game helpfully highlights the squares you could possibly move to, but it’s very easy to paint yourself into a corner, and wish you didn’t choose to move in such a peculiar pattern. A note is kept of the number of moves you take, and there’s a high score table to chronicle such endeavours. It took me 32 moves to complete level 4, but complete level 4 I did… and when you do complete one, the unicorn winks at you – cheeky!
The graphics are neat and colourful, reminding me a little of Rebelstar 2, but without the photons, aliens and lawnmowers, and spot effects are duly provided too. I've seen just the other day that they've done a 'The Unicorn Plus' with extra dinosaurs, so I'll have to check that out once it's been translated into English. Overall it’s a very enjoyable, not to mention highly macho and manly, little puzzler to wile away your Sunday afternoon while you drink your tea and munch on a crumpet, sitting in your conservatory. A terribly English Russian experience.
LET'S GO TO THE VIDEPRINTER!
BEST GRAPHICS UGH!
BEST COLOUR THE UNICORN
BEST SOUND UGH!
MOST ORIGINAL UGH!
MOST PLAYABLE THE UNICORN
MOST ADDICTIVE THE UNICORN
FINAL SCORE
UGH! 3 THE UNICORN 3
Ugh! wins on penalties!
Comments