Your Spectrum
Issue 16, July 1985 - Frontlines
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SPARKS FLY WE'VE GOT IT TAPED TORC OF THE TOWN
Quackshot screen
Be prepared to duck and shoot when Quackshot wings its way onto the market. It's the first of Creative Sparks new range of cheapo games called Sparklers. Think of the funfair, picture the rifle range, and blast those ducks with just your joystick - gone are the days of useless bean bags and bent sights. And if you don't get the ducks, then the rest of the frantic toys'll be out to get you. Get quacking and call Alison Calanda on (nnnn) nnnn to find out how to get more fun for the fair price of £2.50. 		Impressed by the power- packed programs in YS? Hooked on our unrivalled routines? Too lazy to type them all in? Well, now your problem's solved. We've joined up with Digi'T'ape to bring the very best selection of the Your Spectrum monthly dose of programming to you on tape. So, if you've got better things to do with your hands, you can now say farewell to all that typing - LOAD "" are the only keys you'll ever need again!
If you like the idea - and at 3 quid including p&p you can hardly go wrong - you'll find the full details in Digi'T'ape's ad on page 57 in this issue. Plus the tapes will be packed up and posted within 24 hours.
This is also good news if you're thinking of submitting your latest masterpiece to us. If it's published, you'll not only receive lots of lovely lolly but royalties for every tape sold. Even more reason (you need more? Ed) for sending in your megaprograms to Opportunity Knocks. 		award photo
Six days solid on Dragontorc - how did he stay awake?
Does this scene look familiar? Cast your mind back to the quest to complete Avalon. Well, here's a double take ... but this time the game's Dragontorc, the follow-up from Hewson Consultants.
Eamon McGing, whose home-town is Camberley in Surrey, ended his epic adventure at 11:30pm on April 7th after six solid days of addictive playing. And his reward? The grand title of High Lorelord plus an official pat on the back from Hewson.
Now, if you're a careless torcer or you've found the game's beginning to drag on, send an sae to Hewson's offices at n xxxxxx xxxxx, xxxxxxxx, xxxx xxnn nxx and they'll unravel a few secrets for you.

SUPERMANIC JET LAG MICRODRIVIN' ... STRAIGHT ON
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? Nope, it's another game based on a well-hyped cartoon strip star. This time it's Superman who's come out of the telephone booth and into the box.
The game's going to be among the first from a new label called Monolith, a sister company to Beyond Software. This first move from the new company is to dream up one of those corny titles for a chunk of code. This one's called 'authoring' and it'll allow the game's designers to create superb animated cartoon graphics. (What, no Reprosound, Sensory Animation and Smellyvision as well? Ed)
While we all wait for Superman to change into his underpants, Monolith is releasing a couple of games called Rockford's Riot and Quake Minus One. If you find all this too Kryptic, get on the hot- line to Mark Gardiner on nn-nnn nnnn. 		Just when you thought it was safe to go back to your Speccy ... he's back! And just when we thought we might never have to mention the initials JSW again, Software Projects has done the dirty on us. Yep, Jet Set Willy II is due for imminent release.
While you're reaching for the tranquilizers, we'll tell you what we've wheedled out of Software Projects. The game's going to be set once again in Miner Willy's mansion but he's had a few extensions built to the West Wing since JSW - there'll be a lot more rooms this time.
So, what's the cost? Well, other than sleepless nights and sore eyes, it'll set you back £6.95. That's all Software Projects is telling us at the moment but if you want to have a go at getting more info, ring them on nnn-nnn nnnn. 		Till now, it's been a bit of a rough ride trying to convert all your programs from tape to microdrive. But the Evesham Micro Centre reckons its new Interface III will smooth the way to trouble-free conversions.
The Interface III's an easy-to-operate hardware add-on that allows a 'snapshot' to be taken at any stage of a program. At just under £40 it's not cheap but it could be the answer to every microdriver's dream.
If you're not convinced that it'll cope with all your software, check it out on (nnnn) nnnnn. Or you can wait for a full road-test in the next issue.
P a p e r d a t a Spotty Dog
The Century Programming Course for the Spectrum

Century Communications £12.95

Tense, nervous headache? Have you just acquired a shiny new Speccy hut found your first bash at learning Basic has proved a brain-numbing experience? Well, there are always alternatives to struggling with the Speccy's manual. Have you thought about joining a computer club or evening classes or perhaps you'd rather sit down with a book ...
The Century Programming Course for the Spectrum is a new book from Century Communications that aims to teach you all there is to know about Sinclair Basic, as well as instilling in you the best programming techniques. To get the best out of it as a course, the book suggests that you should restrict yourself to reading an hour's worth a night. Now this mightn't sound very much but there's so much info here, you'd soon be overwhelmed if you attempted more.
The really gutsy part of the book is split into four sections. The first covers the relatively simple aspects of Spectrum programming like cursor modes, graphics modes, the PRINT statement, the LET command and simple arithmetic. OK, so far! Part two just about wraps up all the other commands, with full details of how each is arranged. Here you'll find IF THEN, FOR TO, STEP and NEXT plus the finer points of PRINT when using ink, paper and AT or TAB controls.
Between them, parts three and four go over all the really heavy programming techniques, like bubble, binary and ripple shorting. And although the book sets out to comprehensively cover Basic, it doesn't avoid all mention of machine code matters. My only qualm is with the free'n'easy use of flow-charts throughout the book - I'm just not convinced that they add clarity, not confusion.
Still, there's no doubt that this is a pretty encyclopaedic tome (as it should be for £12.95!) that can be used as a reference book even if you don't need to begin right hack at the basics. But be warned, it's full of jargon and often expects you to have an IQ in excess of Sir Clive's! So if you're a real beginner a better suggestion might be to splash out on a somewhat less technical book. (How about a plug for the Capital Radio Book of Computers and Simple Programming? Troubleshootin' Pete) Once you've mastered that, you'll be ready to have a crack at the Century course.

Tony Samuels

HACKING
AWAY
Hacker cartoon

The column that POKEs more fun. Send your hacking hints to Andrew Pennell, Your Spectrum, 14 Rathbone Place, London W1P 1DE.

D'you remember back as far as issue 14? Well, Mark Gibson was pretty desperate for POKEs for Pinball Wizard. As usual a couple of YS readers have come to the rescue. So, here goes Mark, the magic POKEs that'll turn you into a wizard at Pinball. First, LOAD "" CODE 36384 to get it in, do POKE 51566,0 for endless lives, then SAVE "PINBALL" CODE 36384, 16128 to save the modified version. Next, change the LOAD "" CODE command in the loader to LOAD "" CODE 16384 and the pinball table is now yours. Rock on, Tommy!
Those same YS hackers, Tom Dalziel and Paul Macpherson, have also come up with the goods on Finders Keepers, that royal 		rollick from Mastertronic. For infinite lives, POKE 34208,0 will [do] the trick or you could try POKE 30394 with the number of lives you want. Watch out though 'cos more than four may make a mighty mess of the screen so you'll need POKE 33969,0 to disable the printing of remaining lives. Thanks also to a hacker from Holland, Felix Gerrinckx from Antwerp whose help was also worth a king's ransom.
And now code-crackers, here's a record breaker. James Cockle is nine years old and easily qualifies as the youngest hacker who's ever written in. He's come up with a POKE for Atic Atac that'll stop you losing energy - POKE 35353,0. I dread to think what young James'll be getting up to by the time he's my age! (Drawing his pension I expect Ed.).
Now here's a funny thing. Kieron Matthews has found that a POKE we printed way back in Issue 9 for Sabre Wulf has a rather peculiar effect on Lunar Jetman. It prevents the missile from launching and ruining your chances. Then, to reach the next level you should wait for the time to run out and shoot at the base. Trouble is Kieron just can't get past level 10 even with the POKE, 'cos he can't find the trailer anywhere. Mind you, there's a good reason for that - the trailer just doesn't exist! It may be on the inlay card but it's certainly not in the game. To get any further you'll just have to do a Robert the Bruce - try and try again!
There now follows an intermission for a spot of complete lunacy. Hacker Hook has written to ask for the POKEs for Pud Pud from Ocean. Now I've never heard of it but I was willing 		to give him the benefit of the doubt until he declared that he's also a fan of Pud Pud music. Yeah, yeah! We'll be sending the van around.
Another candidate for the men in white coats is Mark Sanderson - he's mad enough to send in yet another POKE for ... no I can't bring myself to say it ... oh, alright but only if I can jumble it up - Jilly T. Sweet! This is the last one EVER - or at least till the next time whichever is the soonest. Try: FOR f=44800 TO 44928 : POKE f,PEEK(f+512) : NEXT f. Now one of Matthew Smith's unused sprites is revealed - you'll see the penknife change into a moving top-hat. To see another one alter the 512 to 640, run it again and you'll get a rotating periscope.
Moving on to a rather newer game, George Baselen has sent in the code words that'll help you get from level to level in Wizard's Lair. They are LYONS, LIAYR, VAULT, DUNGN, CRPYT, HAWLO and CAIVE. I just hope the magic spells in the game are better than these ones!
Finally, a word about Microdrive conversions. A lot of you are asking about the programs that do the conversions for you. Well, the simplest is actually free, supplied with the Expansion System on the demo cartridge, written by yours truly. It's a 'dumb' converter (I was gonna say that figures, but I wouldn't dare!. Ed) just copying blindly, though it makes no attempt to change any code.
One secret I'm surprised no-one's sussed yet can be seen if you load the program 'copier' as usual, then enter as a command: *©. Since I was the one who hid it, I shan't give away the message here - so get cracking.
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