Your Spectrum 17 - Frontlines & Hacking Away

Your Spectrum
Issue 17, August 1985 - Frontlines & Hacking Away

IF YOU REALLY WANT TO KNOW ...	LOOKING INTO THE GLASS	LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVES
You've all missed your chance to dig deep for Sir Clive and help refloat the sinking Sinclair Research company. The business has been struggling since sales dropped drastically around Christmas time. However, Robert Maxwell, The Mirror's generous publisher has nobly handed over a cool £12 million to help pay off the bills! Not being one to slink into the background, Mr Moneybags has secured himself the title of Chairman of the board, while Sir Clive is relegated to the position of Life President. The big question is, what will become of the Sinclair products we know and love? Paul Quade, a Mirror Group spokesman said, "although there are obviously new products in the pipeline, plans cannot be put into action until we've settled the debts and weighed up the pros and cons of existing Sinclair goods." He also let on that Robert Maxwell feels most of Sinclair's babies are good products, and only their marketing let them down. (Does this mean we can expect the tycoon to trade in his Roller for a C5? - Ed.) The Mirror Group's software arm, Mirrorsoft have not been given their orders yet. If they grow along Sinclair/ Maxwell lines the least we can expect is £££1,000,000 Spectrum Bingo ... and watch Your Spectrum's credits. Could we be seeing something like Editor Robert Maxwell, Deputy Editor, Robert Maxwell ... Bob Maxwell ... so impressed he bought the company.	Quicksilva's out to shatter you with the impressive array of vivid colour and whizzo 3D graphics in their latest arcade-style-strike - simulator game, Glass. Now, can you see yourself as a supremo Games Lord? Well this is your objective, and on your way to gathering those vital status points, you'll definitely be Glass - out to shatter QS's recent run of naff games? seeing yourself - reflected by the mirror- images on your screen. There's a real sense of gliding as you zoom through the exotic landscapes of cities and time-tunnels, waiting to fire your mega-missiles, and trying to reserve your energy supply. Your path is by no means clear as crystal - you'll encounter up to eighty varieties of obstacles and nasties, so keep watching the scanners - your defence isn't all done with mirrors! Glass should be on view by now, but if you want it and it's not in sight, give Quicksilva a buzz on nn-nnn nnnn.	OK, you can all relax now, Frankie's about to hit your screen! Ocean has finally let the rampant Holly Johnson loose in its Frankie Goes to Hollywood extravaganza. You have to strike a blow for the hedonistic Frankie philosophy and conquer the mundane side of life, collecting pleasure points to become '100 per cent person'. Only then will you be welcomed to the wonders of the pleasure dome. And while you're playing you'll have the added excitement of listening to a previously unreleased, live version of Relax on audio cassette. Another household hero is making a comeback soon thanks to Ocean. Yes, Daley Thompson's again being put through his paces in another host of sporting events such as cycling, ski-jump and slalom, rowing and tug-of-war. Not all Olympic sports, admittedly, but our Daley's an all-round kind of guy. Daley Thompson's Supertest will be leaving the starting blocks any time now. If you're more into speed than sounds or sport, then Ocean's Street Hawk could be revving right up your street. If you fancy a spin on one mean machine then take a look at this motorbike game. Frankie and Street Hawk will set you back £8.95 each but you'll be able to duel with Daley for only £6.95. If you're all at sea still, give Ocean a ring on nnn-nnn nnnn.

STYLE COUNSEL	LIVING LEGENDS	PRETTY POLYPRINT
If you're a dab hand at graphics, try creating them with style, or rather, real Style, the latest cassette and interface package from Saga. So, what's the tale behind Saga's Style? They claim you'll be designing and creating your graphics much more quickly and easily than ever before. And it's versatile, so you'll find that the interface doubles as a fully Kempston compatible joystick interface. Saga reckons that Style can successfully be used for educational, business or artistic programs, so if your programs need updating, think Style. Best of all, you won't have to fork out a designer price - £29.95 secures. Saga will tell you the full story on (nnnnn) nnnnn.	The second part of the Komplex trilogy, called Komplex City, is shortly to be released by Legend. This part's based on the same 'grab the sequence of letters and escape the baddies' philosophy as its predecessor, but it's rather niftier on the screen. You'll also come up against an even larger variety of baddies and obstacles to avoid - or encounter at your peril. If you're in the mood for a headlong 3D dive into an endless alien cavern (the usual address - 14 Rathbone Place ... Ed), all you'll need is £9.95. Legend has also come up with an idea for recompensing all those of you who weren't exactly enamoured by The Great Space Race. All you have to do, is rip-off (you'll have had some experience of that) the TGSR poster from your wall and send it with a fiver to Legend, xx xxx nnn, xxxxxx xn nxx. In return they'll send you a copy of Komplex.	If you feel that it's time your printer spoke a few languages, then the Polyprint multilingual interface could be the answer. This device speaks seven languages (including the major Eurospeaks and Tasword!), and enables the user to print what he sees without doing a parrot fashion COPY in graphics mode. The character generators are in EPROM and a new EPROM with a different selection can easily be programmed using PROMER-SP or BLO-PROM-SP. Specialised character sets, such as Maths, can also be added to the EPROM and a hard copy obtained by a screen dump. Otherwise, a character font can be down- loaded into the printer to match the screen. Machine code programmers could in fact dump such utilities into the Spectrum's RAM. If you want to be in on the lingo, you can parler avec Cambridge Microelectronics on (nnnn) nnnnnn.
P a p e r d a t a		BOBBY SOC'S IT!
Winning At The Races Using Your Computer by Paul Worden Interface Publications / £6.95 They're under starter's orders - and they're off! Yes, the race from bookshop to bookies is on. Now, hundreds of hopeful punters will be using their Speccies in a bid to increase the odds in their favour at the races. Of course, the question the big money's asking, is can it be done, and more immediately, does this book show you how? First though for a confession. I've had a crack at solving the problem this book tackles but without much success. Look at me - reduced to making a bob or two writing for YS. (Hmm, you're even taking a gamble with that! Ed). Well, as an experienced punter himself, the author's 'currently profitable' system sounds like a good enough bet. The trouble is that the details of the wonder system don't actually appear in the book. Instead, you get an outline of the various approaches to the problem but you're still left with the much trickier task of solving it yourself. So, what have you got to take into account before placing your bets? The author reckons that by considering such variables as the horse's weight, what it had for breakfast, its usual performance and so on, you'll have a better chance of picking the winner - and if not every time, then at least often enough to make a profit. Nothing new in this, you might say. Neither are his traditional points system nor his speed rating method world- shattering revelations. Each system is clearly explained, which should prove useful to programmers new to horse racing but regular punters are going to be disappointed that no definitive system is recommended. You're presented with an example program for each of the different systems described and there's also a helpful section on how to input and display data. And the bit I found especially useful was the simulation program that lets you compare the results of past races. I just wish the process for modifying unprofitable methods was described in more detail. If you're going for a gamble on the gee-gees then this book gives an enjoyable intro to racing systems, but I can't see experienced race-goers finding much help in the programming hints. Paul Worden's system may well be ahead of the field but he's careful not to give too many secrets away, that's for sure. A true mark of confidence and a sure-fire way to shift copies would have been if he'd taped a tenner to the inside cover - I fancy a flutter and I'm willing to try anybody's system if they come up with the cash. Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, as they say! Paul Woof		How d'you rate your chances as a football manager? There's a lot more to it than shooting from the sixty yard line - and the penalties of losing are much more serious. If you want to find out how you'd score, have a go at Bobby Charlton's Soccer by Dacc Ltd. This claims to be so much of a soccer simulation that you'll probably find you've got muddy knees when you leave the pitch ... er, I mean switch off your Speccy! Not only do you have to be a real pro at goal-getting, dribbling and taking kick-offs but you'll also have to shape up your team - moulding their skill, stamina and accuracy till they come up with that cup- winning formula. You also get to hear his master's voice on the cassette plus all the other footie sound effects - well, not quite all, let's hope. If you have the talent, you'll also have the chance of taking part in league tables and compos. The game'll cost you £11.95 but there's more than a season's worth of play in it. Of course, the definitive footie game has yet to be written. Forget about becoming an ace footballer, or a magic manager, how do you join the two Jimmies, Hill and Greaves for their non-stop telly talk- in? Now if you want to suggest that idea to Dacc, you can talk them into it on nnn-nnn nnnn.

HACKING AWAY
*Calling all hackers! You can contact our red hot POKEr, Andy Pennell by writing to Hacking Away, Your Spectrum, 14 Rathbone Place, London W1P 1DE.*

Uh oh! Someone boobed - and it wasn't me, honest. D'you remember the Monty Mole POKEs in issue 15? You'd waited an absolute age for them and then we got them wrong. Aaargh! Well, not wrong exactly but it would've been easier to have hacked into the game than to use Chris Wood's program. Somewhere along the way the REM statements got lost. All is not lost, though. Just add the following REMs to the appropriate lines and you can see what's going on:

`200 REM INFINITE LIVES 210 REM FALL ANY HEIGHT 220 REM WALK THROUGH CRUSHERS 230 REM KILL SOME MONSTERS ON CONTACT 250 REM MOST OF REST OF MONSTERS 260 REM LAST MONSTERS AND WALK ON WATER 270 REM FINISH DATA. THIS IS VITAL`

As you can see, it's only necessary to type in the lines that you really need unless you're gonna go for broke with the whole bunch.
So, now it's down to business. We're starting this month with an oldie-but-goodie that we've neglected up till now - Android. Kyle Heath's written in with his formula for infinitive lives, so here goes. Load the program as usual and select the keyboard option. Press Break then enter these POKEs: 52249,24: 52250,32: 53897,0. You'll now have those elusive infinitive lives.
Now, Kyle, I hope you haven't half-inched this from another mag. I only ask because the POKE you sent in for Jet Set Willy was written by none other than yours truly and appeared in these illustrious pages many moons ago. We've had enough problems with lesser rags swiping our POKEs - some of their pages are starting to look like YS back issues! Well, you know what they say about imitation but ... Kyle's also sent in an account number for Ghostbusters: S 20203002 tang billy 15570011,W+++. Don't ask me what it does though, 'cos I've never played the game.

How d'you fancy 249 lives on Mutant Monty. You do? Well try Paul Emmerson's POKE 54933,0. Scott Waye's been pretty busy too. For infinite lives on Cavern Fighter do POKE 31683,0: POKE 31684,0 and for Black Hawk do POKE 34695,183. If you're a bit fed up with infinite lives, for River Rescue try POKE 36193 with the number of scientists you want to put down in one go and POKE 36225 with the number required to get the 5000 point bonus. And just to round off, Scott's added the 7th level access code for Sky Ranger - RECAP.
Now for the undead, Steven Bennett ... perhaps I'd better rephrase that! Steven Bennett's sent in a novel approach to immortality in Zombie Zombie. When you're asked if you want to load in the city, type CHR$ USR 4867 in response (with thanks to Terry Bulfib in issue 14). Next, type STOP to clear the ERR_SP, then edit line 2010 and remove the obvious LET boy=boy-1. You can't get more undead than that!
Back to the infinite lives POKEs with this small routine for Giant's Revenge and Simon Waddington:

`10 CLEAR 24241: POKE 23606,115: POKE 23607,246: LOAD "" SCREEN$: LOAD "" CODE: POKE 24504,0: RANDOMIZE USR 24450`

Position the tape just after the second loader, immediately before the SCREEN$, and then RUN the above program. That'll nobble any thoughts of revenge on the giant's part.
Now, prepare to enter the Hall of Things (sounds a bit like a trip to Castle Rathbone! Ed). The game has one of those mean looking loaders so Bruce Phipps has come up with the following few lines:

[The code was not printed in the magazine.]

Run this and play the tape from the start. The picture will load as usual and don't worry that the border's not how you remember it. When it's done, do POKE 32717,0 for no wounds, which is really limitless lives, or you can POKE 35923 with the starting amount of magic. Now use RAND USR 24576 to start the game.
Ya wanna maka da money at Mugsy, eh? A couple 'a real dirty rats, Robert Wooley and Stephen Hill wrote in with a piece of code. When you're asked how many customers you want to buy, enter the number 5658986 and you'll be given 5 million and over $10 million. It's a little temperamental, so if it doesn't work try it the next year. Can you refuse their offer?
Finally, Phil Dale needs help - no funny comments please! Can anyone come up with a POKE that'll remove the bull from the Spanish sequence of Travels with Trashman. C'mon and take the bull by the horns.

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