Anything goes in the marvel of Speedball
Speedball 2100
Sony PlayStation £29.99 Bitmap Brothers/ Empire Interactive ***
Back in the days when home computer meant Amiga or Atari, there was a future sport game that transcended its humble roots to become a benchmark for the genre.
Speedball 2's violent mix of football and rollerball has retained its visceral excitement. And finally, 10 years on, the Bitmap Brothers have released an updated version for the PlayStation, and this time it's in 3D.
Speedball has always been a simple game to pick up. Never mind tactics, timeouts and offside, the rules here are straightforward - get the ball in the goal more often than the opposition. Anything goes in the enclosed venue, with elbows flying and stretcher-bearers a crucial part of the team. Nevertheless, tactics are still important, with judicious use of the arena walls still joyously effective.
Taking charge of the lowliest team, your aim is to win league and cup glory: a task made easier by the regular fine-tuning you can give your boys. Of course, the real excitement is in the two-player mode, with the satisfaction gained from pummelling a human opponent far greater than any artificial intelligence.
Despite a decade of technological progress, the Amiga version actually looks better. The obligatory move to the third dimension means that Speedball 2100 just doesn't seem as clean as the original, even if you can now adjust the camera angle. There are also a number of control issues - from slowdown to player selection -that affect the smooth feel of the game.
Despite these niggles, Speedball is a peerless future sports title. Whether the Fifa generation will appreciate an unlicensed game with a single button control method remains to be seen. (GH)
London without the Dome?
Sim City 3000 UK Edition
Windows 95/98 £34.99 Maxis/EA ***
The selling point of the latest edition of the long-running city construction series is that you can "design, build and manage your own UK city in the first truly British Sim City". But the title fails to deliver.
Yes, you can have traffic driving on the left. However, you still have to put up with grid-style cities with more or less straight roads and overhead power lines and so on. The advisors still look American, and the city budgets are still calculated in dollars not pounds.
New features include redwood forests and plagues of locusts. How British are those?
As the small print on the box admits, this is really the SC3000 World Edition with an extra building set that looks reasonably British, but the details are totally swamped by the rest of the design.
Loading the pre-prepared London, which takes an infuriating amount of time to render, reveals a Big Ben clock tower but no Houses of Parliament, no London Eye, and no Dome, though a remarkable number of suspension bridges span the Thames.
Sim City is a terrific game - at least, it is with disasters turned off. But if you already have Sim City 3000 World Edition, you don't need this. (JS)
Wrecking zombies just wears thin
Carmegeddon TDR 2000
PC CD-rom £29.99 Torus/SCi **
In Carmegeddon, you had to race round the streets of a nightmare urban future, mowing down zombies and turning opponents into scrapyard fodder.
In Carmageddon 2, you had to do more of the same. Now, in a radical departure, Carmageddon TDR 2000 puts you in an altogether more benevolent world, where you drive courteously, blow kisses to fellow motorists and throw bunches of flowers at unhappy people.
As if. No, it's zombies and wrecking again, and to be honest, it's all starting to wear a bit thin.
The problem is that the few changes that have been implemented make little difference to gameplay. Sure, the physics engine may have been overhauled, but racing is no more enjoyable than before - the low-gravity environment makes it hellishly difficult to stay right side up.
We are assured, also, that the graphics have been revamped; detachable car parts, though, hardly compensate for blurry zombies and insipid backgrounds.
The hardcore dance soundtrack is way too close to WipeOut (which, chaps, came out in 1995), and the new mission-style levels interspersed with the standard races are repetitive, unimaginative, and even trickier to complete.
One thing that CTDR2K can pride itself on is its improved multiplayer code, which should make online gaming simpler, quicker and more satisfying. Because other humans - as opposed to the infuriating artificial intelligence Schumachers programmed into the game - make far more rewarding competitors. (AB)
