Game Review: Plexar (ZX Spectrum, Mastertronic / MAD)

The previous inhabitants of the planet Plexar have were totally wiped out by a plague.  Now the new inhabitants (known as Plexarians) have arrived at the planet and found the 16 continents connected by Crystal Roads that were built by the Miracle Engineers.

Once a year, one person is allowed to drive over them in their honour and (no surprises here), this time it’s you!

The Main Menu

Once the game has loaded, you can choose from certain levels that you may want to start from.  They are 1:  Alpha, 4: Dorto and 7: Rasti.  Pressing F will cycle through those for you and the screen changes colour too.  Alpha is black and white, Dorto is blue and Rasti is red.

Pressing S changes from keyboard and joystick and then just press the fire key to start the game.

Graphics

When you see the loading screen for Plexar, you will see that the full name of the game appears to be The Roads to Plexar.  The loading screen is fairly colourful and of standard.

When you start playing Plexar, there is an excellent sequence of a scrolling platform at the bottom coming towards you and the rest of the screen opening from a diamond shape from the centre.  I’ve got to admit; it looked very demo-esque (I know that’s not a word but I’m inventing it!)  If you see it, you’ll  know what I mean.  Quite amazing really and clearly an excellent piece of programming.

Although the game opens this way, when you do play it, the scrolling stops and is rather in steps when you stop.

When you lose a life, you will see dazed bubbles wobbling around your head before the screen disintegrates and reappears again.

Playability

When you start the game, you wonder why the controls aren’t working.  The road is really a quick demonstration of moving and jumping whilst the computer completes the level before you play it.  I didn’t like this as you must wait for that part to finish which takes approximately 30 seconds.  For an arcade game fan like me, you want to get straight into the game.  Also, this part even goes over parts of black areas which you can’t when playing it.

The main playing area is in monochrome; it can be hard to see road and yourself at times when on certain surfaces.  Even if you practice a bit, it can still be a bit of a mess.  Certain areas of the road move you around from square to square (as such) or bounce you backwards.  At times, it can be hard to control where you are going.  When you move from side to side, you bounce across.

The road moves in stepped stages to give a sense of speed and this is clearly obvious, when you move back and forth.  Your smiley face is visible when moving backwards.

Danger!

In the top-left hand corner is a rectangle which changes from green, magenta and red for danger.  This is in effect, is a form of timer which you up against to get to the end of the zone.

Naturally, if you run out of time, you’ll lose one of your 5 lives and restart the level again from the start.  It is possible along the way to get extra lives too and trust me, you’re going to need them.  Plexar doesn’t take no prisoners, despite your characters face looking innocent.

Getting to the end of a zone will award you with a time bonus.

Fire Button

The fire button doesn’t fire.  What it does is allow you to teleport of jump over certain areas and move quickly side to side.  So if you’re thinking about something like the game, Motos (where sometimes you can jump), it doesn’t quite work in that way and does different things.

You will come across times where you can change into a helicopter too and be able to fly over the road terrain to advance further.

Flip Your World Upside Down!

If you start on the level 7 Rasti level, you’ll see that the road is at the top-of the screen as if in anti-gravity.  This really does present a challenge, as the game is quite awkward to get into anyway (let alone do it inverted!)

Warp!

When you finish a zone, you move onto another style of game where you move over top-down squared scrolling terrain rather than the more 3D perspective view.  This offers something different, although the theme is in a way, quite similar.

Aliens tend to swarm towards you (albeit) quite slowly.  Platforms for example will appear and disappear adding a slight puzzle and timing to the game.

Sound Effects Only

There is no music in Plexar.

As soon as Plexar has loaded, there is an annoying hic-cups sound every few seconds that keeps repeating until you start the game.  You want to start the game quickly just to escape that!

When you lose a life, you’ll hear some taps and when the screen re-appears, you’ll hear what I’d describe as a “Brrrrr” type noise, descending in tone.

Final Thoughts

It’s very hard to see what squares you are on and takes a while to get used to what each one does.  At times, it does leave you feeling a bit helpless as you just seem to move around randomly, despite trying your best to control your movement.

With the tough playability and monochrome graphics in the playing section of the screen, it makes the game more complicated and less engaging, reducing any real addictiveness.

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