Resource centre for ZX Spectrum games
using Manic Miner and Jet Set Willy game engines
Archive of the
Manic Miner & Jet Set Willy Yahoo! Group
messages
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Message: 5650
Author: ewgf3
Date: 02/03/2006
Subject: Mesage for Igor, and other JSW/MM authors
Wow, like everyone else, I was amazed (when I finally managed toget
logged back on, my ISP is playing up AGAIN) at the war of words
that's been kicked up, largely over the release of UMM.
I won't cover old ground, except to say that UMM is excellent, though
admittedly the combination of it's greater complexity, and it's
sometimes use of the JSW/MM quirks, would make it harder to play for
the newcomer, especially if they aren't willing to take time to get
used to it.
The people who have said that the many JSW/MM rewrites rely too
heavily on these quirks are correct (to my mind), in that these games
are only really accessible to those who know the JSW/MM quirks
intimately, otherwise they are too difficult for the casual user to
enjoy. A lot of the beauty of both Jetset Willy and Manic Miner came
from the simplicity and consistancy of their relative game aspects.
Since Andrew Broad began his excellent research into the games'
engines, more and more rewrites have contained, in part or in full,
these quirks, which are not apparent to the casual games player, and
make some games all but unplayable (or certainly unenjoyable) to many
people.
Of course, the people in this group aim their rewrites largely at the
people in this group, most of whom know are cogniscent of the
hidden "features" in the engine, but for those outside this group, or
anyone who just wants a straightforward rewrite, then many of the
higher profile releases (especially Andrew Broad's games) are too
difficult, or even seemingly impossible. This isn't a criticism of
the games in itself, I'm just saying that there are essentially two
kinds of rewrites, those that follow the style of the original JSW
and/or MM, and therefor have no need for the player to know or use
the quirky features, and those that do require the player to know all
of the undocumented (except for here and Andrew's extensive WWW site)
features.
I myself don't play many of the games here, as they tend to rely on
the quirks and split second timing to such an extent that I find them
too much like hard work. Again, that is no a criticism, as the
authors of these games deliberately make them so demanding, but it
would perhaps be better if the games (or at least the games'
documentation) made the player aware of the requirements the game
makes on the games player's knowledge.
Perhaps any rewrite (past or future) shoule be classified
as "Classic" style, and perhaps "Advanced" (or "Extended" or
whatever) style, denoting whether the user is expected to be
proficient in the game engines' hidden quirks.
Regardless of that, I've had a lot of fun with UMM, and don't agree
at all with most of the criticism, apart from it being less
accessible than Igor's previous games, due to it's pushing of the
game engine.
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