M6 Simulator 1950's Beatnik Edition

Post date: 10-Sep-2016 22:15:43

Game By: BiNMaN

Reviewed by: Simon Ferré

Well, after promising regular updates I fell into an access hole in my kitchen floor and badly bruised (or worse) a couple of ribs. Several packs of painkillers and anti-inflammatories later I am well enough to get back into the swing of things again.

I present the next entry into the competition. You may recall there was a game in last years competition just like this, so this, erm, special edition could promise bigger and better things. Sadly, though, it doesn't. Here's the rather nice loading screen though:

That really is quite pretty. If driving was actually as much fun as the image portrays we'd all enjoy it far more, and road rage would be a thing of the past.

My goodness, though. This game is huge. It has several files to LOAD which, even on fast load on my emulator takes forever. What's that all about?

The menu screen is pretty good though. Clear, crisp, and positively monochrome. I suppose the good thing is that you don't need to have a colour TV license to enjoy this in all its glory:

I do like the icons below the menu. They describe the options very nicely. They serve no other purpose though. Onto the game proper:

The colour once again has been dispensed with. Maybe this is for the sake of clarity. Well, even though the M6 motorway is a pretty empty straight affair in this simulation (I guess they could have added the bends and turns later on), it appears to be plagued with large hornets. Thankfully they don't move about and distract you. The only issue I have is that only a small stretch of the M6 motorway was completed in the 1950s, with additional sections completed after that well into the 1960s and beyond.

Anyway, the game is pretty much identical to the one last year (bonus points for managing to create an almost identical sequel), so I won't bore you with any further description of the gameplay.

Here is the inevitable game over screen you'll probably see the most:

And as soon as you press a key once (to start again) on my emulator at least you get this:

Well, that's the end of that. Entering GO TO 30 and hitting Enter doesn't do a lot, so your only option at this time is to reLOAD. Maybe this is something that is happening only in my emulator, but how on Earth would I be able to figure that out?

As a mild distraction, here is the blurb that was included with this entry into the competition:

You're a 1950's beatnik heading north to spout some spurious clap trap at some pretentious northern coffee house

A simulation of driving 232 miles up the M6 back when there were hardly any cars (saying that there are too many in this version), as you drive you'll need to stop for a wee, food or a drink the quicker you get to the layby and park up the remaining time gets added as a bonus.

If you don't get there in time you become distracted and slow down, if you have a drink (being the 1950's you'd have a beer or two as I don't think drink driving legislation existed back then) then you may stray into oncoming traffic until you sober up.

You can damage the car by scraping against other vehicles but ahead on collision (sic), side swipe or being rear ended is game over.

All in glorious black and white.

Controls

1 Keyboard

2 Kempston

3 Sinclair

Keys are 2W90

Included are two versions, standard and ULAplus.

As I don't have any emulator with ULAplus support, I cannot see what any differences are. Maybe you have one and can see what it looks like.

In summary, it's not a bad game. Unfortunately, it's also not a good game. I mean the basics are good but it is let down by the sheer tedium (which is in fact not that far off real-life driving). I'd be surprised to hear of anyone managing to complete it. Maybe driving on the other side of the road would alleviate the boredom.

Score: M6 out of 10.