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### Mr. Mole [MSX]

#### http://www.nerlaska.com/

#### http://msxdev.msxblue.com/

#### Reviewed By J. Monkman

With our early gaming heritage full of shining examples such as Zub, Head Over Heels, Wizball and Jet Set Willy, 8-Bit developers often compensated for a lack of detailed presentation and depth by creating titles that were bizarre in concept and supported by colourful and surreal plots and background stories - and that's one element of Mr. Mole that the MSX team at Nerlaska Studios have got spot on.

As far as I can make out from the translated Spanish manual, Mr. Mole (the game's titular burrowing mammal) has set out on a quest to meet up with his internet girlfriend only to find the streets of Mole City blocked by piles of rubbish from the outside world. Much to the annoyance of our sexually frustrated hero, the city council have no plans to tidy the mess until the Spring, and to make matters worse, Mr. Mole has just paid for an expensive manicure so burrowing through the trash is out of the question. Understandably aggravated by the situation, he sees a stray football lying amongst the litter and angrily boots it down the blocked street - and 'POOF!!' - the ball crashes into the rubbish containers piled at the end of the road, causing them to explode and disintegrate before his feeble eyes into a cloud of rank-smelling debris. The football rolls back down the now-unobstructed street to Mr. Mole's feet, and his adventure begins.

Before going any further, I just want to say that I really, really wanted to like Mr. Mole. Admittedly, I'm not a massive fan of breakout games in general, but I found the concept of a mole clearing streets full of rubbish with a magical football genuinely endearing. However, there's so much wrong with the game that I've no choice other than to give it the slating it deserves.

First up against the wall are the controls. Breakout should never be limited to keyboard or joystick control; they lack the fluid movement and responsiveness of a mouse or trackball (both of which are available for the MSX and MSX2) and I really can't understand why support for the most obvious choice of input device has been omitted. In addition to this, and equally unforgivable, the physics are more than slightly wonky and the ball rarely rebounds at the angle you'd expect it to. In fact, on several occasions I've succeeded in sending it flying through solid (and indestructible) walls, highlighting one of many bugs that should have been captured well before release. I mean, come on - was this game even tested?

It gets worse. The randomly awarded power-ups seriously upset the balance of the game too - the laser cannon with it's limited five shots is next to useless and the triple ball is not really worth going for either thanks to the ball's crazy recoil properties. However, collect the magnet and you can breeze through any of the 20 levels; in fact, this combined with the password system effectively removes any real challenge from the game at all.

The later stages introduce various subterranean nasties that get in your way, but none of these will hinder your progress as much as the game's own bugs; whilst playing I had to hit the reset button on more than one occasion due to my ball becoming stuck, endlessly bouncing at a 45 degree angle between two sections of wall. Even the password system has its flaws - there's no backspace function and unbelievably there's no way to exit back to the title screen either. Enter the password screen without a password and you'll have to reset the machine. Very sloppy.

It's not all bad news though. In it's defence, Mr. Mole is professionally presented and features very colourful graphics and some nice little touches (such as the cute little spin Mr. Mole performs upon completing a level). The music is outstanding, and to be honest its the cheerful soundtrack that kept me sane whilst playing through this otherwise broken game. For that alone Manuel Dopico should be given a medal.

In all, Mr. Mole is a very disappointing entry for the 2007 MSX Dev compo - especially so when you take into consideration the quality of Nerlaska's previous 2006 entry (Monster Hunter). Even a competent bug-fixing session would only address half the issues raised above, and as it is I really can't see the game being a serious contender in this years competition.

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There's much to like about Mr Mole, and if it would stop irritating me for five seconds I might be able to find some of it. James has unfortunately pretty much covered it. The physics are frequently broken and the collision detection even worse, sometimes blocks disappear that aren't even in the same zip code as the ball. The magnet isn't even quite as useful as James implies, since the angle the ball leaves you is largely random so completing a stage with it becomes a trial and error process of continually firing the ball into the air.

It's weird; I can only assume someone has something on Nerlaska's CEO, like photos of him playing on a CPC because little effort has gone into this one, especially compared with last year's winner of the same competition. The contest website says "Finished". Perhaps they're taking the piss?

Mouse control, physics from someone who got better than an E at GCSE, collision detection that actually activates when there's a collision and just a little care would have resulted in a very good Breakout game. Instead, what we have here is "Brokenout".

RGCD – We play em, so you don't have to. And please don't play this one.

Dudley.

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Graphics: | 85%
Sound: | 92%
Game Concept: | 40%
Gameplay: | 35%
Lasting Appeal: | 30%

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