from the forum issue 104

[Darran@Retro Gamer]

Favourite Microsphere game
For the letters page

[The Laird]

Obviously it has to be the amazing Back To Skool, this was as close as anyone came to gaming perfection in the early days of the Spectrum. My childhood would not have been the same without this wonderful title.

[jdanddiet]

As much as I tinkered around with the Skool games, the most fun and time I had was with Wheelie, a great racing game

[Morkin]

Wheelie, as I used to spend hours playing this with my best friend. We both loved building ramps & launching ourselves off them (on a 10 speed racer no less) , so this game was a perfect match, as we could jump over cars on a motorbike! My love of my Evil Knievel figure & bike also made this a favourite game of mine.

[Sputryk]

Wheelie. Although the Skool games were certainly entertaining, they were too taxing for me at the time. Wheelie, though frustrating, offered more longevity; just a pity it was a very difficult memory game when racing back to the fnish.

[pantal00ns]

Contact Sam Cruise, love the 'Skool' games but the detective setting just edges it for me.

Possibly linked to Movie being one of my favourite speccy games as well.

[merman]

As a C64 fan we did not get many of the Microsphere games, so it has to be the one I played the most. Skool Daze acted as therapy when I wasn't enjoying school. Change the names to teachers and fellow pupils I did not like and then misbehave a lot...

[Smurph]

Has to be Skool Daze for me. I remember it being the first game I played on a 48k+. Good times.

[r0jaws]

I genuinely couldn't remember any Microsphere games apart from Skool Daze so had to look them up... WOS

Not a lot there, and I didn't really like Skool Daze, so that's a bust for me. Could be a fairly short article.

[stvd]

Really liked both "Skool" games put preferred the Detective theme of Contact Sam Cruise.
Wheelie (along with Jetpac) were the first games I ever played on the Spectrum and
the reason I got one.

[slacey1070]

I genuinely couldn't remember any Microsphere games apart from Skool Daze so had to look them up... WOS

Not a lot there, and I didn't really like Skool Daze, so that's a bust for me. Could be a fairly short article.

Likewise. Tried Wheelie out last night, didin't like it.... Skool Daze had a bit of "wow" factor back then....thats about it. Yes, I agree, the article might be quite short, as they didn't have a massive catalogue...

I'm still waiting for an Interceptor article...!

[psj3809]

Skooldaze and Bak to Skool were amazing but for me it was their first major hit which was Wheelie. One of those 'had to be there' moments when it first came out, excellent game, get to the end of the level and then race back against the ghost rider, had to write a map of the directions of where to go. Great game for its time, has aged quite badly but does give you some great memories if you played it back in the early 80s

[Matt_B]

The Skool games, Wheelie and The Train Game are too good not to mention.

However, I'll go for the easily overlooked Sky Ranger instead. It's an oddball cross between helicopter simulator and shoot 'em up, but Microsphere never made an conventional games. I suspect a lot of people gave up on it fairly early as there's a bit of steep learning curve; not least, every little bump you make results in another crack on the wind shield and you've soon got so many that you're left peering through the gaps to make out what's ahead of you. Still, once you get the hang of things it's a cracker to play, as you go weaving through the skyscrapers chasing after the watchers, whilst keeping an eye out for places you can refuel at. It's also pleasantly quick for an 80s vector graphics game, which comes in handy when you're lining up for those 90 degree turns at full speed.

[Darran@Retro Gamer]

Crikey, I thought this would have been a bit more popular...

[paranoid marvin]

~Their catalogue was small; Sam Cruise , Wheelie and the 2 Skool games being the only notable releases. The fact that they were all brilliant games does make you wonder why they didn't release more...

Sam Cruise was a great looking game that I never got into (one of those I must go back to one day), the Skool games were interesting but way too hard, but Wheelie was pitched at just the right learning curve. Great animation (especially when turning) but flickery as anything - strange how I didn't notice that back in the day!

Has to be Wheelie - the graphics may have diminished , but the gameplay's still there in bucket loads.