Thing Bounces Back

Fresh from his Sizzling exploits against the evil toy goblin and his nasty toys, Thing On A Spring (the alternative page margin hero from ZZAP!) sproings back (but for the first time on the Spectrum!) for some new adventures in toyland.

He finds himself in an industrial complex composed of 11 separate scrolling areas, connected by a system of wide and tangled ventilation shafts; through these our heroic coil tumbles. In the piping his somersaulting progress is blocked by minions, but Thing can turn at junctions and reverse direction.

He can also collect points by touching Crowns stuck in the pipes.

Some pipes end in exits which hurl him into one of the toy factory's zones; there he finds more varied surroundings, a chaotic multilevel layout of slides, automatic bounce pads, unidirectional conveyor belts, elevating blowers, debilitating lasers, crumbling platforms and descending doors which block or trap him.

An unwary Thing is easily trapped and with no escape he has to quit the screen - which returns him to the ventilation shafts. Narrow gauge pipes snake through the factory; falling into one, Thing is taken uncontrollably to another part of that playing area.

Emerging from the pipe he must quickly move to one side to avoid slipping back into the funnel's gaping mouth.

But what of the Great Mission? To stem the flow of evil playthings, the bonce with a bounce must gather computer components: a tape, a disk, listing paper and ROM. Once they're found he can exit one playing area and progress to another.

Needless to say a horde of evil toys, still on the departed goblin' s pension scheme, do their best to push Thing from platforms and girders and back into the narrow pipes. Encounters with them reduce springboy's limited liquid engineering; the oil level is indicated onscreen by a descending propeller.

When lubrication is dangerously low, it's time to find an exit and return to the ventilation shafts where collectable oil cans exist. A total oil-out loses Thing one of his lives.

Bonuses can be collected by striking red mystery platforms on their undersides. They evaporate, and some reveal extra points, but others give a headache as a heavy weight clonks down on Thing's cranium.