[{"TitleName":"Garfield - Big, Fat, Hairy Deal","Publisher":"The Edge","Author":"Neil Strudwick, Stephen Cargill, Jim Davis","YearOfRelease":"1988","ZxDbId":"0001977","Reviews":[{"Issue":{"Name":"Crash Issue 50, Mar 1988","Price":"£1.25","ReleaseDate":"1988-02-25","Editor":"Barnaby Page","TotalPages":116,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Acting Managing Editor: Barnaby Page\r\nStaff Writers: Mark Caswell, Dominic Handy, Gordon Houghton, Lloyd Mangram, Ian Phillipson\r\nSubeditor: David Peters\r\nPhotographers: Cameron Pound, Michael Parkinson\r\nOffice: Frances Mable, Glenys Powell\r\nTechnical Writers: Simon N Goodwin, Jon Bates\r\nPBM Writer: Brendon Kavanagh\r\nStrategy Writer: Philippa Irving\r\nEducation Writer: Rosetta McLeod\r\nContributors: Robin Candy, Mike Dunn, Paul Evans, Dave Hawkes, Nathan Jones, Nick Roberts, Ben Stone, Paul Sumner, Bym Welthy, Nik Wild\r\nEditorial Director: Roger Kean\r\nProduction Controller: David Western\r\nAssistant Director: Markie Kendrick\r\nDesign: Wayne Allen\r\nProcess and Planning: Matthew Uffindell, Nick Orchard, Ian Chubb, Robert Millichamp\r\nAdvertisement Manager: Roger Bennett\r\nAdvertisement Executive: Andrew Smales\r\nSubscriptions: Denise Roberts\r\nMail Order: Carol Kinsey\r\n\r\nEditorial and Production: [redacted]\r\nPlease address correspondence to the appropriate person!\r\n\r\nMail Order and Subscriptions: [redacted]\r\n\r\nADVERTISING\r\n[redacted]\r\n\r\nTypesetting by The Tortoise Shell Press, Ludlow\r\n\r\nPrinted in England by Carlisle Web Offset, [redacted] - member of the BPCC Group.\r\n\r\nDistributed by COMAG, [redacted]\r\n\r\nNo material may be reproduced whole or in part without written consent of the copyright holders. We cannot undertake to return anything sent into CRASH - including written and photographic material, software and hardware - unless it is accompanied by a suitably stamped addressed envelope. Unsolicited written or photo material is welcome and if used in the magazine is paid for at our current rates. Competition entries and letters to the CRASH Forum, to other sections and to staff are always read with interest but cannot be acknowledged even if an SAE is included, and letters submitted for publication may be edited for length and style.\r\n\r\n©1988 Newsfield Limited\r\n\r\nCover by Oliver Frey"},"MainText":"Producer: The Edge\r\nRetail Price: £8.99\r\nAuthor: Steve Cargill\r\n\r\nThat fat, overblown, waddling, lazy scoundrel of a cat Garfield is out to do his good deed for the day - his feline friend Arlene has been taken to the local pound, and it's all down to Garfield to pluck his true love from her imprisonment. But first he must get out of the house, and that won't be easy.\r\n\r\nGarfield, the comic-strip cat brought to the Spectrum screen for his tenth birthday (see panel), has two appetites - one for food and the other for rest. So this heroic ball of fluff must keep on consuming food, or he'll become very tired, drop off to sleep and leave Arlene languishing in the pound.\r\n\r\nBut at least there's more to eat than dry meal. There's his 'master' Jon's coffee, for a start; and later on Garfield can scoff a string of sausages and numerous other scraps. And this cat has a helpful digestive system - watch out for the Snack Attack warnings which appear periodically below the main screen. When there's a Snack Attack on, the flabby beast can nosh practically anything.\r\n\r\nGarfield can be helped or hindered by his ever-present pooch Odie. Our hero doesn't really deserve this faithful dog as a friend - a well-aimed swipe at Odie earns points for the callous cat. Still, Odie doesn't seem to mind this mistreatment, for he always bounds back for more.\r\n\r\nGarfield can also get help from his nephew, Nermal, the cutest little kitten ever - if he can find him.\r\n\r\nNow Garfield is not the most house-proud or best behaved of cats - given half a chance, he likes nothing better than to tear the best chair's upholstery apart and add a stack of points to his collection. Still, the purple Dralon never did look too good on the three-piece suite, did it?\r\n\r\nMessages at the foot of the screen keep up a running commentary, and useful objects lie around for Garfield to gather. There are newspapers, dog bowls, bones, towels and tin cans - but it takes some experimentation to find out what they're used for.\r\n\r\nAnd if he does make it out of the house into the bright light of day, Garfield will be distracted all the way to the pound by useful places such as butchers' shops - in fact, they may prove so diverting that the fat cat never gets to free his long-suffering Arlene at all.\r\n\r\nCOMMENTS\r\n\r\nJoysticks: Cursor, Kempston, Sinclair\r\nGraphics: very close to Jim Davis's comic-strip originals; monochromatic playing area\r\nSound: nothing but walking effects\r\nOptions: definable keys","ReviewerComments":["Big, Fat, Hairy Deal is brilliant! It's totally addictive, with perfectly-animated cartoon characters, jokes and surprises around every corner and the joy of kicking Odie up the rump every now and then. The excellent graphics have some really effective shading, and all that lets the game down is the lack of colour and sound - a tune would have cheered it up a bit. Our lasagne-loving friend leaps and bounds around the screen in a genuinely cat-like way with Odie following close behind - but if Odie touches Garfield the cat gets very tired, so the best idea is to give him the boot. There's a serious aspect to the game, though, and the puzzles get more involving as you progress. This is a great game, full of fun and frolics, so get down to your local software shop and have a Big, Fat, Hairy Deal!\r\nNick Roberts\r\n92%","Big, Fat, Hairy Deal captures exactly the combination of sardonicism and wit found in the cartoon strip. All the characters are superbly animated, making full use of the Spectrum's high-resolution graphics; Odie is my favourite, bouncing happily around the screen with his tongue hanging out. And Garfield's expressions are simply brilliant - he veers from wide-eyed surprise to a fantastic toothy grimace to a cynical grin. The monochromatic graphics suit the cartoon style perfectly (the colourful information panel detracts from it, if anything). And though some backgrounds lack detail, others - such as the park and the sewers - are very good. The messages really add to the atmosphere of humour and laziness, and it's very satisfying to be able to kick Odie away if he's bothering you! There are a couple of very minor faults: a bit of colour clash, and an inexplicable change of direction when you're in the street. Forget them; though this is in a simple arcade adventure format, it's been made into something really special.\r\nGordon Houghton\r\n89%","This is a really good laugh! The graphics are very good; some of the characters and animations belong in On The Screen, though the monochrome display is a bit disappointing. Big, Fat, Hairy Deal is a must for Garfield fans, simply because it recreates the comic's characters so well. Odie is very annoying - that's true to the original, I suppose, but he does tend to get on the nerves more than he should. Still, there's lots to do and I'm still trying to work out what loads of things can be used for. And the lack of sound is no problem when a game's as addictive as this.\r\nMike Dunn\r\n89%"],"OverallSummary":"General rating: Funny and addictive - with real arcade-adventure challenge as well as comic-strip slapstick.","Page":"18,19","Denied":false,"Award":"Crash Smash","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Nick Roberts","Score":"92","ScoreSuffix":"%"},{"Name":"Gordon Houghton","Score":"89","ScoreSuffix":"%"},{"Name":"Mike Dunn","Score":"89","ScoreSuffix":"%"}],"ScreenshotText":[{"Text":"Big, fat, hairy but perfectly formed: graphics 'very close to the comic-strip originals'."},{"Text":"'Full of fun and frolics' - but quiet, too quiet."},{"Text":"That thinking feline"}],"BlurbText":[{"Text":"BIG, FAT, HAIRY LICENCE\r\n\r\nCopycat crime took on a wacky new meaning in California this January, when 45 cars were broken into on a single weekend - and Garfield car stickers stolen from every one!\r\n\r\nBut the crying of distant car alarms is music to the ears of Garfield's marketing men in Indiana, where the fat cat's tenth birthday on June 18 is hyping Garfieldmania to new heights.\r\n\r\nGarfield, born as the star of a still-running comic strip by Jim Davis, also appears on all kinds of merchandise including calendars, T-shirts, and cuddly toys.\r\n\r\n'Garfield is one of those rare characters that has a following from five to 95,' explains The Edge's Tim Langdell. 'The average person knows Garfield.'\r\n\r\nAnd plenty of them snuggle up to him every night - 'when we were making the game a lot of people came out of the closet and admitted they had the cuddly toys,' Langdell laughs.\r\n\r\nBut The Edge was duty bound to keep skeletons out of the comic-strip cat's closet - there was 'very firm guidance from above as to the image of Garfield,' recalls Tim Langdell's colleague and wife Cheri Langdell.\r\n\r\n'He can't utter any profanities, he can't really smash somebody or kill them - he's got a sort of moral tone.' The cute creature can't die in the game, either - he just falls asleep (remember Piranha's Yogi Bear, reviewed in Issue 47, where technically it isn't the precious licensed character but you, the player, who dies?).\r\n\r\nIn the event, only one of The Edge's proposed scenes was cut from Big, Fat, Hairy Deal - where Garfield was 'using an instrument to do something that might be considered aggressive,' says Tim Langdell.\r\n\r\nAnd he hopes that despite the tight control, Big, Fat, Hairy Deal will have wider appeal than other recent character licences. 'There's been a large number of character licences,' he observes, 'almost all of which have been poorly received. There's a lot more that can be done with a licence than's been done so far.'\r\n\r\nThe perfect licence might need a 16-bit machine, says Tim Langdell, but he's got high hopes for the Spectrum Garfield game. 'It's a very complex adventure,' he enthuses, 'and only bright teenagers and adult players will actually solve it. It's pretty hard to do, but it won't put off youngsters.'\r\n\r\nAfter all, he says, 'the strip cartoon isn't aimed at kids'.\r\n\r\nAnd the Langdells are so confident they're backing a winner that more Garfield games are in the works already - with the cat's creator, Jim Davis, helping out.\r\n\r\nThe first sequel could be out by April. And 'we expect Big, Fat, Hairy Deal to be big till Easter,' says Cheri Langdell. 'Garfield will have a perennial popularity.' So don't leave him in the car."}],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":[{"Header":"Presentation","Score":"90%","Text":""},{"Header":"Graphics","Score":"89%","Text":""},{"Header":"Playability","Score":"91%","Text":""},{"Header":"Addictive Qualities","Score":"90%","Text":""},{"Header":"Overall","Score":"90%","Text":""}],"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Your Sinclair Issue 27, Mar 1988","Price":"£1.5","ReleaseDate":"1988-02-11","Editor":"Teresa Maughan","TotalPages":100,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Teresa Maughan\r\nArt Editor: Darrell King\r\nDeputy Editor: Marcus Berkmann\r\nTechnical Editor: Phil South\r\nProduction Editors: Fran Husband, Jackie Ryan\r\nDesigner: Catherine Higgs\r\nContributors: Soo Abram, Richard Blaine, Audrey & Owen Bishop, Ciaran Brennan, Jonathan Davies, Mike Gerrard, David McCandless, Duncan McDonald, John Minson, David Powell, Nat Pryce, Peter Shaw, Rachael Smith, Tony Worrall\r\nAdvertisement Manager: Mark Salmon\r\nAdvertisement Executive: Simon Stansfield\r\nAdvertisement Director: Alistair Ramsay\r\nProduction Manager: Judith Middleton\r\nMarketing Manager: Bryan Denyer\r\nArt Director: Hazel Bennington\r\nPublisher: Kevin Cox\r\nPublishing Director: Roger Munford\r\nFinance Director: Colin Crawford\r\nManaging Director: Stephen England\r\nChairman: Felix Dennis\r\n\r\nPublished by Dennis Publishing Ltd, [redacted] Company registered in England.\r\nTypesetters: Carlinpoint [redacted]\r\nReproduction: Graphic Ideas, London\r\nPrinters: Chase Web Offset [redacted]\r\nDistribution: Seymour Press [redacted]\r\n\r\nAll material in Your Sinclair ©1988 Felden Productions, and may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the written consent of the publishers. Your Sinclair is a monthly publication."},"MainText":"The Edge\r\n£8.99\r\nReviewer: Phil South\r\n\r\nHah! I think I know why they gave me this game to review. It might have something to do with the fact that the hero is a fat lazy slob, with a liking for coffee, snoozing and large amounts of nosh. First person to draw comparisons with me is looking for a typewriter in the gob! Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, the game.\r\n\r\nThere's usually two ways a game based on a well known and loved cartoon strip can go; either brilliant or complete trash. You run the risk of not doing the character justice, annoying fans of the strip, and more often than not doing a sub-standard rush job into the bargain. So where does Garfield fit in?\r\n\r\nYou have to collect items from around your house in order to escape to rescue your true love, Arlene, from the City Pound. In order to keep going in the game, you've got to drink coffee to stay awake and eat to stop yourself getting tired. But as well as this ceaseless drive for nourishment, you have to solve the problems in the game too, like how to stop yourself running out of coffee and food, and how to get to the Pound without nodding off on the way or just getting lost. There are some interesting little twists to the game, like where you find one of the first pieces of food (I defy anyone to find the hidden healthfood store on their first go!) and how to distract the butcher long enough to snatch and eat the sausages, and this all adds to the fun.\r\n\r\nThere's little or no sound in the game, no music anyway, just the sound of Garfield's paddy paws (cat's don't make a noise when they walk, do they? Ed) on the carpet. I'd have thought it would be better to have a noise in there for when he kicks Odie (the stupid dog) out of the frame, rather than just a constant tick, tick, tick as he walks around. Still, it's not too annoying, and I suppose most of the memory in the computer is being used for the graphics, which in this game are far more important.\r\n\r\nI'll have to be honest; I didn't really like this game when I first played it, and I fully intended to slate it completely. But after playing through it and solving two or three puzzles, it started to grow on me quite unexpectedly. I must say I was very impressed by the quality of the graphics; the guy who drew and animated them must be a real Garfield fan, 'cos he's captured the essence of the madcap cat, and squeezed it all into a 48K game. All his famous facial expressions are there, changing along with his moods, and in time with the game action. The gameplay, I thought, was just a tiny bit bland, but I suppose like the music it came second to the fact that the game had to look right, first and foremost.","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"A good licence deal, mounds of dosh for The Edge, and a playable and fun arcade adventure for us lot. Everybody wins, really.","Page":"26","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Phil South","Score":"7","ScoreSuffix":"/10"}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":[{"Header":"Graphics","Score":"9/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Playability","Score":"7/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Value For Money","Score":"8/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Addictiveness","Score":"7/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Overall","Score":"7/10","Text":""}],"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Sinclair User Issue 71, Feb 1988","Price":"£1","ReleaseDate":"1988-01-18","Editor":"David Kelly","TotalPages":108,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Graham Taylor\r\nStaff Writer: Jim Douglas\r\nStaff Writer: Tamara Howard\r\nArt Editor: Gareth Jones\r\nAdventure Help: Gordo Greatbelly\r\nZapchat: Jon Riglar\r\nHelpline: Andrew Hewson\r\nContributors: Richard Price, Tony Bridge, Chris Jenkins, Tony Dillon, Gary Rook\r\nHardware Correspondent: Rupert Goodwins\r\nAdvertisement Manager: Mike Corr\r\nSales Executive: Steve Prescott\r\nClassified Sales/Production: Alison Morton\r\nPublisher's Secretary: Debbie Pearson\r\nSubscriptions Manager: Carl Dunne\r\nPublisher: Terry Pratt\r\n\r\nTelephone [redacted]\r\n\r\nSubscription Enquiries [redacted]\r\n\r\nSinclair User is published monthly by EMAP Business & Computer Publications\r\n\r\nCover Illustration: Jim Davis\r\n\r\nSinclair User\r\nEMAP Business & Computer Publications\r\n[redacted]\r\n\r\nPrinted by Nene River Press, [redacted]\r\nDistributed by EMAP Publications Ltd.\r\n\r\n©Copyright 1988 Sinclair User ISSN No 0262-5458\r\n\r\nABC 84,699 July-Dec 1986"},"MainText":"Label: The Edge\r\nAuthor: Steve\r\nPrice: £8.95\r\nMemory: 48K/128K\r\nJoystick: various\r\nReviewer: Graham Taylor\r\n\r\nThere have been quite a few licences based on cartoon characters and some of the more recent ones have faithfully created the general look of the character - Yogi Bear springs to mind. Garfield goes beyond that. Garfield doesn't just look a bit like Garfield in some general sort of way - Garfield looks exactly, expression by expression, mood by mood, moment by moment, right. The plot is right too - the gameplay has been intelligently based around themes from the cartoon. The overall plot has Garfield trying to rescue his sometime girlfriend Arlene from the city pound. The game requires Garfield a) to stay awake b) to keep eating c) to kick Oddie - the most ludicrous dog in the world and d) to get around to actually figuring things out and finding his way to the city pound. Getting out the front door is going to be a good start... Bewildered owner John is here, ever the innocent he plays almost no part in the plot though, being too stupid to understand the mighty plans of cats and dogs.\r\n\r\nImagine the comic strip brought to life - that's the game, some visual details are sparse but all the graphics are big. Garfield the cartoon is renowned for his wide range of expressive gestures, they're all here - check out the cheesy smile, the gigantic and grotesque 'eating face' (too horrible to be described here - imagine a mouth and nothing else), check out the looks of disgust, of indifference - not Oddie's dumb surprise at being kicked across the room yet again... The game is mostly black and white of course, but there are touches of colour where that doesn't lead to yucky attribute clash.\r\n\r\nGarfield the sprite can walk, jump, pick up likely looking objects, use or eat them and kick - this last one is (fortunately) so necessary you have to do it over and over again - watching Oddie hurtle through the air is one of computer software's best violent moments.\r\n\r\nThere are assorted useful objects around - some of them are obviously for eating (Garfield starts to look very sick if he gets hungry or if he exerts himself too much) others, like the torch, have obvious uses, try it in the cellar which contains other things besides rats... though the rats, it should be said are pretty cute.\r\n\r\nSound effects are goodish, though the game doesn't really require much. I figured out a few things after the first couple of tries - it's important to remember Garfield is lazy - this may be the only game in the history of software where you sometimes have to deliberately rest a bit. There are a number of areas including a street scene you'll discover when you first load it up but it's quite possible to get completely bewildered and feel as though it's not possible to get any further into the game - there is always another exit though you just need to find the right object...\r\n\r\nIt looks brilliant, it's funny, it contains scenes of gratuitous violence against stupid looking dogs, it's a challenge. It's something like a Classic don't you think? Yep, so do I.","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"Easily the best cartoon licence ever. Garfield looks, acts and plays right. Better than anyone could have imagined.","Page":"34,35","Denied":false,"Award":"Sinclair User Classic","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Graham Taylor","Score":"10","ScoreSuffix":"/10"}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[{"Text":"HINTS AND TIPS\r\n\r\nTo see where you are going in the dungeons, take the lamp from the TV set.\r\n\r\nWhen tired, climb up somewhere high and sit down.\r\n\r\nWhen Oddie jumps up to you, jump over him, then when he comes back, kick him.\r\n\r\nKick or jump on the chests to open - you may find something useful.\r\n\r\nIf Oddie has something you want, kick him."},{"Text":"PROGRAMMERS\r\n\r\nKnown to the people at The Edge as the Caped Programmer, Steve Cargill (aged 21 years and addicted to pizza) was the person who put life into Garfield.\r\n\r\nSoftography: Fighting Warrior (Melbourne House, 1985), Sir Lancelot (Melbourne House, 1985). Began working as an In-House programmer at The Edge, and was responsible for the conversions of Shadow Skimmer and Shaolin's Road."}],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":[{"Header":"Overall","Score":"10/10","Text":""}],"CompilationReviewScores":[]}]}]