[{"TitleName":"The Krypton Factor","Publisher":"TV Games","Author":"Dave Howcroft, Dave Kelly, Dave Price, Glenn Benson, Richard Naylor, Richard Whelan","YearOfRelease":"1987","ZxDbId":"0002776","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: TV Games\r\nRetail Price: £7.95\r\nAuthor: G Benson\r\n\r\nIntelligence, quick thinking and athletic ability are just some of the skills needed to prove yourself in The Krypton Factor. Based on the long-running Granada TV series, which has been putting suckers through their gruelling paces for a decade, this licence from Domark label TV Games throws up to four contestants into the ring.\r\n\r\nThe Krypton Factor consists of six rounds testing mental agility, observation, response, physical ability, intelligence and general knowledge; players can choose their 'characters' from among four men and four women before the first round (participants in the TV show are ordinary members of the public).\r\n\r\nIn the mental-agility round, a series of numbers appears briefly onscreen. The digits must be remembered and rearranged into ascending order. At first there are just six numbers to struggle with, but this can increase to a maximum of nine.\r\n\r\nNext there's an observation round. Here a picture appears with a scrolling story line beneath; picture and words then disappear to be replaced with a subtly different alternative version. The contestant must identify the changes within a time limit.\r\n\r\nIn the two-part response round, contestants' reactions and responses are tested on the Ergobuggy and Vidiwall. The first is a strange combination of rotatable pedals, some moved by the legs (as on a bike) and others by hand. The two sets of pedals must be rotated at different speeds to propel the buggy forward - it's a tricky test of coordination.\r\n\r\nAnd the Vidiwall is a large square formed of many video screens, which randomly change colour. The player must decide in a split second which colour is shown on most screens, and then hit the key which represents that colour. The first contestant to do this correctly ten times wins the round.\r\n\r\nSheer physical ability is now tested on an assault course, where players can adjust their contestants'stamina and strength in both legs and arms. Different obstacles, which include the net climb and a high wall, require different combinations of strength and stamina; in some you must rely on arms, in others on legs.\r\n\r\nNext it's the turn of brainpower, as each contestant is challenged to piece together the parts of the Krypton Factor logo. Some of these pieces can be turned and fit within a grid; others can be removed from the grid and repositioned.\r\n\r\nThe last round tests the general knowledge of the contestants. Questions scroll across the screen, and in time-honoured quiz-show fashion the first player to press his key gets to answer. The correct answer is then revealed onscreen, and the game relies on players' honesty in admitting when they answered incorrectly.\r\n\r\nCOMMENTS\r\n\r\nJoysticks: none\r\nGraphics: lacking detail, but not colour\r\nSound: simple title tune, unimaginative effects\r\nOptions: choice of eight charismatic contestants; up to four players","ReviewerComments":["The mental test is the same every game, which destroys the point, and the response test is also soon mastered. The point of the TV show was that it put untrained people in demanding situations; as an unchanging computer game The Krypton Factor is quite silly, because results can be improved with practice.\r\nBym Welthy\r\n37%","Not only does the Spectrum music sound nothing like The Art Of Noise on the TV show, but the game ranges from the appallingly bad Ergobuggy section to the astoundingly simple, though adequate. mental-agility round. It says something that the best section of the game involves putting half a dozen numbers into ascending sequence - I would only recommend The Krypton Factor to those who see themselves in the half-dozen preset personalities.\r\nMike Dunn\r\n32%"],"OverallSummary":"General Rating: A simply constructed (but mentally demanding) repetitive quiz game.","Page":"20","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Bym Welthy","Score":"37","ScoreSuffix":"%"},{"Name":"Mike Dunn","Score":"32","ScoreSuffix":"%"}],"ScreenshotText":[{"Text":"It's a gas: The Krypton Factor"}],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":[{"Header":"Presentation","Score":"60%","Text":""},{"Header":"Graphics","Score":"50%","Text":""},{"Header":"Playability","Score":"39%","Text":""},{"Header":"Addictive Qualities","Score":"37%","Text":""},{"Header":"Overall","Score":"37%","Text":""}],"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Your Sinclair Issue 29, May 1988","Price":"£1.5","ReleaseDate":"1988-04-13","Editor":"Teresa Maughan","TotalPages":116,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Teresa Maughan\r\nArt Editor: Darrell King\r\nDeputy Editor: Marcus Berkmann\r\nTechnical Editor: Phil South\r\nProduction Editor: Jackie Ryan\r\nDesigner: Catherine Higgs\r\nContributors: Guy Bennington, Richard Blaine, Audrey & Owen Bishop, Ciaran Brennan, Lucy Broadbent, Jonathan Davies, Mike Gerrard, David McCandless, Duncan McDonald, John Minson, David Powell, Peter Shaw, 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":"TV Games\r\n£7.95\r\nReviewer: Richard Blaine\r\n\r\nWhat will they think of next? Maybe there's a company out there negotiating for the rights to News At Ten or Gardener's Question Time...\r\n\r\nI'm sure you've seen the Krypton Factor on TV - the idea, if you haven't, is to pit four contestants against each other in a series of tests of their physical and mental abilities. The one who scores highest is supposedly the best all-rounder. On the box, players are tested on their memories, their abilities to perform different physical tasks, their recognition skills and their general knowledge. The computer game manages to reproduce the memory and general knowledge tests quite well, but the physical section is really a bit of a joke.\r\n\r\nThe first subgame (of six), involves remembering sequences of numbers flashing on screen, and then being able to type then back in, but in the correct numerical order. This is not half as easy as you might think; at the same time though, while it's something of a challenge at first I don't honestly think it has much addictive quality.\r\n\r\nGame number two is weird. First you have to study a really naff picture while reading a story which scrolls across the bottom of the screen. Then you study a similar pic and read a similar story. In both pic and story, things have been changed - present becomes postcard, fete becomes fair, and so on - and you have to identify the changes.\r\n\r\nThe third section has two separate games; in the first, you have to move the Ergobuggy to the end of a course. On the TV, this is quite a challenge, as you have to pedal in one direction with your feet and in the other with your hands - no mean feat, I can tell you. On the computer though, it's just an exercise in joystick waggling. Ho hum, and a missed opportunity.\r\n\r\nOnce you've done that, you go to the vidwall, as in the real thing. And again as in the real thing, the longer you take over the buggy, the less time you have on the vidwall. This is a rectangle of TV screens, divided into four quarters. You have to work out which quarter has the most coloured screens of the same colour and then hit the right button. If you're confused, that puts you just ahead of me, as I was totally lost by this point. I tried hitting all the buttons at once, and the machine made all the right noises, but I didn't score anything.\r\n\r\nSection four is another Summer Games-type game, this time on the assault course. Your little figure runs along, viewed from above, and every time you come to an obstacle, you have to work out what combinations of strength, stamina, arm and leg power will best get you past it. Again I pounded away at all four keys, but this time it seemed to work, as I scored 10 points! At least I think I did. It could have been because I was the only person taking part and so automatically won!\r\n\r\nPart five involves solving a puzzle. At the bottom of the screen is a disassembled design, chopped into nine pieces. You have to put them in the right places in the empty square in the given time limit. Again, not as easy as you might think.\r\n\r\nFinally you get to the sixth section, the general knowledge quiz. This works much like Trivial Pursuit (not surprisingly, as TV Games is owned by Domark, which published that game). Rather than typing in the answers, you say them out loud, press a button to have the right answer flashed up, and then tell the computer whether you were right or wrong. Lots of scope for cheating if you're playing with yourself (Don't you mean 'by yourself'? Ed).\r\n\r\nAnd that's it, really. Up to four people can play, and right at the start everyone gets to choose from eight digitised pictures, which are accompanied by potted biographies. (Karen, a 22-year-old secretary from Blackpool). You can change the details if you want, but you can't change the picture - you're stuck with that grinning visage.\r\n\r\nWhat more can be said? The Krypton Factor is one of the century's less gripping licensing ideas, and while it has flashes of almost-interest, it really doesn't grab me. Yet again, this is an example of a licensing deal where no-one sat down and thought much about whether or not the projected product would work. Just because you can computerise something doesn't mean you should. Some things just don't work as computer games, and I tend to think that The Krypton Factor is one of those.","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"Not an obvious computer tie-in, and in the end a none too successful one, either.","Page":"73","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Richard Blaine","Score":"6","ScoreSuffix":"/10"}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":[{"Header":"Graphics","Score":"6/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Playability","Score":"5/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Value For Money","Score":"6/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Addictiveness","Score":"4/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Overall","Score":"6/10","Text":""}],"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"ACE (Advanced Computer Entertainment) Issue 7, Apr 1988","Price":"£1.5","ReleaseDate":"1988-03-03","Editor":"Peter Connor, Steve Cooke","TotalPages":132,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Advanced Computer Entertainment\r\nFuture Publishing [redacted]\r\nTelephone [redacted], Fax [redacted], Telecom Gold 84:TXT152, Prestel/Micronet [redacted]\r\n\r\nCo-editors: Peter Connor, Steve Cooke\r\nReviews Editor: Andy Wilton\r\nProduction Editor: Rod Lawton\r\nStaff Writer: Andy Smith\r\nArt Editor: Trevor Gilham\r\nArt Team: Angela Neal, Sally Meddings\r\nPublisher: Chris Anderson\r\n\r\nCOVER PHOTOGRAPHY\r\nStuart Baynes Photography [redacted]\r\n\r\nSUBSCRIPTIONS & SPECIAL OFFERS\r\nChristine Stacey [redacted]\r\n\r\nCOLOUR ORIGINATION\r\nWessex Reproduction [redacted]\r\n\r\nDISTRIBUTION\r\nSM Distribution [redacted]\r\n\r\nPRINTING\r\nChase Web Offset [redacted]\r\n\r\nCopyright - FUTURE PUBLISHING LTD 1988 - No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without our permission."},"MainText":"Definitely not a game for one player only, this program is a brave but uninspiring attempt to convey the excitement (if any) of the popular TV series.\r\n\r\nUp to four players choose a game character from a list of eight, represented on-screen by a digitised portrait and a brief biography. You can enter your own occupation, age, and home town if you want, but these details don't reappear in the game.\r\n\r\nThere then follow six challenges, each one a separate lead (best make sure you have a tape counter!) testing your powers of observation, short-term memory, physical control, and general knowledge. At the end of each round the scores and running total are shown and at the end of the game there's a brief victory display (just a static screen with a trophy) for the winner.\r\n\r\nThe physical control sections involve tapping different keys at different rates simultaneously, either to propel an 'Ergobuggy' across the screen, or to tackle the 'assault course'. All the sections are dominated by strict time limits, except the 'Observation Round' in which you spot differences in pictures and short stories. The problem here is not too little time, but too much of it - those not playing at the time have nothing to do.\r\n\r\nThis game offers a modicum of fun to a family of four who want to gather round the monitor. You could play with less participants but it wouldn't be as enjoyable For the soloist it's a waste of time.\r\n\r\nReviewer: Steve Cooke\r\n\r\nRELEASE BOX\r\nSpec, £7.95cs, Out Now\r\nAms, £7.95cs, £12.95dk, Out Now\r\nC64/128, £7.95cs, £109.95dk, Imminent\r\n\r\nPredicted Interest Curve\r\n\r\n1 min: 60/100\r\n1 hour: 50/100\r\n1 day: 60/100\r\n1 week: 50/100\r\n1 month: 40/100\r\n1 year: 30/100","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"Once you get over the slow pace and poor controls, interest peaks then slowly fades away.","Page":"51","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Steve Cooke","Score":"616","ScoreSuffix":"/1000"}],"ScreenshotText":[{"Text":"Amstrad: Piloting the Ergobuggy involves tapping different keys at different rates - a test of co-ordination that sounds difficult in theory but disappointingly easy in practise."}],"BlurbText":[{"Text":"AMSTRAD VERSION\r\n\r\nNot very exciting graphically and lacks sound during play. Some sections would benefit from a joystick option. The 464's inbuilt tape counter makes the multi-load a little more bearable, but the combination of loading delays and waiting for others to take their turn does nothing to enhance gameplay.\r\n\r\nGraphics: 5/10\r\nAudio: 3/10\r\nIQ Factor: 7/10\r\nFun Factor: 5/10\r\nAce Rating: 641/1000\r\n\r\nPredicted Interest Curve\r\n\r\n1 min: 65/100\r\n1 hour: 55/100\r\n1 day: 60/100\r\n1 week: 55/100\r\n1 month: 40/100\r\n1 year: 30/100"},{"Text":"SPECTRUM VERSION\r\n\r\nDigitised pictures display poorly on this machine and the graphics are generally slightly inferior. Plus 2 owners lacking a tape counter may fume over occasional loading errors, but otherwise there is little difference between this and the Amstrad version."}],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":[{"Header":"Graphics","Score":"4/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Audio","Score":"1/10","Text":""},{"Header":"IQ Factor","Score":"7/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Fun Factor","Score":"5/10","Text":""},{"Header":"Ace Rating","Score":"616/1000","Text":""}],"CompilationReviewScores":[]}]}]