The Spectrum Show EP 162

Added: 2026-06-01

[00:00:16]There have been several micro drive emulators available and very good ones they are too. Things like the Pico MD and V drive both emulate Sinclair's hardware really well, giving a brilliant retro feel. The V drive even fits into a real mic drive case. However, both need the original interface one to work. Now though, there's an alternative. Sadly, not widely available.

[00:00:47]Derek Fountain has come up with this device, cunningly named the ZedX expansion system recreated. The device consists of a 3D printed case containing three Raspberry Pi Picodes and two circuit boards that contain the electronics and screen. One Pi handles the interface one ROM emulation. The second handles the IO and the third handles the MDR filework and Z8 integration. The one I have has been loaned to the show by KOPS. A massive thanks to him for letting me explore this piece of hardware. The technical details are on Derek's website. And as I'm not involved in electronics, most of it goes over my head. To use this, you'll need a few MDR files. These can be made by yourself via emulation on a computer. The best option is to use Tom Dolby's excellent Z80 on MDR tool to build MDR images with any games that you want. I use this when reviewing the V drive, though already have a few pre-built. For completeness though, you copy some Z80 files into the Z80 on MDR folder. And then you enter this command line with the name of the cartridge followed by the names of the games you want. After a few seconds, you'll have an NDR file, complete with a menu when you run it.

[00:01:59]You can only get between five and 10 games per MDR file, depending on the size of the games, obviously. Back to the device, then you put the MDR files onto a micro SD card and slot it into the device.

[00:02:17]You turn everything on and it's ready to use. First, pick the drive you want to use using the rotary control and then you click the right hand button and the list of MDR files is displayed. Like the original expansion system, this supports up to eight drives. You do though have to be careful that the files or games on the cartridges will work with drive numbers higher than one.

[00:02:39]Once selected, you can now just use it like the real thing. So, this is the Sinclair demo cartridge. Load the MDR file, press run, and there it is. And it loads much faster than the old original.

[00:02:51]Sadly, there's no motor sound or real indication of it loading.

[00:02:56]Any MDR file can be used like the real thing. So for example, you can format one which will give you about 130k of storage.

[00:03:06]Obviously you can then save your own basic programs and load them back in.

[00:03:28]Other things missing though are the interface one network and serial ports.

[00:03:32]So essentially this just emulates the micro drives. I doubt many people would need those things, but it would be great to have them just in case.

[00:03:48]This is still a nice piece of kit containing all you need to emulate the Sinclair micro drive system without having to buy or own interface 1 and eight micro drives. The project is open source and the author does not build or sell these units beyond the odd one here and there. So, I'm led to believe. I emailed to ask him about the potential inclusions of serial ports and network ports and also how people can get one of these things. He very kindly responded.

[00:04:12]In brief, he has never supplied this device to anyone. The project is open source, so it's aimed at letting people make their own. If, however, people wanted to make one like himself, but didn't have the skills, they could always contact him for prices. Expect to pay around £65 plus though, as it's very timeconuming putting this thing together, and the components and case and Raspberry Pies all come in at around £45 to50. He said adding sound could be achieved if there was a demand for it.

[00:04:39]As for serial and Sinclair networking, again, these could be added and even the possibility of a real RS232 option because the Pico has its own UART. He could also emulate the Sinclair network again if there was demand. Because of the low numbers, though, and the effort involved in adding all these extra things would only benefit the few that have managed to make their own. He emphasizes again that this is an open project, so people could do this themselves and share. He also wanted to point out that it doesn't really emulate the interface one because you can't control real micro drives. It just gives the same functionality without needing the original hardware.

[00:05:15]So, let's give this a little speed test then using the normal game Birds and the Bees. And it took on average about 3.5 seconds. So, it's certainly faster than the original micro drive. Adding this to my graph and yes, it's done pretty well.

[00:05:32]I enjoyed testing this out.

[00:05:34]It brought back memories of when I owned real Mac drives and I spent hours moving all my basic games over to that format.

[00:05:41]It also has a pass through port which you may have noticed and it works fine with the ZX HD interface and more than likely other interfaces you want to use.

[00:05:50]This is certainly an option if you want to relive those days if you can persuade the creator to build one of course or make one yourself if you're technically minded. Again, thanks to KUP for lending me this device.

[00:06:15]There are times when I pick a game from the shelf that I haven't really played and wonder what's all this about and I often wonder after playing it why did I even bother. Here is one such example.

[00:06:27]The other day I picked this William Wobbler released by Wizard Computer Games in 1986.

[00:06:32]It was written by Mal Gillot and Steve Evans. Steve's name appears in the writing credits for such games as Gluglug from CRL and Guardian 2, a great Defender clone. Not bad credentials then. William Wobbler was Wizard Computer Games's only release. When I first started playing this game, I thought the graphics were large, colorful, and well- definfined. And yes, there's a bit of attribute clash, but it's okay. A bit like Don Priestley games really. As soon as I tried to play it, however, it all went downhill. Let's start by moving left and see what happens. Ah, he dies. Okay, let's try again and move right then. There seems to be pools of water that he can't get past. Okay, left, right, and dead. So now what? There's a key to pick up, which is a nightmare in itself because the pickup key is the same as the jump key. So, you have to keep proddding left and right and jump until eventually things line up and you can collect a key. I have no idea why this was in place. Surely it should be easier to pick up a key anyway. I then discovered that this block thing on the ground is some sort of trap door. Maybe a nod to Don Priestley. Who knows? Pressing fire will drop you down. Progress at least then. Now, from here there are two other items. A dot dot dot port, whatever that is, and an egg. Again, collecting these are annoying and timeconuming.

[00:07:59]Moving right. And we have two options.

[00:08:01]We can jump over and try and avoid the animal on the other side or drop down and probably die. Let's go for the jump first, then. With the key in possession, I jump and uh dead. Okay. Holding all three items, the key, the port, and the egg. and dead. Okay. Attempts three, four, five, and six involve jumping near the edge and trying to jump over the monster.

[00:08:26]Uh, dead. Okay. So then the only option then is to go down.

[00:08:32]We landed safely. Then get killed by a flying frog. Okay. I then discovered that pressing down will lower William's neck, thus avoiding the frog. Moving left and a snake appears and a frog and dead. Okay, this is madness. Let's try again. Okay, pick all the things up.

[00:08:52]Drop down, duck, and run to the right and on and on and ducking and avoid the frog. And on and on, and eventually we'll get to the far right where there's something that needs a disc and something that looks like a ladder. There are no real playing tips for this game, and the map doesn't make it any easier. No matter what I did, though, I couldn't get William to climb the rope. H okay. There is a poke that makes you immune to all enemies, so you can at least explore. But that really didn't help because I didn't know what to do. Is this supposed to be entertainment?

[00:09:32]If you press the break key, you get a little shooting game. H okay. According to the map, if you score 1,000 points, you get some kind of clue. The game had a competition attached, and the first one to complete it would win a prize, allegedly worth £1,000. No one never did. Initial adverts were for the Commodore 64 version with the Spectrum version coming soon. The advert was then doctorred for the Spectrum release, taking off the free disc offer. The free disc on the 64 was labeled completion disc, and it was something that could be written to when the game was finished, and you could then send it off to Wizard to claim your prize. because no one's ever completed it, there isn't a full solution available. This makes me think it can actually be completed. Anyway, after using the poke and another 20 minutes, I managed to get far enough to the right hand corridor and discovered that if you line William up with his hands almost touching the rope, he magically climbs up. This gets us into another long level with lots of tree stumps. You can jump over them or go down them, and each one will take you back to that long corridor at various points. Some though take you to different areas altogether. Visiting the other areas are equally as annoying where you have to jump and duck to get just a little bit further. Apparently, there is a puzzle to solve once you've collected all the clues. If you press I, you can see what you're carrying and eventually you'll fill all these slots up with clues and then there'll be an option to end the game. This takes you to a grid of 20x 20x 20. And this has been mentioned in the Lemon 64 forums, and no one can solve it because there are just too many combinations.

[00:11:08]Apparently, if you complete it, you can save it to disc wizard. Obviously, that time has passed.

[00:11:15]After more playing with the immunity poke, I got nowhere fast. 40 minutes, a lot of swearing, and nothing but frustration. Oh well, back on the shelf with this one then.

[00:11:28]Sticking with the same naming convention, this is Billy Blue Bottle, released by Power Software in 1984.

[00:11:35]You are a super blue bottle. You have powers, so the inlay claims. And your job is to rescue a fly and eat moldy food. What else do blue bottles do?

[00:11:52]There are little to no hints other than the basement is flooding and there is a pump somewhere. The screen layout reminds me of Morrison and the bikers with a lift moving up and down on the right hand side.

[00:12:04]You can move left and right and there's an additional key that lets you fly, but when you stop pressing it, you drop down. So, in some instances, you have to keep pressing it or holding it down.

[00:12:15]There's also a fire key, but I never found out what to do with that.

[00:12:22]There are objects scattered around. Some kill you, some you can push around, and some like the food you can eat. Finding out which one is which is down to trial and error, which results in a lot of frustration.

[00:12:35]To add to this, there are people walking about squirting fly spray, which will vanish after a short amount of time, but still has to be avoided. But the biggest problem though, apart from the timing, which we'll get on to later, is the lift. It took me ages to work out how not to die in it. And the trick is, if the lift's going up, fly up to the roof and stay there. If it's going down, just sit on the bottom. Once you have this, you should be able to traverse all of the levels. However, the timing is terrible. In fact, some of the reviews say that it's impossible to complete the first level because the time you are given is just not enough.

[00:13:14]At the bottom of the screen, the basement holding the fly is flooding slowly and that gives you a fixed amount of time to eat the food to keep your strength up and to move the pump. So, at the bottom left, you will see a cyan thing and that is the pump that has to be pushed into the lift. Obviously, avoiding all of the people, fly spray, and other deadly things. Each push results in a loss of energy, so you need to go back and eat more moldy food.

[00:13:44]And this introduces yet another problem.

[00:13:46]You can only push the pump four paces before Billy Blue Bottle runs out of power. But if you push it four places, you then get trapped because you can't move beyond the fly paper above it. So you end up having to move it one place, then go get some food, which takes a very long time, and then come back and then move it four places, which should give you enough room to fly up to the ceiling and get round. So annoying. I tried many times to get past this level and failed. So without cheating, I don't think this screen is completable. So adding a few pokes and onto the next screen, which is more slow paced.

[00:14:28]And along with the third screen reminds me a little bit of antics from Bug Bite.

[00:14:33]In the second screen, at the top right, you will see a pair of green lips. At least I think that's what it is. and you then have to collect that. When you've done that, you can then make your way down to rescue the fly bottom right.

[00:14:46]And on the third and final screen, you have to collect a pair of magenta lips bottom left. And then go up and collect the cyan key in the middle right. And then finally get back up to the exit to complete the game. There are places on this screen where you have to keep stabbing the fly key to hovering between two spikes as various nasties roam about. No wonder there isn't an RZX of this game. If you do manage to complete all three screens though, either by luck or cheating, you do get a very nice end of game screen.

[00:15:24]And I think that's the best thing about the game in general. One to avoid then.

[00:15:42]Let's take a quick look at some new releases. Starting with Zack McDracken Saves the Chickens, released in 2025 by Retro Souls and written by Dennis Croucher.

[00:16:01]The game starts with some excellent music. And once we get into the game itself, the idea is simple. Rescue the chickens. What else did you expect from this title? You have to move around and grab those chickens because they're too stupid to get into the teleport themselves.

[00:16:23]Once you've grabbed one, you then just move towards the teleport and drop them in.

[00:16:36]You have to use lifts to move to different levels and to move the chickens. You do have to be careful though. You can block yourselves in with the lifts. The graphics are wonderful, colorful and large and well animated.

[00:16:47]The control works well. It's a pity that there's no music playing in the background though.

[00:16:56]As the game progresses, things get harder, as you would expect. There are 20 levels, and further into the game, you get things like bridges where you have to use chickens to bridge the gaps.

[00:17:17]Great fun to play and very well thought out.

[00:17:30]Next we have Flappyverse released by Yuan GM. Again, really nice presentation here.

[00:17:44]The story goes that all modern media and storage has been wiped out. And to get humankind back to where it was, the data has to be collected from older sources.

[00:18:02]You control the hero, a robot named FLP82.

[00:18:06]Tasked with this job, he travels to each location and has to collect the data storage on the devices that resemble floppy discs. Once he's got them, he has to then take them back to the terminal.

[00:18:26]The tricky part though is that FLP82 is always moving and he has limited amount of moves to complete each stage.

[00:18:44]The graphics are large and well-drawn and move well enough, and there's some nice music playing along in the background. Control is a little bit tricky until you get used to it, and you can stop him from moving by holding down the movement key when he's against a wall.

[00:19:08]Later levels add more things to avoid like force fields. All in all, a great game and highly recommended.

[00:19:16]And finally, we have Soy Stomper, released by Death Squad in 2026.

[00:19:30]Like many of the newer games released, there's an option to give the authors a bit of cash to encourage them to make more games. It's not a lot, and I'm happy to give what I can. Anyway, the game, the first thing you notice is the colors. They're so in your face and don't really look like a Spectrum.

[00:19:56]The same can be said for many Death Squad games. They use the attributes really well. The downside is the movement, which is in character squares, but to be honest, you don't really notice.

[00:20:14]The idea is that you have to go around and stamp out all the soy boys. To do this, you maneuver around the screen and avoid anything that moves. When you get on top of one of the soy boys, you stomp up and down a few times to flatten them.

[00:20:37]When all the soy boys have been stomped, the next level begins.

[00:20:41]Some levels have simple moving enemies, and others have enemies that home in on you.

[00:20:53]Each level has a time limit, too, so you can't hang around. There's some great music that plays along with incidental tunes throughout. Control is good and very accurate, which is a good thing for this game. A really enjoyable title then, and again, highly recommended.

[00:21:25]So Paul, your episode on trilogies got quite a lot of comments, mainly because you seem to miss quite a few out. What was going on? Do you know how much work I put into getting all those trilogies and making sure they were trilogies and making sure that even though it might have been called the same thing, it wasn't actually a trilogy? And then Yes, I know. I hold my hands up. Yes, Horus should have been in there and Saber Man should have been in there and all the others.

[00:21:51]>> But Magic Knight had four games.

[00:21:54]>> Well, exactly.

[00:21:56]>> Did you do Manic Miner Jetset Willie and Jetset Willie 2?

[00:22:00]>> No.

[00:22:01]>> Why not? That's obviously a trilogy.

[00:22:05]Is it though?

[00:22:06]>> Yeah.

[00:22:07]>> Well, it surely Jetacket Willie 2 is just Jetacket Willie with a few extra bits, isn't it?

[00:22:11]>> It's a completely different game engine.

[00:22:13]It plays differently. Quite a bit differently.

[00:22:14]>> Does it really?

[00:22:16]>> The game engine's completely different.

[00:22:17]Well, first of all, most noticeably, it's faster. It's quite a bit faster than Jetset Willie.

[00:22:24]>> So, so does that make it harder then?

[00:22:25]>> Um, well, yeah. Jumping's different. In Jetset Willie, if you hit a direction that you're facing and jump at the same time, you'll jump from the spot. In Jetset Willy 2, you take a step. And in particular, if you just keep your finger on, say, left and jump, you'll keep jumping left. But between every jump, you take a step, >> right? So that they weren't just cashing in on the name.

[00:22:47]>> Um, well, they were a bit, but let's face it, everyone wanted everyone wants his new jet willy game. So they and they gave us one and it was quite a bit different. But the the big one you missed out was Horus.

[00:23:00]>> I know. Mainly because I don't like the Horus trilogies. Um I mean I don't even know where to start with them. The first one was just a a Pac-Man ripoff despite it being magazines.

[00:23:11]>> Yeah. I mean it it introduced tunnels and stuff but Yeah. And then the second >> bridges then.

[00:23:17]>> Yeah. Okay.

[00:23:18]>> Where you could go in mid-creen you could go underneath to the other side.

[00:23:21]Then Horus goes skiing.

[00:23:24]>> Yeah. which was just a frogger to start with, a very poor frogger to start with, and then a downhill skiing game that's been done a million times on a million systems.

[00:23:33]>> It It was quite a good skiing game though, Paul.

[00:23:36]>> No, I thought I I I really loved I I hated the frog a bit cuz you get killed and then an am the ambulance taking your previous horror to hospital would run you over.

[00:23:50]>> Need I say more? And then the third one was a a bodgeged up hunchback clone and a halfhearted bodgeged together panic clone with some spiders in it.

[00:24:03]>> I think you're saying I didn't like it so therefore I didn't put it in the trilogies.

[00:24:10]>> Also also there was supposed to be four of them. Um Sinclair released the fourth one on the scion handheld calculator thing but never released it on the spectrum. I don't know if they had plans to, but >> um someone in the comments mentioned the Quest Probe trilogy, Hulk, Spider-Man, Human Torch, and The Thing.

[00:24:29]>> Is that because um well, they're all Adventure International games, but were they in the same I mean, they featured superheroes, but then again, there were other games that featured superheroes, but they're not trilogies. There were a couple of Superman Superman games. There were um Judge Dread games and all that sort of stuff. So, what reason are they saying it's a trilogy?

[00:24:51]>> I think they were literally called the Quest Probed Trilogy.

[00:24:54]In fact, I think wasn't there a compilation later on in the Spectrum's life called the Quest Probe Trilogy with all three games on. I might be wrong there, but maybe I saw magazine adverts in the Quest Probe trilogy with the three on, but there were three separate ones.

[00:25:09]>> There were there was an advert with them all on on an underground train if my memory >> Yeah.

[00:25:14]>> is correct. Is there a strong enough reason to say that um these are trilogies? It was done by the same company. Fair enough. They are superheroes, but then again, there are other superhero games. Is it Are they all set in the same place? I'm not sure that. Are they set in the same town? I don't say they're all set on planet Earth because that's a bit of a get out.

[00:25:34]>> If you say all games set on the planet Earth or form a trilogy or a series, then it's going to be a very long one.

[00:25:42]>> Okay. I've got some more.

[00:25:43]>> Yeah. Uh we have uh Mountains of K which was a trilogy of text adventures which I was going to put in and I can't for the life of me think why I didn't. Um I mean they're they were highly regarded but having but when you go back and play them they're just um very basic location descriptions and I mean yeah you could get some enjoyment out of that anyway.

[00:26:05]Yes, I should have put them in. Hands up on that one.

[00:26:08]>> Okay. You said you had some other ones.

[00:26:10]>> Yeah. Okay. The exploding fist. Uh, where the Exploding Fist, Fist 2, and Exploding Fist Plus?

[00:26:16]>> Is that really a trilogy?

[00:26:17]>> They've all got the word fist in the title.

[00:26:20]>> Were they all from Melbourne House as well?

[00:26:23]>> Tie-ins in the series. Where the Exploding Fist, Melbourne House, Fist 2, The Legend Continues, Melbourne House, and Exploding Fist Plus by Firebird?

[00:26:32]>> Hadn't Firebird probably bought Melbourne House by >> Very probably. Yeah, because that was 1988. So, yes, that is a trilogy. It's listed as a trilogy. I missed it out. It was It probably one of those games that I didn't think would be part of a trilogy, you know, with the way the Exploding Fist, but it was great when it came out and and everybody was playing it.

[00:26:51]>> It's It's like thinking, "Oh, um, Bruce Lee's a great game. I bet it's part of a trilogy."

[00:26:57]>> Yep.

[00:27:00]Any others that were missed?

[00:27:01]>> Somebody mentioned a Batman. Now, there's Batman. There's Batman the Cave Crusader, Batman the Movie. Would you class those as a trilogy? They're all the same person probably all set in the same vicinity stroke era stroke universe as it were cuz Gotham City and all that.

[00:27:17]>> Yeah, >> I don't think they're listed as trilogies using the same character.

[00:27:22]>> There was Batman which was the 3D one.

[00:27:24]>> Yeah, that was Ocean. There was Batman the movie which was Ocean.

[00:27:28]>> Batman the Cape Crusader was Ocean.

[00:27:31]>> Yeah.

[00:27:33]>> I mean, if you if you take this to movie, it's almost like that those first two were really good and dark and gothic. The first one was the best of those four and the best of us two. Then you had the horrible was it Joel Shoemacker ones that were not not good at all. Then you had the Dark Knight trilogy and it's almost feeling like well are those three sets of movies a trilogy of sets of movies cuz they're all different in different ways and look different and play differently.

[00:28:03]Well, if you go back to the games, they play differently. I I'm not sure I call that a trilogy, the Batman trilogy. For the same reason I wouldn't call those three sets of movies, for example, a Batman trilogy.

[00:28:14]>> Fair dudes. And and the final one that I've got is yours. Obviously, >> it wasn't just mine. Other people said uh Saber Man, Saber Wolves, Underworld, and Night Law. Obviously, there was then Pentagram as well. And uh the legendary Mayare. I was really surprised you missed this one, Paul.

[00:28:33]Yeah, I mean it is listed in the series as Saber Wolf, Underworld, Night Law, Pentagram, and Mime.

[00:28:38]>> So, it was only a trilogy up until Pentagram came along.

[00:28:42]>> Yeah, but so was Magic Knight, and that was the first one you did until Storming came along. So, >> I don't know why. I mean, the the the two obvious one, well, the three obvious ones are Horus, Mountains of Ket, and Saberman.

[00:28:56]>> Yeah, >> I think >> But you missed out. Maybe maybe I suppose Manic Minder and Jetacket will I always thought Jetacket Willy 2 was just a modified and fixed version.

[00:29:04]>> I can I can see why you wouldn't think Jet that wasn't a trilogy, but at least we've done this and we can address the fact that yeah, you were never going to get any of them. But let's talk about a few more of them.

[00:29:16]Paul, >> I think I'll go and have a glass of wine.