GLIDER RIDER (Quicksilva) You get a lot of time to think when you're gliding on the thermals. Mostly the feeling of flying like a bird makes them nice thoughts, but everyone gets a little melancholy at times and this mission is enough to make anyone think hard. One subject that has taken my mind recently is the word "volunteer". I remember becoming one when I joined the "Silent But Deadly" squadron, but I thought that you had the chance to choose your missions; ie. attempt to avoid those that were likely to be suicidal. That isn't the way the army see it. Once a volunteer, always a volunteer, seems to be their assumption. This one has to be the last - one way or the other! If I succeed then my future is assured - I'll be remembered in all the history books, rich beyond my dreams and set up for life. If I don't ... I don't want to think about that. The briefing covered the following items: Abraxas Corporation HQ EoOs Island Activity Production and distribution of arms and other hi-tech military equipment to anyone with the ability to pay. No moral considerations are taken into account - money = arms. World Council decides they have to be stopped. Silent But Deadly approach selected from all available options (a great honour?). EoOs Island Location Pacific Ocean (152.28 West, 14.54 South) Description Unique land mass - made completely of plastic by Abraxas. Completely undetectable on radar. Intelligence Island is disguised by the use of nylon grass and poly- thene trees. Power comes from small nuclear reactors, part of a distributed network all over the island. Main building geiger counts suggest that two reactors are housed within it to provide emergency backup. All power units seem to lack protection - assumed to be a weak spot. Mission details Codename Paethon Background EoOs is incredibly well defended, apart from the distributed power network. It is therefore essential that these should be destroyed one by one before the unprotected backup reactors are destroyed within the main building. Method SBD Hang Glider unit will be too small to be seen on radar defence systems and there is a good chance that one man could enter island completely undetected. Use of motorised bike will allow terrain movement and glider can be used for elevated bombing. Weight restrictions suggest that only hand grenades can be carried. Viability Code 1F (They always put this in code and then never tell us what the code means! I can only assume that this translates to "dangerous".) Equipment Mark 5 Glider and the collapsible E37 motorbike unit. Engine can be removed after mission and attached to the glider to provide a microlite aircraft for escape purposes. Nine standard hand grenades. All equipment will fit in standard issue rucksack, including bike and engine! Objectives Primary Destroy the ten external reactors and rendezvous with awaiting submarine (can only surface for 30 mins from mission start). Secondary Find more ammunition on island. (You can only carry nine grenades.) Destroy as many operatives and operational buildings as possible. Defences Reactor Ground-to-air lasers. Can be disabled, we believe. Main compound Very heavily defended - may be impenetrable. Sea Appears to be shark infested - Don't swim! Gameplay There are two control modes, one for the motorbike and the other for the hang glider, and later the microlite. Simple direction controls are noted below. You can define your own keys for each of these controls or use a joystick if you prefer. Bike control Function Control Move up & left UP \ Move down & right DOWN \ Move down & left LEFT / Move up & right RIGHT / Glider control Function Control Climb UP Dive DOWN Bank left LEFT (anti-clockwise) Bank right RIGHT (clockwise) Drop grenade FIRE To take off: reverse direction whilst driving down a slope. To land: use your imagination! Pressing BREAK quits the current game. Loading On a 48K Spectrum or a Spectrum+ type: LOAD"" On a 128K Spectrum use the tape loader option on the menu. Once the main game has loaded the extra soundtrack data and digitised sound will be loaded. This is not available to the 48K Spectrum or the 48K mode of the 128K model. Commodore & Amstrad versions follow normal loading procedure