Super Seymour Saves the Planet

by Nick Thompson, PG, PP, Peter J. Ranson, Shaun G. McClure
Code Masters Ltd
1991

Label: Code Masters
Memory: 48K/128K
Price: £3.99 Tape
Reviewer: Big Al Dykes

Give a man a cape and a pair of tights and everyone will think he's some sort of weirdo. Give a CodeMasters cartoon character a cape and a pair of tights and he becomes a super hero, ready to save the world from environmental disaster.

Super Seymour is a Bomb Jack style platform game in which our the little potato-head bounces, flies and spits his way around increasingly difficult and heavily populated levels. Each screen is divided by walls and platforms and filled with toxic waste, fruit and mutants. Our fine veggie friend Seymour must pick it all up and bump off all the bad guys to boot (literally) by jumping on their heads. There are tons of bad guys to deal with, some, like the mutant burgers, hallowe'n masks and helicopter heads are quite fast and will actively chase you around the screen, others are slower and easier to avoid and jump on.

Luckily Seymour also has a variety of special weapons at his disposal (if he's actually going to dispose of them I hope they are bio-degradable) which are released by the mutants once they've been squashed These include the 'super blow', the phelmy 'super spit' (yuuckk!) and the 'super snare' all of which allow him to stun or trap otherwise very awkward enemies. He can also collect a speed up icon and make super duper leaps enabling him to collect lots of yummy fruit and avoid lots of unyummy baddies. Let's just hope he doesn't get any flies in his soup-er though!

Super Seymour cartoon style graphics are very well drawn and all the characters (good or bad) are funny and well animated. The game doesn't really impress immediately but once you get into it, go through the first few levels and find out how to use his special weapons property, it becomes very enjoyable and addictive. So it's a big hurrah for Super Seymour. I'll sleep a lot better now in my nuclear shelter knowing he's out there protecting the planet.

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GARTH:
Although Super Seymour is suspiciously similar to Bomb Jack, it's still one of the most frustratingly addictive games I've played for ages. For £3.99 this represents superb value for money and as an added bonus it's completely environmentally friendly as well.

Graphics: 80%
Sound: 68%
Playability: 83%
Lastability: 81%
Overall: 84%

Summary: Pollution is or the way out, well at least in the world of computer games, where Captain Planet and now Super Seymour are on the job. I really enjoyed this installment in the Seymour Saga, it contains much more arcade style fun than Seymour Goes to Hollywood and will keep you busy pulverising polluters for a long time.

Transcript by Chris Bourne