by Bojan Abraxas Pandža
◆ I got a ZX Spectrum in 1986 or 1987. I mostly remember being in third grade when my aunt brought it to me from Germany. Of course, my father complained and was mad at her, claiming I wouldn’t learn anything anymore and would just spend my time playing games. Anyway, I had all the major titles, or rather, the classics. I don’t remember who made me my first compilation tape, but back then you could also order games through ads in Svet Kompjutera <World Of Computers – a popular Serbian computer magazine>.
I got hooked on Popeye <1985> and, of course, Manic Miner, which was truly addictive but also a really tough and frustrating game because the slightest mistake would send you straight to your doom, so every life was truly precious. Every time I lost a life on one of the first three levels, I’d immediately quit the game and start over. Each new level would raise my blood pressure while I tried to overcome every single obstacle.
Manic Miner <MM> is considered a cult-classic today. It is the creation of a teenager, Matthew Smith, who was only 16-17 years old at the time. and the creator himself is known for using psychedelic drugs and all sorts of things while he was a minor during the game’s creation, so it’s no wonder that everything looks a bit chaotic, psychedelic, and at times schizophrenic. The game was originally released by Bug-Byte in 1983 and was later ported to all other home computers. MM is considered by many to be one of the most influential platformers in video game history, defining an entire genre of games. It actually came about as a request for Smith to make something similar to the legendary Donkey Kong.
In the game, you guide miner Willy through 20 dangerous levels, and you have to collect items before you run out of, uhm… air?! Along the way, you must precisely plan Willy’s jumps to avoid deadly falls and all sorts of bizarre characters like ball-juggling seals, wind-up mad robots, raging toilet bowls, chickens and kangaroos. After Wily collects all the keys, coins, gold bars and whatnot, he must reach the blinking portal that takes him to the next level, and you get a bonus life for every 10,000 points. Also, throughout the entire game, you’re accompanied by classical music from “In the Hall of the Mountain King” by Edvard Grieg, which is another layer of madness. Yep, it was really tense, I would be sweating constantly every single time I played the game. MM was perhaps one of the most stressful titles on the ZX Spectrum I’ve ever played, and I’ve played quite a few.
As for the graphics, they were the best they could be on an 8-bit computer back in 1983, but they were not all that important. The most important thing was that the game itself was good and playable, and you often had to use your imagination. I remember Benny Hill’s Madcap Chase <1985>, it was similar to Popeye because it was made by the same developer, DK’Tronics. The only thing Benny does, if I remember correctly, is take some laundry off a clothesline where some poor woman was drying it, and there was also some dog that was chasing him, I think. The gameplay was super simple, but I got hooked on it just because it really lets your imagination run wild, and for us kids who grew up in the ’80s, using your imagination was truly something special. The graphics really weren’t important, all that mattered was imagining that it was actually Benny Hill, and that’s it.
Manic Miner is the only game I played relentlessly for years, hoping I’d beat it someday, but I could never get past level 11, where phones come at you from all sides. It was so scary, you literally started to fear not just for your in-game life but for your own life, and your heart felt like it was about to stop. And of course, I always died there. You have to really figure out each level, play through it countless times in multiple ways to perfect your skill.
Anyway, I would often go to my neighbor’s, who I think had an Atari XL/XE, where he ran Miner with a cheat for infinite lives. I would watch him beat the whole game, but even with unlimited lives, he really struggled on the later levels, playing them over and over until he mastered them. I thought to myself, “I don’t stand a chance if he’s struggling this much on level 12 or whatever with 1,000 lives”. MM has always given me more headaches than any other title I’ve ever played because I would finish most of the games sooner or later, but not god damn Miner. The sequel, Jet Set Willy, should also be mentioned here, but that’s pure gaming hell. You go somewhere you don’t even know how to get back from, and if you die, the game sends you all the way back to the beginning and you lose everything.
◆ If there’s one thing that can get on a guy’s nerves, it’s that Jet Set Willy. I recently looked at the entire game map and it made me sick. Hats off to anyone who managed to finish it. The hardest level for me is the one with the flying pigs. Dude, I’ve gotten my ass kicked so many times.
◆ Matthew’s games are hell, I sometimes wonder how anyone can enjoy playing them. Like, how much did you really enjoy Miner and JSW, and how much did you play them out of sheer stubbornness, with the goal of beating them at any cost?
You can grab the game at the link below :
You can also play Manic Miner online :
One response to “Manic Miner – ZX Spectrum | <classics review>”
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