Three Weeks in Paradise

Another issue of the magazine, and another Wally game to review. This time the title of the game has to rate as Mikro-Gen’s worst pun yet. The game features three of the Week family on a tropical island so the title is Three Weeks in Paradise (gedditt?).

The main character in the game is the ubiquitous Wally Week and he’s got the responsibility of rescuing Wilma and Herbert from the Can Nibbles tribe. The Can Nibbles are a nice bunch except for their predeliction for human flesh, Wilma and Herbert are on the menu. As with most Wally games the idea is to collect a number of objects and get Wally to use them in a cunning way to achieve his aims. As might be expected, Wilma and Herbert are both well guarded: Wilma is trussed upside down, hanging from a tree and guarded by a witch doctor, while young Herbert is sitting in cooking pot with two ferocious lions standing either side.

The controls are of a standard Wallyesque type with Mr Week being able to jump and move left or right. The A key is an interesting addition — its function changes depending on your location and inventory. The first use likely to be made of A is as an IN key. On some screens there are other ways of moving onto another screen, apart from the IN key. Some of the alternative exits are quite obvious or are labelled, others are a bit more obscure. The IN key is likely to cause big headaches to most map makers.

Wally is able to carry two objects at once with the items shown on a small window at the lower left hand corner of the screen with the keys 1 and 2 used for dropping or picking up the objects. Once picked up and inside a window, a small text description appears in case you can’t quite recognise Mikro-Gen’s visual interpretation of some objects. Also along the bottom half of the screen is a life counter, where each of the four lives is shown as a skull and crossbones. Next to lives are a couple of skeletons, having no apparent use at all — the only thing they do is tap their feet after long periods of Wally inactivity.

As ever with Mikro-Gen, the solutions to the problems in the game are of a devious but logical nature. On the beach it seems impossible to cross without losing a life because of the quicksand. However a pair of flip flops should help your dilemma, as once they are wrapped around Wally’s feet the quicksand can safely be traversed. Most of the problems follow this sort of format.

You are not up against the clock in this game, despite the cannibal’s hunger the only danger is from a variety of nasties flitting about on different screens. There are bats, lions and even snails to dodge. Also there’s no energy bar, bump into a baddie and you’ll lose a life. After all the lives are lost, the usual Mikro-Gen analysis of performance is presented, together with a percentage of the game completed score.