Father Christmas
This is a festive themed game for the Commodore 64. Sold in support of the “Save the Children” charity. You control Father Christmas through three different levels. The first one, has you collecting bits of Santa’s sleigh, whilst navigating ladders and platforms and avoiding thieving elves in his home. Amusing, you chose the presents before the following level begins. The second level is in Santa’s Grotto; you have to collect the presents which fall from the sky at a alarming pace! The third level, you take control of your sleigh and deliver those presents to five different locations : America, Europe, Africa, Finland and, Antarica (no that isn’t a typo - it’s the actual name of the location - and yes, I’m assuming they meant Antarctica). Each region has a different landscape. A flashing arrow appears to show you where to drop the presents. This is really tricky - there are obstacles that get in the way(clouds, jets and birds)! Your sleigh moves horizontally - and you control how fast it goes(that’s unique to the Commodore 64 version). Complete all of the levels, and you are able to put your name on the high scores table. The graphics are quite colourful and rendered well. The scrolling is fast and fluid. There are no sound effects, but the Christmas music coming from the SID chip is superb. I suppose there is a novel little type of arcade game here, but it the difficulty level is set way too high. There is some nice variation in the levels - but ultimately the game does become rather tedious. It’s not really helped by the fact that you can’t fail - your only real object is to get on to the high scores table.