Count Duckula : No Sax Please

Copyright : Alternative Software | Reviewed by : Malc Jennings

Count Duckula and his faithful servants Igor and Nanny have transported themselves and their castle over to the land of the Pharoahs, Egypt. There they decide to search for the mystical Sax, an ancient Saxophone with strange and magical powers. They know that the Sax is hidden somewhere in the tomb of the great Pharoah Upanatem, a gigantic pyramid in the middle of the desert. What they do not know is that they have also brought some unwanted guests in the shape of the Crow Brothers.

Graphics

Count Duckula is one of those games that sold simply because of the award winning cartoon series rather than game reviews or graphical representation. Having said that the back of the box displays screen shots that certainly have not been taken from the CPC version and the usual excuse "may be a different version shown".

The CPC version does not contain any primary colours at all, the entire game looks as if it has been coded for Black & White Television sets or green screen monitors because those with colour certainly didn?t miss anything. Because of this the game does not looks it best, despite the fact that the characters have been very well presented they are often hard to see behind the mess of black and grey pixels that make up the game.

We have played the ZX Spectrum version of this game and can honestly say there is no difference between the two, this is not good for those that shelled out the extra cash for the CPC along with the better hardware and higher capabilities of the CPC machine.

Sound

Sound is pretty nice with the entire theme from the cartoon series being presented nicely on the start screen of the game and some (not many) but some sound effects in the game itself. It might not look better than the ZX version of the game but certainly sounds better, not much I know but it?s something.

Gameplay

Duckula must explore the pyramid, solving puzzles and collecting useful items while keeping an eye out for wandering Mummies and Crows. With Igor keeping an eye on the time and Nanny keeping an eye on Duckula he must find the mystical Sax before dawn breaks in Transylvania and the castle returns him home.

Ok so you control the lead character (Duckula) and you must avoid the various nasties, if you are touched by any of them you are frozen and the clock advances one hour. You can pick up various items but only avoid picking them up by jumping over them, when it comes to using them you can press keys 1-3 to activate them.

Sadly because of graphical problems and the fact that you can hardly see your character let alone the Mummies and Crows it makes it very hard to play and one tha won?t last very long. We recommend leaving Duckula in Egypt and coming back home for another game instead.