JamsPlace - Literally Immersive Gamebooks

The last few hours have been rather exciting for me. When I was about 11 years old, my ‘then’ brother in law had managed to pick up a 48k Spectrum computer. For several weeks throughout the summer holidays I’d go round my sisters and have a game of Saboteur II. Remember it? The sequel to Clive Townsend’s masterpiece, Saboteur.

By todays standard you probably wouldn’t appreciate the impact it had on me, but it brought me and inlaw closer together although being a bellend he was still full of front and bullshit. I digress. We enjoyed this action adventure where we played some kind of stealth assassin. (The sister of the previous Saboteur). Starting off on a hang glider was origional to say the least, and you had to wait a certain amount of screens for a safe enough leap off. Jump too soon and you’ll fall several hundred feet onto a craggy cliff. 

Once you have leapt off safely, the adventure begins. You need to infiltrate a huge enemy compound (much larger than the origional) fight your way past armed guards and viscous pumas (wtf), locate a dozen or so bits of paper hidden about the complex, deactivate a huge silo, find the lower levels while you dodge vampire bats, and escape on a motorbike. What a rush!!
Canny players will draw a map or direction list as they play. I do remember managing to escape, but only my inlaw found all bits of paper and deactivate the silo. It took him three hours apparently and even then his friend lent a map to him. 

This game had everything, even the graphics improved on the origional, the pace of the hero, the flying kicks and somersaults and general flow were all nice and smooth. The pumas were especially fun to watch, and when you killed them left you feeling a wee bit guilty. (If you have any conscience at all)

It was a great privilege to chat breifly to Clive Townsend himself and if you are also a fan then check out his website clivetownsend.com for news and the saboteur goody shop. He is currently working on bringing Saboteur II to an app format having already released the first. I will certainly be waiting in the shadows for this! Goodluck Clive.
Jam out.