A retro treasure (Treasure Island Dizzy)

Member Name: dididave

Product:	Treasure Island Dizzy
Date:	12/11/08 (127 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Logical puzzle solving, colourful, rewarding.

Disadvantages: Terrible collision detection, very difficult, no sound

Dizzy, our egg shaped hero has somehow managed to get stranded on a Desert island. His way of escape is to the right to the sea but he cannot swim. This leaves him with one option, left to find something on someone to help him of the island.

"Treasure Island Dizzy" is the second in a long series of Dizzy games released on multiple gaming platforms during the 80's and early 90's by the legendary Oliver Twins. The roaming two-dimensional platformer was really established by the Dizzy franchise and even in this advanced gaming age "Treasure Island Dizzy" is very playable.

As with all the Dizzy platforming adventures (ignoring the various bizarre offshoots), "Treasure Island Dizzy" involved standard puzzle solving at it's most basic level. Whether it was picking up a treasure chest to access a higher area or a snorkel so you can start to explore the sea this is very much a lesson in logic. However, some of the puzzles and item usages are incredibly bizarre as the game progresses and it is unfortunate that you have just the one life as you trial and error numerous items.

Despite being able to carry three items they are cycled through by dropping the first one on display. This can be very frustrating and challenging especially in the water were you definitely need an item but risk dropping your snorkel and dying. With no restart points this game, like so many games of the 80's is a lesson in perseverance and reward. You do get satisfaction in getting that little bit further each time but you may also want to throw your gaming machine out the window!

The simplistic keyboard controls of all the Dizzy games work just as well here with left right and jump being the games bread and butter. Controls in this game always seem to have a slight delay on them so you soon get the knack of jumping a second before you actually need to in order to avoid a trap, bad guy etc but collision detection is pretty atrocious. You could swear you did not touch those spikes only to find yourself dead and back at the starting point.

Graphically, the Amiga version was certainly the most polished and I remember it being the most colourful of the Dizzy games. "Treasure Island Dizzy" is certainly the most appealing looking of the franchise and the maps are more pleasant to play on despite being comparatively small and requiring lots of backtracking and item juggling. Sound is a virtual non-existent in this title but it does not really suffer for it as the repetitive title music is pretty pointless.

This is a game with some nice touches including the fact not all contact with bad guys i.e flying bugs kill you but can instead hamper you by reversing your controls. Clouds, a mainstay of all Dizzy games are once again central here to access many areas and the fact some are more solid than others lead to lots of "leaps of faith" to try and get to a new area.

All in all "Treasure Island Dizzy" is one of the most challenging, annoying but enjoyable Dizzy titles I have played and one that will stay in my memory as a reminder of how good games used to be made. Of course, few of you will have an Amiga nowadays and if you do will be lucky to pick up this title from eBay. However, you are in luck as the creators Codemasters have released it for the PC for free. Why not download it for some retro gaming fun?

http://www.codemasters.co.uk/downloads/details.ph p?id=17413

Summary: A retro classic.