Classic games have a habit of turning up on the Psion computers. We have Tetris in the
form of Atomic, Asteroids, FrotzS5 for Infocom text games and a Spectrum Emulator. Now
it's Web Sailor's
(Ngai Kim Hoong's) production of Sokoban in the spotlight.
Sokoban is a block-pushing puzzle game. You must push the blocks around a 'maze' to their
destination in the correct way to win the level - do it wrong, and you will trap yourself,
or be unable to move the blocks around, as you can only shift one at a time. There are
fifty levels in this version.
When Sokoban is launched, something immediately looks odd. Look at the screenshot to see
this for yourself - the five toolbar buttons are squashed up and the text is truncated.
However, there is plenty of space at the bottom of the toolbar which is unused, and no
battery indicator. Something unusual happens if you tap the digital time on the toolbar,
though. A small analogue clock appears in its place. To me, this looks like an incomplete
conversion from the same piece of software's Series 5/5mx/7/netBook version.
The playing field is a bit small, too, as it only takes up a third of the Revo's screen
lengthwise. The rest is taken up with the level information and problematic toolbar. I
think that the screen space could definitely be used better in Sokoban.
Moving on to the actual gameplay, Sokoban is a faithful reproduction of a classic game.
The levels are hard, so fifty of them should keep almost anyone occupied for a long time!
Any level can be jumped to, so if you can't finish a certain level, you can move on. An
undo feature is also available, too, if you make any mistakes, as is a reset button for
trying the level again.
Sokoban is a typical 'gameplay over graphics' game - and this isn't necessarily a bad
thing, as some of the most popular games don't have impressive visuals. Take games like
Tetris, Centipede, Asteroids or text-based games, which live on over the Internet as
multi-user MUDs, MOOs, MUSHes and MUCKs. However, with a little more care, Sokoban could
look better on the Revo, too.