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edits
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→Q*Bert
| requirements = console, monitor or television, joysticks
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Q*Bert is another in a quickly growing list of popular arcade games that has been translated for use with the TI99/4A. It plays essentially like the arcade game.
==Performance==
Q*Bert is a funny-looking character with a long nose who bounces about on a pyramid trying to change the color of the blocks that make up the pyramid while avoiding collisions with red and purple balls, spider-like creatures and snakes. There are several levels of play and each is harder than the one that proceeds it.
The game may be played by one or two players. This decision is made prior to starting the game. Each player has three Q*Berts. As far as I could tell, there are no more Q*Berts to be had.
The game will not operate with all joysticks. Only those that plug directly into the joystick port seemed to work. Those that required adapters worked only with limited success.
I ran into a problem playing this game that I find distressing. The screen consists largely of a 28-cube pyramid, each cube consisting of three coordinated colors. Quite often while playing my brain stopped seeing a pyramid with its illusion of three dimensions. Instead, the plane changed so that I was seeing a one dimensional, triangular pattern of varied colors. Having lost the illusion of three dimensions, which occurred most often when the pyramid colors were not highly contrasted, I felt disoriented. Literally. When this occurred, it was rather too easy to jump little Q*Bert off the edge of the pyramid, which does not result in high scores. The graphics are well done and sound is used well in this game. The movement of Q*Bert and his adversaries is very smooth.
==Ease of Use==
This game is easy to understand, with all input through the joystick.
==Documentation==
Q*Bert comes with an eight-page manual that could have easily fit into two pages. The manual does not show the care and attention to detail that TI users have come to expect. In this regard, we may have been spoiled by TI.
==Value==
In my opinion, this game is not worth close to the $49.95 list price that it carries. It did not hold my interest for very long, as I reached my level of ability fairly quickly. Kids who played it seemed to enjoy it, but they too tired of it rather quickly. Unless you are a Q*Bert nut, I'd look around until I found it for about $30 before plunking down the cash.
'''— JK'''
