Alternative World Games, Commodore 64

Alternative World Games is a parody of the famous Commodore 64 Epyx ‘Games‘ series, developed by Hungarian company Novotrade and published by Gremlin Graphics in 1987. It is apparently known as “Sports-A-Roni” in North America, although I’ve no effing idea what that’s supposed to mean…

The game features eight satirical sporting events that take place in famous locations around the world. There’s the sack race; the “pile of plates”; boot throwing; river jump; pole climbing; “run up the wall”; pillow fight, and pogo stick. Either one or two players can complete against each other for domination or world records, in a bunch of events that no one cares about… Actually, that’s not fair because Alternative World Games actually plays quite well, considering that it’s a bit of a throwaway game idea.

Some of the events can be played simultaneously with a second player, or against the computer (sack race, pole climbing, and pillow fight), and the remaining events are games of skill for one player. Gameplay-wise, the events require good timing to master and each has its own rhythm.

Graphically, Alternative World Games isn’t too bad. The sprites are well-animated and the backgrounds are well-drawn enough as to be recognisable. There’s also some decent music by the late Ben Daglish.

While Alternative World Games isn’t what I would call a classic, it is at least a reasonably fun game to play for a short while and is not an embarrassing release for Gremlin (and it could easily have been).