The Amstrad CPC version of Ariolasoft‘s Bride of Frankenstein could be the best version of this game available for 8-bit home computers (although that’s really not saying much). It looks slightly better than the C64 and Spectrum versions, and it’s also got fairly responsive controls, so is somewhat playable.

Bride of Frankenstein originally came out in 1987 on the Ariolasoft “39 Steps” label, and it was also re-programmed, re-packaged and re-released as “Frankenstein Jnr.” by Codemasters in 1990. This version has a changed player character and also a different storyline to Bride of Frankenstein. It’s easy to get the two variations mixed-up.

Whether you’re playing the game as Bride of Frankenstein or Frankenstein Jnr. the same frustrating-but-compelling gameplay is still at its core, and the main quest is the same… Get the spade; get the lamp; dig and find the body parts; rebuild The Monster… And: you still get stuck on enemies when you touch them, which means that it’s better to stay away from them wherever possible. At first I thought this was a bug, but I eventually realised that it’s actually a feature to make the game more challenging. Touching enemies slows you down and tangles you up with them… Who’da thought it?

The Bride‘s health is represented by both a beating heart, and also a green flask. The green flask is life energy and must be kept topped-up at all times. Standing next to large green vats and pressing ‘action’ will re-fill the flask and you need to remember where these re-filling stations are located because they are key to your survival. The beating heart measures heart rate and if it goes above a certain level for a period of time you’ll die from a heart attack. So you need to keep an eye on both of these measurements. A high heart rate can be brought down by backing off and hiding although I think that this game does have time limits so you can’t hang around waiting too much.

More: Bride of Frankenstein on Moby Games