In the summer of 1984 Ultimate put a new game in the shops at £9.95. Its previous games had cost £5.50, and most Spectrum games still cost under £6. CRASH got its review copy with two hours to spare before going to press. One reviewer complained that it took almost that long to load, ran through the jungle “like mad”, and decided that it was better than Atic Atac and that the price rise was a pity. The magazine made Sabre Wulf a CRASH Smash and then declined to give it a percentage, the only Ultimate game in CRASH’s own table of reviews without one: “Let’s just say ‘unrateable!’ and leave it.”
Four pieces of an amulet
The hero is a new character, Sabreman, in a pith helmet and armed with a sabre. He is lost in a jungle maze. The only instructions are a warning carved in stone and printed on the cassette insert: put together the four pieces of the ACG Amulet so that he can pass the guardian of the cave and escape. As with Atic Atac, working out what anything does is left to the player.
Your Spectrum counted 256 screens, arranged as a 16 by 16 maze bordered by mountains. Sabreman moves around one screen at a time, and when he walks off an edge the next screen is drawn in its place. Jungle creatures burst out of the ground a moment after he arrives: spiders, scorpions, snakes, hippos and rhinos, frogs and tribesmen. Some can be killed with the sabre; others can only be dodged. The Wulf itself lives in one small but vital part of the maze and cannot be fought.
Orchids grow in the clearings, blossoming and wilting quickly. Run over one in full bloom and something happens. Your Spectrum worked out five colours: cyan made Sabreman run faster, purple reversed the controls, red let him run through creatures unharmed, yellow put him to sleep for a few seconds, and white cured the effects of the others. Personal Computer Games found another clue: when a native lines up with a piece of the amulet horizontally or vertically, he turns slowly and a stern tune plays.
How it was built
Your Spectrum’s hacker Dave Nicholls opened up the code and found that the 256 screens are built from only 48 room types, each assembled from blocks such as a lake that reappears around the jungle. He guessed there were more than a hundred of those blocks. Personal Computer Games named the team as Tim and Chris Stamper, Carol Ward and John Lathbury: “Chris and John program the structure of the game, while Tim and Carol concentrate on the graphics.” They had worked on it “full-time and at weekends” for six months since finishing Atic Atac, and Ultimate gave that as the reason for the higher price.
In 1988 Tim Stamper gave CRASH another reason. “We were having a severe problem with the number of (illegal) copies. And I think going from £5.50 to £9.95 was a bold step we took.” He also revealed that Knight Lore had already been finished, and was held back so that it would not stop Sabre Wulf selling.
Reception
Personal Computer Games made it a PCG Hit and said “Sabre Wulf is Ultimate’s best entertainment yet”. Computer & Video Games scored it 9 for getting started, graphics, value and playability, and the reviewer wrote: “I have never seen graphics of such high quality on a Spectrum.” Sinclair User gave it 8 out of 10, found the graphics “not entirely flicker-free” and thought the main criticism was the price.
It sold anyway. CRASH reported in 1988 that in Ultimate’s heyday a game like Sabre Wulf sold more than 350,000 Spectrum copies, more than Activision’s Ghostbusters sold on all formats together. Firebird bought the rights to a Commodore 64 version, released in 1985 at £9.95, and there were versions for the BBC Micro and Amstrad CPC.
Sabreman’s return
Personal Computer Games was told, as a secret, that Sabre Wulf was to be the first of a four-part series. Sabreman came back in Underwurlde and Knight Lore, both released at the end of 1984, and again in Pentagram (1986). Rare returned to the name in 2004 with a Sabre Wulf for the Game Boy Advance.
Sources
- CRASH, issue 6 (July 1984): editorial (“on the eve of seeing Ultimate’s new game”); p. 62, review (£9.95, “a steep increase from £5.50”, the two-hour deadline, the amulet warning, “unrateable”).
- Your Spectrum, issue 6 (August 1984), pp. 36-38: the 256 screens in a 16 by 16 maze, the creatures, the Wulf’s territory, the five orchids, and Dave Nicholls’s hacking column (48 room types built from data blocks).
- Personal Computer Games, issue 9 (August 1984), pp. 58-59: PCG Hit review, the natives’ clue, the team and the six months’ work, the four-part series (the magazine spells Lathbury “Latchbury”).
- Computer & Video Games, issue 34 (August 1984), p. 40: review, scores of 9, “launched this month”.
- Sinclair User, issue 29 (August 1984), p. 39: review, Gilbert Factor 8.
- CRASH, issue 51 (April 1988), pp. 35-38: the price rise and piracy, Knight Lore finished first, sales of more than 350,000, Sabre Wulf listed as an unrated CRASH Smash in issue 6.
- Commodore User, June 1985 (Firebird buying the Commodore 64 rights) and September 1985 (review of the Firebird version, £9.95).
- Wikipedia, “Sabre Wulf” (web, secondary): the BBC Micro and Amstrad CPC versions and the 2004 Game Boy Advance game.