Beasts and Bumpkins - Electronic Arts œ29.99
                 (Strategy game on CD only)

                      Reviewed by Sue

Beasts and Bumpkins is one of those silly, time-wasting games that
always catches my eye - whether it's the title or the premise
behind the game, or just the feeling of playing god, I'm not sure.
It's probably a combination of all of these, but mostly the
latter! :-)

Once again, you are the being in charge of a group of people whose
lives depend on you. These people lead short but interesting
lives, punctuated with bouts of love-making (a.k.a. "nookie" or
"rough and tumble" as they call it) which is necessary to
let the species survive. To cope with their expanding population,
they must extend their village by constructing new cottages and
other buildings, grow food, fight off attackers (the "beasts" of
the title) and generally try to survive. They aren't the most
intelligent of people (hence the name "bumpkins") so they will
need all the help you can give them.

Food comes in several forms - the simplest to manage are chickens
which just wander round their coops and need no control. Then
there are the cows. These can be marked with a fetching bell so
that they can be identified as yours. They need to be led into an
enclosure (which your people must construct) so that they can't
wander off.  This is easier said than done - trying to maneuver a
cow and a bumpkin through a gate into an enclosure without letting
all the other cows escape is not a trivial task. Luckily the cows
breed as enthusiastically as the bumpkins and there is no cuter
sight than a new born calf lying in the field next to its mum. The
cows have to be milked and the milk taken to the farm but
generally the girls from the village will do this without
prompting. Milk also generates income.

In spring it's time to plant wheat which will ripen in summer and
be harvested in autumn, being taken to the mill to be turned into

bread.  The grain costs money to sow but also brings in revenue
when the bread is sold.

The game consists of 30 missions, each of which has a goal. On the
earliest missions it is as simple as getting your population to a
certain level or having a particular amount of cash. On Mission 3,
you have to get 25,000 gold pieces and also find the Golden
Chalice of Barathkar which, you're warned, is well-guarded. The
learning curve is fairly gradual so you always feel the program is
well balanced.

Other artifacts can be found at other times and piles of gold can
sometimes be discovered which can swell your coffers. Mushrooms 
growing wild, when eaten, can help or hinder your mission.

Buildings at your disposal also increase in importance and
complexity as the missions progress. When an early mission
commences, you can probably only build chicken coops, cottages and
a builders' guild (which turns peasants into more efficient
builders). Later you can add farms, bakeries and, after building a
farm, fenced enclosures, a church ... even later a footman's guild
(to train peasants as fighters) and a well. I haven't yet got to
the stage of building stables but I have built a town hall.

Now, the beasts. The ones I have seen so far are giant wasps,
wolves, zombies and ogres. They home in on whichever bumpkin is
closest (especially children) and then joyfully rip them to
pieces.  Sometimes you will hear the buzz of the wasps or the
howling of wolves as a warning that they are nearby.

The music is excellent - medieval and very atmospheric. There are
also lots of sound effects and speech samples - the bumpkins are
extremely polite and always say hello to their neighbours as they
pass. Little speech bubbles appear by them as they talk. The girls
whistle and call to the cows as they move them from pasture to
enclosure and some of the inhabitants may occasionally make
comments about you (along the lines of "Our leader is truly
great!"  which is very gratifying)


Unfortunately, life is all too short in this kingdom of yours. A
bumpkin's life may be snuffed out suddenly through a beast's
attack, they may be assaulted or even murdered by one of their
fellows (on later levels you can deal with this antisocial
behaviour with a jail system) but on earlier ones you just have to
look on as they mug each other on the way to the bakery. If
violent death is escaped, they will age (this happens
disconcertingly suddenly) and, eventually, drop dead. It's very
sad to see a corpse and then a skeleton lying on a path. From
about Mission 7 onwards, priests collect and bury the corpses near
their church.

On Mission 6, things livened up as I got my first wizard. The pop
up hint said to select a spell and a target. He only had one spell
- fireball - and walking past was a lone cow. Yes, I did it, I'm
sorry. But it WAS spectacular and at least the cow didn't fire
back! During that mission he found another spell (detect traps) so
I assume that by the final missions he will have a good arsenal of
weapons and defensive spells.  On Level 7, a church allowed me to
recruit priests. These could, at first, heal, bury the dead or put
out fires but on later levels gain other skills such as curing the
plaque. Other specialty types who are mentioned in the manual are
pikemen, archers, tax collectors, knights, cavaliers, minstrels
and flagmen.

I could go on even more about this game. It has held my attention
from the very first mission onwards. I gather a mission disk will
be released in time but even the initial package will keep you
entertained for ages especially if you have a warped sense of
humour.









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