Qix

---

Here's a killer game for the Lynx
by Ed Castle

July 3, 1996

When I ordered Qix I literally had no idea what to expect. When I turned it on and played my first game I died immediately. I couldn't work out what to do! I, naturally, hadn't read the manual, so I had absolutely no idea what to do. Anyway, Qix is a very strange game. The basic idea is to use your line drawing 'thing' to capture parts of the screen. Bit vague eh? Well it's a very strange game. Just buy it and see for yourself.

Hum. Not really many options. You get to choose one player game, where you play through the levels on your own or two player game, where you and your pal take it in turns to attempt levels. You play two completely separate games, swapping over whenever one of you dies. The final option is to play in practice mode, which is level one, but with infinite lives. By pressing option 1 at the game selection screen you get the chance to enter a password. You are given the password for the level you are on when you get a game over.

This is very strange. I think the graphics are great. You are presented with a very slick looking layout. It reminds me of some old graphical DOS programs. Everything moves very smoothly. The actual game graphics are very basic, but do a great job. There are lots of different 'fills' all of which look great. The actual Qix are just straight lines that move about, changing colour, and looking mystifying.

Sound? What sound? Sorry, my fault, I had the volume turned down to minimum. The sounds are crap. They are basic, grainy, and I'm sure I've heard most of them in other Lynx games. Certainly nothing to write home about.

The control is simple, easy to learn and difficult to master. You move around with the joypad, and can move onto the screen only when you hold down A or B. Once on the screen you can do what you want. If you hit something you die.

This game is amazingly addictive, but very hard. The difficulty doesn't put you off, I've played it for around 8 hours now, and have only reached level 25, but will play it for a good hour tonight. This isn't the sort of game you finish in a day. I'd recommend it to everyone. Puzzle lover or not, you'd like this game. It is one of my favorite Lynx games.