Rockstar Ate My Hamster
Rockstar Ate My Hamster, Amiga conversion by Colin Jones and published by Codemasters in 1989.
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Player's Review
"Ever wanted to make it big? Here's your chance! Choose your stars, make all the decisions and try to hit the big time!
BIDET - Shoot stunning videos - Hollywood or Cricklewood? Will you use an expensive director like Cecil Bidet-Mills, or your trusty sidekick Clive? Do you go out on the road or lock the band up in the Studio?
THE BIZ - The first big break, the elusive "deal" - will you be offered a recording contract? Can you compete in the charts with megabands like The Boring Old Gits From The '60s? When do you release the follow up single? Will your album go platinum? Is your act a one hit wonder?
GRABBED! - Don't get sued, ripped off, busted, pirated, bankrupted, extorted, embarrassed. exposed or grabbed by the tax men!
It's a hard life in the management game."
The object of the game is to collect all four Silver Discs and go Platinum. You have one year to do it and there is a lot of rng involved. Depending on when you hit the fire button can determine when where you land in the charts. Using publicity can can either help or hinder you and it is possible for your rockers to be killed off this way. When choosing your group at the start you can think of this as number of lives although losing your highest rated rocker can cost you fans.
Getting those silver discs however isn't entirely straight forward, at least in this version of the game. The discs seem to light up after reaching sales milestones and no so much about being in the no1 spot. You need to release a Single and let it get high in the charts to generate interest for your Album release. The sales bar tracks how well your album sales are doing. Once interest in your single drops, so do album sales. The idea is to keep the album high in the charts so you need to get a new Single out pronto.
I don't know if its just this version but spending silly amounts (3mil) on the music videos doesn't seem to do much better than say the 50 grand option. A soon as you knock out a new single, the previous is removed so some judgment is needed on how album sales and chart position will be affected. It can take three or even four weeks for your single to enter the charts which can be agonising as you watch the sales slump. The key here seems to be to do at least two publicity stunts a week . If you are really lucky the single might be an instant chart topper causing a spike on the sales chart and a silver disc!
The game does include a save / load option and should be used when things are going well as they could go bad any moment especially when using publicity. Thx to modern quality of life options, save states have come in real handy to have a lot less of the bad publicity which is what makes the game look deceptively easy in the video. Charity options are very random and supporting one or not can be the bad option leading to bad publicity. Avoiding the sponsors is a good idea as they come with there own sordid issues.
Overall, this conversion is pretty much a colourised version of the Spectrum original with an additional intro. I acknowledge the video could have been a lot shorter if I skipped all the text and chart screens. The interface is overly simple and makes the entire game loop a bit boring to watch as it repeats over and over.
00:00:00 Intro
00:02:25 Character Screening Screenings
00:08:27 Game
BIDET - Shoot stunning videos - Hollywood or Cricklewood? Will you use an expensive director like Cecil Bidet-Mills, or your trusty sidekick Clive? Do you go out on the road or lock the band up in the Studio?
THE BIZ - The first big break, the elusive "deal" - will you be offered a recording contract? Can you compete in the charts with megabands like The Boring Old Gits From The '60s? When do you release the follow up single? Will your album go platinum? Is your act a one hit wonder?
GRABBED! - Don't get sued, ripped off, busted, pirated, bankrupted, extorted, embarrassed. exposed or grabbed by the tax men!
It's a hard life in the management game."
The object of the game is to collect all four Silver Discs and go Platinum. You have one year to do it and there is a lot of rng involved. Depending on when you hit the fire button can determine when where you land in the charts. Using publicity can can either help or hinder you and it is possible for your rockers to be killed off this way. When choosing your group at the start you can think of this as number of lives although losing your highest rated rocker can cost you fans.
Getting those silver discs however isn't entirely straight forward, at least in this version of the game. The discs seem to light up after reaching sales milestones and no so much about being in the no1 spot. You need to release a Single and let it get high in the charts to generate interest for your Album release. The sales bar tracks how well your album sales are doing. Once interest in your single drops, so do album sales. The idea is to keep the album high in the charts so you need to get a new Single out pronto.
I don't know if its just this version but spending silly amounts (3mil) on the music videos doesn't seem to do much better than say the 50 grand option. A soon as you knock out a new single, the previous is removed so some judgment is needed on how album sales and chart position will be affected. It can take three or even four weeks for your single to enter the charts which can be agonising as you watch the sales slump. The key here seems to be to do at least two publicity stunts a week . If you are really lucky the single might be an instant chart topper causing a spike on the sales chart and a silver disc!
The game does include a save / load option and should be used when things are going well as they could go bad any moment especially when using publicity. Thx to modern quality of life options, save states have come in real handy to have a lot less of the bad publicity which is what makes the game look deceptively easy in the video. Charity options are very random and supporting one or not can be the bad option leading to bad publicity. Avoiding the sponsors is a good idea as they come with there own sordid issues.
Overall, this conversion is pretty much a colourised version of the Spectrum original with an additional intro. I acknowledge the video could have been a lot shorter if I skipped all the text and chart screens. The interface is overly simple and makes the entire game loop a bit boring to watch as it repeats over and over.
00:00:00 Intro
00:02:25 Character Screening Screenings
00:08:27 Game
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