Dog Daze

Personal Computing Today Issue 2
Writer: Chris Palmer

Give a dog a bone and it should keep him happy but this species always tries to get rid of them.

Dog Daze makes a welcome change from man's worst enemy the space invader and requires just as much concentration and digital dexterity to win.

This two player Atari game is completely new in concept and theme. Both players control differently coloured dogs which are moved around the screen in any direction using joysticks.

It looks deceptively simple at first when just two dogs appear on the screen followed by a randomly placed fire hydrant. The object of the game is for each dog to mark his territory, in this case the fire hydrants, so that each one establishes his ground.

There are two ways of doing this firstly to run your dog up next to the hydrant which magically makes it change colour. Secondly, try a more devious method and fire your dog's bone at the hydrant. Here's where your aim needs to be accurate as you line your dog up with the hydrant, and press the fire button to send the bone sailing smoothly towards the target.

If your aim is true the hydrant changes to your colour and you gain a point, but if you miss, your bone will either stick to the opponent's hydrant or to the side of the screen and you will have to collect it to use it again.

As soon as you have captured one hydrant then another will appear randomly.

The scoring is displayed on a row of 16 hydrants on the top of the screen. These gradually change colour depending on how many hydrants each player has captured, the winner being the first person to change all these to their own colour. You can set variations on the game, such as a time limit or filling the screen with hydrants before you start, if you want to increase the difficulty. The graphics and sound are both used very well on this game and it should appeal to anybody old enough to hold a joystick.