Finally! A solution for hair-loss. Yes a computer game that will, once and for all, take care of your disappearing hair. To put it simply, playing this game will make you lose all you hair. Voila! No more problem! What's more you'll never notice that it's gone. Baldies will make you feel great about not having hair! Makes me wonder what the team members at Creative Edge look like.
Baldies are cute, bald and totally ruthless with only world domination on their minds. It's easier for them to be single minded, there are no hair follicles getting in the way of their brain cells. Their objective is to wipe out the enemy Hairies by any means possible. And boy, are there many ways to kill those Hairies!
Baldies is a real-time adventure where you get to play god to your Baldies and help them take over the world. There are four types of Baldies; Workers, Scientists, Soldiers and Builders. Each caste has its own energy reading which must be maintained for maximum effect. The Workers are your Breeders and form the backbone of your whole strategy. The combined energy of all the Workers powers a shovel utility and gives wings to your Baldies. The Builders build the houses and maintain them once they're up. The Soldiers make bullets and grenades that they use against the Hairies and the Scientists make the warfare inventions that wreak further havoc and destruction on the Hairies. Each group is vital to your success and the key is learning to balance all of them to achieve your objectives.
To get started, depending on the level, you'll need to build a house. Plant a flag, change some of the Workers that are wandering around into Builders and when there's sufficient Builder energy, Boing! a new house appears. When building a house of any kind it's important to make sure that if it needs to grow that it's not surrounded by trees, rocks, water or holes. Now, using the grab hand utility, grab some of the protesting Baldies and drop them into the house. You can only put ten Baldies into this first level house. Click on the house and you'll see four rooms with a hallway, one room for each type of Baldie. You'll also see how many Baldies are in each room and two boards at the back of the house. The left board determines what type of house you want the Builders to make. You can build a Breeder/Worker house, a Science Lab or a Strong house. The right board tells the Scientists what invention you want them to make. Once you pick an invention it will also appear on your status board at the bottom of your screen. Note that you have to have Baldies in either of these two rooms for anything to happen no matter what you put up on the board. Put all the Baldies into the Builder room and wait for them to build a bigger house. Once this happens move all but two Builders into the Workers room and leave. This is how Baldies breed. Lump as many as you can into the Workers room in a house and sooner than later you'll get more Baldies. Note that if you want to increase the size of the house, just move more Baldies into the Builders room.
Once you've got your Baldies breeding, you can start making war on the Hairies. You'll need a Science Lab for your Scientists to work on making those deadly inventions. Again, park a flag where you want your Lab, put in some Builders and wait. Once the Lab appears, move your Baldies into the Scientists room. You'll also need to make some Scientists out of the wandering Baldies outside. It's the Baldies who are wandering around outside that increase the energy levels for any given caste, so be sure to balance and monitor these levels. Click on the Science Lab, then click on the right board and pick an invention. You'll have plenty to pick from, more if you have many Worker/Breeder houses. Just to skim the surface you can choose from; cannon, electro, landmine, pit, popper, springboard, trap, shark bait, snake and skunk bomb. This last is created when you grab a skunk and drop it into your Lab. Once you have it ready and armed, drop it on an enemy house and watch them all run out. Whew! What a stink! My favorite has to be the Mad Cow. Depending on the level, not all levels have cows, you can drop a cow into your Lab and your scientists will turn it into a deadly weapon. To use it just put it in the middle of an enemy field and wait. The cow will moo a few times, the enemy Hairies will be attracted to it and when enough of them have come calling, BOOM! A most effective weapon with an impressive area of devastation. I like to use it to blow up as many enemy castles and houses as possible. Your Scientists are quite the cleaver crew. Drop a bunny into your lab and use it to make your Baldies breed quicker for a time. Drop in a fox and use it to decrease the breeding ability of the Hairies. Catch a goldfish and make it rain goldfish. Drop in a rock and make it rain rocks on those silly Hairies. In the higher levels you'll also be able to invent a car and a helicopter. The car is cute but rather useless. It's hard to maneuver and gets stuck easily. Be aware that all of these things can harm your Baldies too. Be careful where you put them. You can even create "Acts of You" which include; earthquakes, storms and Armageddon. Use this last one only if you are sure that you outnumber the enemy. Try it, you'll like it!
Baldies has a nifty zoom feature that lets you zero in on any given part of the action. This is also handy if you're trying to catch those pesky goldfish. A Map View lets you get a look at the overall land situation with the placement of yours and the Hairies houses and also if you're being attacked. You have an options page which lets you control such things as music loudness, effects loudness, whether to have clouds and shadows and saving/loading games. Two panels make playing god nice and easy. The Main Control Panel is the main workhorse. This is where you change Baldie type, give them wings, use the shovel or set up a construction flag. This is also where your grab hand is and the power level readouts. At the bottom of your screen you'll find the Invention bar and game options. This has six slots for your inventions and a trash can for those inventions you no longer need or want. This also has your map view, zoom mode, panel placement (for your Main panel) and the options page.
Baldies comes with two versions on a CD-ROM. A Windows 95 and a DOS version. The Windows version uses DirectX 2.0 which the installation warns may interfere with your display driver. You may have to obtain the latest version of your display driver in order for this game to run properly with DirectX. I had problems with the game slowing more and more until nothing would function. A nasty little bug which I hope they've fixed for later versions. Otherwise, installation is a breeze with the AutoPlay function active in Windows 95. The DOS version differs only slightly from the Windows version in that the Windows version uses much more detailed graphics. Ironically this may be what's causing the problem. I found the DOS version to be detailed enough for full enjoyment. I also found that the DOS version runs well in a DOS window in Windows 95.
Baldies can also be played Head to Head or on a Network. An IPX network with full drivers is needed to run this option, and four players can compete for world domination with a real-time chat to taunt the other players. For all versions of the game, DOS, Windows or Network, the CD-ROM must be in your drive as the game plays from the CD. A minimum of files are copied to your hard-drive so, you'll not be losing much space to the game.
The action is, generally, easy to follow, with graphics that are rich in color and details. The buildings, especially, are quite spectacular and detailed and change with each world. The background music is constant but can be tuned out if you like. The sound effects are local to the scene you are looking at, which means that if you're not looking at a battle, you won't be hearing its sounds.
Written by Glenn Soucy
Click here for screen shots.
486 DX2-66MHz or higher processor,
Min 8 MB RAM,
SVGA Video Graphic Card DirectX 2.0 compatible,
Double speed CD-ROM drive or faster,
Sound card DirectX 2.0 compatible,
Microsoft Mouse or 100% compatible.
DOS Configuration
486 DX2-33MHz or higher processor,
Min 4 MB RAM,
VGA Video Graphic card,
Double speed CD-ROM drive or faster,
Microsoft Mouse or 100% compatible,
All major sound cards supported.
Network:
IPX compatible with all necessary drivers installed,
8 MB RAM (each player).
| Graphics: | 87% |
| Sound: | 80% |
| Music: | 73% |
| Gameplay: | 84% |
| Interest: | 85% |
| Overall: | 82% |
Web site: Panasonic Interactive Media
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