Jimmy White's Whirlwind Snooker & Pool (Amiga) - A Playguide and Review - by LemonAmiga.com
58This is a 3D snooker game, produced by Archer MacLean, and published by Virgin in 1991. In those days, any fast 3D game was incredible, and this set a whole bunch of new standards upon release. Unfortunately, my playing skills aren't a match for the AI.
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Production Notes:
Captured: 31 December 2022
Narrated: 3 July 2023
Completed: 6 September 2023 (V3)
Jimmy White's is a game I had on copy, and may have got an original box given to me a lot later. Back then, the NTSC compatible screen size meant the game was a letterbox, and we all thought the screen was meant to be a letterbox, so the game would run faster on a PAL machine. I didn't play it much, with so many other mega hit games to play, but it was impressive to see the 3D. Even when I got myself a PS1 in 1996, one of the games was Jimmy White's, even though it was a port of the Amiga version. At some point I remember being good with the spins and the potting, and remember beating the computer on Easy level at least once. Of course, coming back to this after so long, it was difficult to get back those skills. I think the Pool game was a lot better, as I'd warmed up by then, and it seemed easier. I'd never played the Pool game before this recording.
I got the idea to do a Ted Lowe voice during the narration, and practised it a bit before I sat down to ad-lib the narration. My voice could only sustain 10mins of it, so I marked out a section in the middle of the review, in red, before I started the narration, so I knew when to go into it. There were a few bullet points I'd written on paper here, such as Tooting, Wandsworth, Queensferry, Teeth, Hair, Pizza Face etc, and I used them during the impression to make it sound knowledgeable. I didn't even use Ted's actual nickname for Stephen Hendry - The Wonder Kid.
During the edit, it became obvious to use the various GamesMaster footage, to spice up the boring review. And I put in some photos to keep it interesting. I found some real static from an old TV, and faded that over the Ted Lowe section, with a TV frame around it.
Danscore:
Amiga sports games often see the player controlling a little man, moving around a bunch of obstacles, in a top-down or side view. Few games ventured into 3D, and those that did - such as the velodrome in The Games Summer Edition, seemed impressive - even in their basicness. Of course we had Powerdrome and Hunter, and Indy 500, but 3D in 1991 was the exception to find a good one. Archer MacLean loved to tap the metal of the machine, and he hand-coded this himself. The angles of play are impressive, even if it is often difficult to take the shot from those angles, and have to reply on the cue came. It seemed impressive, and yet slightly annoying, when the AI kept messing around with the HUD. Having flies and funny faces is also a nice touch, although highly distracting when a shot needs to be lined up almost pixel perfectly. The screen area was also an issue in the old days, while today we can use emulators or NTSC mode to get around it. I'd say that all Snooker games after this used the same template, just as all modern F1 sims started with F1GP. So the legacy is huge. Although, snooker was a lot more popular back in the 80s and 90s than it is today, because people went to clubs, and clubs had tables. In the future, I fully expect to put on the latest VR headset to play a current snooker game, to discover that it looks almost exactly the same as this. So hats off to Archer (RIP), and his legacy. I'd give this 8.5 out of 10.