Olli & Lissa: The Ghost of Shilmore Castle Longplay (C64) [50 FPS]

Developed and published by Firebird in 1987.

Shilmore Castle, a stone fortress located somewhere in Scotland, has been purchased by a wealthy businessman who intends to have it dismantled and shipped back to the USA. The castle's resident ghosts are none-to-keen on having their ancient family home uprooted and sent abroad.

Sir Humphrey, one of the most senior spooks, enlists the help of Olli and Lissa to help him brew a potion of invisibility, which he will use to scare away those that threaten his home.

Taking control of Olli, you must navigate the rooms of the castle and the landscape beyond in search of the ingredients needed by Sir Humphrey. Once located, the ingredients must be taken back to the starting location and added to the cauldron.

Although you might expect this to be a maze-like game, it's a very simple flick-screen platform similar to Manic Miner. The main challenge of the game comes from the fact that the number of rooms that you have to clear increases by one for each ingredient; each room must be navigated successfully on the way to collect the ingredient and again on the way back.

Each room contains a number of patrolling enemies that must be avoided or jumped over in order to progress. If Olli touches an enemy, falls into a pit (or falls too far) then he will be dazed and is sent back to the start of the room.

Adding to the overall challenge is the ever-decreasing energy bar (effectively a timer). The bar ticks down at a constant rate, so Olli must reach the ingredient and make it back to the cauldron before the bar runs out. Should Olli make it back in time, Lissa will reward his success with a juicy snog that full replenishes his energy, ready for the next challenge.

Graphically, the game features some pleasingly cartoonish sprites, but it's glaringly obvious from the colour palette that this is a by-the-numbers conversion from the Speccy version.

There's also the unanswered question of what the hell Olli is actually supposed to be? Whatever he is, he could certainly do with a few days on a sun-bed and a good dose of vitamin C as the poor chap is terribly pale - those massive clown shoes can't be doing much for his posture either.

The game features some music by Ben Daglish on the title screen, but the rest of the game is limited to some basic effects.Anyone expecting some smooth SID sounds is going to be disappointed.

With it's cute cartoon graphics, Olli & Lissa might offer some fun to those who enjoy this sort of game. Unfortunately, the agonisingly pixel-perfect jumping damages it's long-term appeal and means it's not a game that you'll return to often.
#retrogaming

[TheCodedtestament]

I loved this game, despite the fact that I couldn't pass the second level for years!

[ALRetrogamingLongplays]

Olli & Lissa Longplay (C64) [50 FPS]: Pixel-perfect jumping and poor replayability take the edge of this curious platformer.

Read the video description for my review!

[metalcoola]

There was also a sequel for Speccy, sadly, it was never release on C64