Producer: Tartan Software
Retail Price: £2.50
Author: T D Frost

This set of three programs was devised using Tartan's very own Adventure System, a programming aid which can be used by anyone conversant with BASIC who has no desire to purchase the more expensive utilities on the market (Tartan's system only costs E4.50). Machine code routines are used but these are generated from a code generator program and no knowledge of machine code is required to make use of the system. The game, Spy Trilogy, might also be seen as an advert for the kind of things the utility can achieve such as split-screen scrolling and RAM SAVE.

The three linked adventures must be completed in the correct sequence. At the end of each you are given a code word which enables you to proceed to the next adventure. Time is an important and limiting factor, so to make things a little easier to begin with the clock is switched off in the first two adventures. Further encouragement lies in the fact that a practice mode is offered on the first game which leads into a real game once the 90% mark is reached.

There's a bit at the start of this game - I'm not sure whether it is a joke or something which is explained later on. The program asks for your name, you dutifully type it in, and then the game immediately starts with your name, Bond (he of the leggy sports car helicopter movies). You have decided to apply for the secret service. To weed out those with enough sense to avoid risking their lives playing with poison darts and the like, you are exposed to a suitability test. This tests your intelligence, aptitude and application of logic to the very limit. You are placed in the simulated situation of having to collect five items of a potential agent's armoury from the Agent Training School. Your task is to be completed within six hours.

Before you load the main program (following the instructions) you are asked for 'Pictures on or off?' Also, a very helpful note tells you to start your map at bottom left of your paper. Whatever else night be said of this adventure it certainly knows how to be polite and knows how to woo the weary adventurer.

COMMENTS

Difficulty: difficult
Graphics: average
Presentation: good
Input facility: v/n
Response: sluggish

Tartan Software
£2.50

Any James Bond fans out there? (No, but there's quite a few people in here I'd like to shake and stir - Ed). This is a definite golden oldie, so let's take a quick trip back in time to when all Speccys had 'dead flesh' rubber keyboards and 48K memory was considered huge (and everyone ate Hovis bread and worked down 'pit, etc etc... -Ed).

Spy Trilogy has three separate missions - dreaming of qualifying, really qualifying and finally your first mission as a fully-fledged 007. Technically the game's showing its age a little. You can't RAMSave and it's a bit slow, but still thoroughly absorbing. It's well set out, the problems are logical, and it's very atmospheric - you really do get the feeling of being there.

The first mission, later revealed to be a dream sequence, features a series of riddles and a mind-bending mathematical puzzle that should you busy for quite a while. Although some of the puzzles rely on this dream state for their validity, their logic is always internally consistent and certainly won't destroy the atmosphere of the game. The second and third missions are of a more serious nature. In the second, you must find two components of a top secret instrument, and make good your escape. The third quest has you retrieving a code book from an enemy complex, and throwing it to your mate outside - and hopefully living to tell the tale!

On all three missions there is a time limit, though thankfully it is the amount of moves that is limited - no annoying 'real time' messages to interfere with the gameplay.

The first two missions are not exceptionally difficult, but part three is harder. The maps are always logical, and you are even advised as to where to draw your first location! (I wonder why this never caught on?)

Both beginners and more experienced adventurers should find something to their liking here, and as we're offering it cheaper via. the Treasure Chest, it's certainly worth a look.