Producer: Global Software
Retail Price: £7.95
Author: Various

Well, we've had hit compilations in pop music and, more recently, compilations of computer classics. Here we have four adventure games, which, if not classics, are above average and well worth a look. The tape carries four adventures chosen by Tony Bridge who writes a weekly column in Popular Computing Weekly.

Heading the cast is Mizar's Out of the Shadows which was Smashed here in December 84 only to flounder for reasons only too familiar to small computer companies - the shops would take anything from large established firms, obvious winners from small concerns, but nothing involved or adventurous from new quarters. The fact that the high street shops ended up with a big load of old rubbish on their shelves in any case is neither here nor there, small games houses didn't stand a chance. Out of the Shadows still plays like a very good program but the graphics are crude by todays exacting standards, and indeed, if any criticism can be aimed at a tape that brings you four full games for under E8, it is that the games on this tape are a little dated. That said, the tape represents exceedingly good valve for money.

Out of the Shadows is an arcade adventure which dwells in the world of monsters and magic requiring a subtle blend of technique with out and out battle bravado. It stands as one of the more successful attempts to bring the flavour of the Dungeons and Dragons game to the computer screen. The figures behind the game are impressive. 300 commands, 500 locations, 14 types of monster and 50 different types of object describe what is a deceptively complex game (for some tips on play see CRASH May 85).

The principal innovation which runs through the game, and the one which gives the game its title, is the way the ground about you is illuminated by your flame when play takes you below ground or after nightfall. What tends to come out of the shadows is a whole horror film of assorted nasties which become more obstructive the deeper you go down the dungeon. To light the shadows your player, whether elf, human or dwarf, uses a lantern and torches. As you move around, the shadows sweep across the floor in a very realistic fashion. When in the dungeon you must keep an eye on the level of oil in your lantern and check how many torches you have left. A lantern casts a larger light than a torch and when a torch goes down the lighted area it reveals slowly diminishes and the darkness closes in around you.

There are six quests and if this were not enough there are many variations on each theme. The same quest can be tackled by different players in competition where how long each game takes and how many times it has been saved are the deciding factors. A hero of one encounter can set off on a new quest with the same hard won trophies. Possessions such as torches and copper coins are soon amassed by opening or attacking crates and jars. Valuables can be taken to the shop for the buying and selling of provisions such as food, needed to counteract the energy-sapping spells you cast. Delving deeper into the dungeon you meet more powerful adversaries and the burden of ever increasing treasures, which weigh you down and make you short of breath during combat. Taking on foes leads to increased confidence, strength and dexterity. Should combat become too injurous, it's worth remembering how natural healing occurs at a greater pace nearer the surface.

Project X - The Microman was reviewed here in September 85 and was the game that used every programming aid in the book: Melbourne Draw for its loading screen, Quill & illustrator, and The Patch, a programming device which explains the sudden appearance of startlingly realistic telephone ringings, wailing sirens and so on. The game sports the extremely useful STORE/RECALL from memory commands while the standard of screen presentation is very high with a smart and helpful text layout and different colours breaking up the screen.

The story centres around a Professor Neil Richards whom you play as he struggles to come to terms with a freak accident in his laboratory. While working there he irradiates himself and immediately drives off to his colleague's lab a few miles away. Your task is to enter the colleague's home but your size has been reduced to that of a hamster and your friend's house is protected by COM 2, a high-tech security computer. The computer's chief task is to stop intruders entering the lab, something you must do to attain the antidote to the animal miniaturization you have inadvertently turned upon yourself.

The Mural is the second program on side one of the tape which is noteworthy for its curious introduction. The story goes like this. It's a sunny day and you're walking along Neasden High Street in the hope of finding some excitement when suddenly you're accosted by two men wearing suspender belts (anything is possible in Knees-up Neasden). You discover you have been sent by the Tight-mouse Board of Censors to engage you in a task of painting over an obscene mural. Having made their deliverance they knock you out, and here's where we actually get to the adventure you must tackle - you awake to find yourself in a cave.

The first frame has moss and lichen growing in a large dark, dank cave but moss and lichen need light so that ruins this one a bit. Getting into the adventure things don't improve much. The whole of this adventure has a dated feel. Its linear storyline unfolds in a lacklustre fashion with the poor and inadequate EXAMINE command responding when the program deems it necessary. The program only responds when you're getting somewhere and so the one-way feel of the plot becomes only too apparent. In general the program is unresponsive and has a bad case of the 'You Can'ts'. Not far north of the first location you'll meet a penguin who jumps into block your return south. There is nothing wrong with not being able to hit or kill the flipping animal, but the program could at least acknowledge your attempts to do something that's pretty obvious given the circumstances. There are many examples of dated vocabulary sorting with GET MAGGOTS failing to pick up a TIN of maggots and GET PASS failing to acquire a pass CARD. This kind of nit-picking awkwardness in adventuring passed long ago - now authors are much more considerate. In other areas the program goes beyond being unresponsive and strikes a note of being purely naff. When trying to enter the back door of the cottage to the south OPEN DOOR is unsuccessful while UNLOCK DOOR does the trick; this is without picking up or using a key!

The Mural is the type of adventure which just sits there waiting for the player to input the one and only correct solution. While it waits, it sees no reason why it should keep you entertained. The lack of interaction has you quietly going off to sleep. The location descriptions are rather good but not extensively researched and the overall impression is not a good one.

Galaxias, the fourth game on the cassette, is from the same devious mind which devised Bored of the Rings and Robin of Sherlock, namely Fergus McNeill. This game predates its two famous successors but is an early sign of the inventive genius which was to give The Quill some rare chart success. Loading up, the game presents a pleasant face with a very attractive futuristic redesigned character set. What's more, it is eminently readable. Exits are clearly marked and there are a few, rather average, graphics.

As a space pirate your mission is to tour the planet of the local system and find a fabled crystal. The on board computer gives a rundown of the planets within range and much of your time is spent exploring these planets, collecting the items there, and deciphering the clues scattered about them. You begin in the hideously decorated Zagro spaceport, I mean, can you imagine a mirror glass corridor with a green roof light. The first part of the adventure unwinds itself in a reasonable manner except for the discrepancy by which food is eaten from the inventory while drink is drunk but remains in your list of possessions. An alcohol reclamation unit off the bar turns out to be the toilet with soft music to help you relax. The wall behind the bar is burnt with many laser scorch marks. There are quite a few other examples of the budding comic genius.

Galaxias is an interesting program with a superb redefined character set and some welcome comic touches. The detailed descriptions of the different planets you visit make the game most enjoyable and a notable member of the four.

{ZXSR Note: Although a compilation, each game was all scored separately but they do not lend themselves to the ZXSR Review Score structure. Instead they are listed below.}

COMMENTS

OUT OF THE SHADOWS

Difficulty: easy to play but will take months to complete
Graphics: good original lighting concept
Presentation: very good
Input facility: arcade response
Response: good
General rating: excellent

Atmosphere: 9/10
Vocabulary: 8/10
Logic: 8/10
Addictive Quality: 9/10
Overall: 9/10

PROJECT X - THE MICROMAN

Difficulty: many tricky points due to unfriendly vocabulary
Graphics: some, generally poor
Presentation: good use of colour in redefined text
Input facility: verb/noun
Response: instant Quill response
General rating: good value

Atmosphere: 7/10
Vocabulary: 5/10
Logic: 6/10
Addictive Quality: 6/10
Overall: 6/10

THE MURAL

Difficulty: not difficult
Graphics: none
Presentation: good
Input facility: verb/noun
Response: fast
General rating: strange, humorous in places, but generally disappointing

Atmosphere: 7/10
Vocabulary: 4/10
Logic: 5/10
Addictive Quality: 6/10
Overall: 6/10

GALAXIAS

Difficulty: quite easy
Graphics: a few, average
Presentation: superb character set
Input facility: verb/noun
Response: fast Quill response
General rating: entertaining

Atmosphere: 7/10
Vocabulary: 7/10
Logic: 7/10
Addictive Quality: 8/10
Overall: 7/10

Compilations are definitely the in-thing at the moment. Here's the first especially for adventurers, although it contains four lesser-known adventures rather than a group of mega-hits. Still, anything that carries Tony Bridge's seal of approval has to be worth looking at, and the varied selection here should provide at least two or three for anyone to enjoy.

FAX BOX
Title: Fourmost Adventures
Publisher: Global Software, PO Box 67, London SW11 1B5
Price: £7.95

OUT OF THE SHADOWS

My own un-favourite is this attempt at producing a D&D style game.

The opening screen invites you to restore a saved game, create a new dungeon, create a new hero, or create both. And your hero can be either a human, elf or dwarf, though there arr no characteristics to set up other than those you're issued with. You then base a choice of six quests; or of a random quest; or of no quest at all if you just want to have a mooch about. The quests all have grand names like Silmaril, The Island, or Crown and Serpents - and as that sounded like an interesting pub to visit I set off in search of it. It has to be said, though, that all the quests look remarkably similar.

One feature of the display screen is an attempt to simulate real vision, So, your little matchstick man can only see what he'd see in real life; any part of the landscape that's blocked by walls or whatever doesn't appear on the screen until you move to a more suitable position - hence the shadows, out of which various beasties come so attack you. One of the first essential things to do is locate the home of the Merchant, somewhere near your starting point. Here you can buy and sell items, including the food that you'll need to keep on trekking.

There are plenty of spills and spells, as you attempt to slay a few monsters and boost your experience. If you fancy moving a matchstick man round a matchstick landscape and getting attacked by matchstick rats then this could be just the game for you.

THE MURAL

The Mural is certainly a contrast - unless there are now dungeons and dragons in Neasden High Street. This is where you allegedly begin the game, according to the scenario. Having been accosted by two men wearing suspender belts, you're given the task of painting over an obscene mural. Now you have to admit that as adventures go, this is just that bit different!

You awake in a cave with nothing more for company than The Quill's gothic character set, but with exits in all directions. Trust me to pick the one which is immediately blocked off by a penguin which drops down and sits there eating a sandwich. Or was it a sandwich eating a Penguin? Whatever it was, I had nothing to try to get past it with, so I entered the cupboard, warily examined the smelly fur coat and tin of dead maggots, before going north and walking into a lamp post where I was given a message that I'd met the lion and the wardrobe, but no witch yet!

Back at the cave, another exit leads to the obscene mural itself, so in the interests of research, I took a close look. It "shows several nubile elven-maids in some extremely erotic postures while a gorilla in a tutu dances in the background." Shame it's text-only. It sounds just like the YS Christmas party! Interesting as the mural is, the room's a bit plain otherwise, so it's back to the cave and out the other side and off to a small house, where you find a carved cuckoo, a copy of the New Orc Times (ouch!) and a C5 order form quietly mouldering away. Heading off in yet another direction through a field of ripening corn, past the buzzing insects and the hovering vultures, I managed to squeeze mvself into a pillar box but couldn't squeeze myself out again. The adventure makes as much sense from in there as it does from anywhere else, so I stayed put and tried to read the small white envelope and puzzle out why I hadn't been able to get the bucket with a hole in it out of the well. Baffled yet? Me too - but I enjoyed it all tremendously just the same.

MICROMAN

Released previously as Project X - Micro Man, this is the tale of Professor Neil Richards (that means you), who's been given a dose of Gamma Radiation that's reduced him to the size of a box of matches. Quite why the shrinking has to occur while he's sitting inside his car I don't know, but it does lead to the first fiendish problem - how to get out. As it seems to me highly unlikely that most people would get it, I'll give the answer here, but backwards, of course: TIGN INRU TFOD AETS NIEL DNAH DNIW.

With that out of the way I was soon wandering towards the main road, where a dead hedgehog warned me to be careful. It's bad enough being small without being squashed,.Keeping to the fields seemed a better bet, and the first simple maze came in the form of a haystack - no prizes for guessing what you can find hidden there. Later on a broken lolly stick proved its usefulness, though you've no sooner dug your way out of somewhere than you're confronted by a giant mole. Up onto a lawn and you're outside a house, though inside the garden shed there's a swarm of killer wasps that saw me off. Fortunately the RAMSAVE feature helps battle recommence pretty easily.

MicroMan's a lot of fun, and clever use of The Illustrator means that decent graphics pop up fairly regularly.

GALAXIAS

This final adventure on the Fourmost tape is the one that'll probably interest lots of people as it's an early effort from someone who went on to do better things. That someone is Fergus McNeill, the better things arc Bored Of The Rings, Robin Of Sherlock and various quests for various joysticks.

Not that Galaxias is in any way bad - it is certainly my favourite in this collection, with lot's of style and indicating just how much variety you can coax out of Gilsoft's utilities.

For a futuristic adventure we're presented with a futuristic character set, though I'd have willingly sacrificed it for one that I could read. Alongside it goes a futuristic adventure language, too, so that you get responses like 'Confirmed' instead of 'OK', and 'Input not understood.' Your job is to cruise the galaxies and find the lost crystal, but first it helps if you look round the locations near the Spaceport where you begin. Just south of the Metalon Bar you'll find the Alcohol Reclamation Centre, (the loo!) while further on there's the miniest of mazes - one location!

There are special instructions for when you reach the bridge of the meta-galactic skycruiser, and these enable you to visit whichever planets are within your reach. Initially there are four of these: Graflon, Terminan, Akrol and Septule. Graphics are used sparingly but effectively, and the ability to travel between the different planets means there's a lot of variety in the adventure - just as there's plenty of variety in this package. And at £2 an adventure I can't see anyone complaining. Okay nothing stunning, but a nicely thought-out collection of good solid stuff that might otherwise have escaped your attention.

Fourmost Adventures
Publisher: Global Software
Price: £7.95
Memory: 48K

This package from Global Software features three Quilled text adventures and a re-release of Mizar's Out of the Shadows - a complicated Dungeons and Dragons simulation.

MICROMAN

The best of the Quilled games is Microman, a souped-up revamp of Project X - The Microman written byJohn Lemmon and Tim Kemp in 1984. That was before the Illustrator and Patch utilities were available, and they've now been used to good effect to add half-screen faster graphics which don't interfere with the rest of the game.

We've reviewed the adventure before and, standing alone, it rated four stars. The plot will be familiar to any fan of the Incredible Shrinking Man, and stars Professor Neil Richards as the scientist who accidentally irradiates himself whilst running an experiment on miniaturisation.

Knowing he has little time before the rays take effect, he leaps into his motor and speeds off to his colleague's nearby lab for help. Alas, before he can get to the antidote he blacks out. Waking, he finds himself shrunk to the size of Action Man and stuck in his car.

A little lateral thinking about the uses of seat belts will soon see you out of the car, but if you want to get back to normal size you're going to have to run the gauntlet not only of Com 2, your friend's sophisticated security system, but also of the ravenous flora and fauna in the grounds around the house.

Everyday objects take on unexpected significance and weapons can be fashioned from a needle and button. These are soon necessary in a tight to the death against a giant mole.

You'll need to work out how to cut your way through the glass of the greenhouse, and find an air supply to take you into the depths of the fishpond. The problems then become more scientific as you attempt to overcome Com 2 and its protection devices. Beyond lies safety and normality - perhaps.

The intriguingly original storyline and intricate problems generate an absorbing atmosphere. There's little that's superfluous to the action and, despite the addition of the bright graphics, the game remains large - the original text-only game had 150 locations and there are still more than 120 in this version.

Microman is yet another example of the Quill's versatility. It sold for £3.95, 18 months ago, and its inclusion in a package retailing at £7.95 for four games makes for excellent value and satisfaction.

OUT OF THE SHADOWS

This isn't a standard adventure. It's a real-time implementation of the D&D format, offering a choice of quests, regular and difficult combat sequences and plenty of spells and treasure. There are the usual hit point ratings and you can develop your character by gaining experience and wealth.

Once you've loaded up you must choose your race - elf, dwarf or human, each with different characteristics - and then decide whether you want to play through one of the six prepared quests or create your own. The screen displays a map of the visible area around you as well as a scrolling commentary of your actions.

There is a large command vocabulary which will allow you to move, fight, trade and perform magic. Because of the speed of the game and the viciousness of your opponents, it is wise to be familiar with those commands before you start - any dithering will end in death.

There's a large element of surprise in the monsters' attacks. Because your screen map only shows what you could actually see in 'real' life you never know what may be lurking around the corner. You also start at a low skill level, either unarmed or perhaps with an ineffectual dagger. Fortunately, there is a merchant who can sell you survival equipment - in fact he is the only definitely friendly character in the game, so you're going to need his help and a fair amount of treasure to acquire the items you'll need.

You begin in the safety of your home base and the first task is to find the merchant. Step outside and you're immediately into hostile territory. Monsters, animals and traps abound and even the journey across to the merchant's house can get you severely damaged. Treasure is secreted in containers scattered around the countryside and in other buildings, but is almost invariably guarded. If you have weapons make sure you've 'prepared' them for use.

The quests are fairly typical of the genre - find Elessar in the Labyrinth, steal the Orb from the Rusters, deprive the Demons of the Sceptre. To start with it may be wise to choose a questless option - that will help you to get accustomed to the game format and to learn exactly what is treasure and what is dangerous. Once you've done that you may feel more confident about taking on a quest or two. Simple they're not!

The magic is limited. You can cast sleep, slow and blast spells, teleport up and down or apply healing ointments to your inevitably numerous wounds. There are also magic rings, wands and staves to smite with and the occasional potion to restore your vitality. A full inventory can give you a rundown on your possessions, armour, wealth and spells.

All told this is a fast, action-packed and complex game with a variety of scenarios. The interpreter has a good response time and, though the map graphics are a little spindly and occasionally difficult to understand, especially on a small screen, they are adequate for the gameplay. Fighting your way Out of the Shadows will be demanding, so gird your loins, ye D & D freaks.

GALAXIAS

Written by Fergus McNeil of Bored of the Rings fame, Galaxias is no relative of the arcade Galaxians, save for the fact that it's set in space. Cast as a space pirate in command of a fancy spacecruiser, you must discover a fabled crystal - further detail is not given and you'll have to piece information together as you explore. The game has a number of location graphics, mainly to set the scene at landing points.

The action commences at Zagro Spaceport. Exploration reveals the usual down-at-heel bars and dirty landing bays. Except for food and drink there is little to find here beyond a laser probe which you can expect to come in handy later on. Having exhausted the dubious pleasures of Zagro you climb into your cruiser.

On board there's the bridge with its command computer and also engine-room, walkways and living quarters. As befits a fierce space pirate, there's a smuggler's cache down in the engine-room, kitted out with a handy bar of gold. The teleport will beam you down to the planets and there's also an escape ship, its presence ominously suggesting that you're likely to run into trouble somewhere in deep space.

Navigation is simple. Type 'list' into your command computer and the planets within range will be listed. Type in the name of the planet or space station and you'll be transported there with the minimum of fuss.

On each planet you'll face particular problems, most of which will require equipment from other worlds to get you through. So, if you want to get the laser rifle embedded in a wall on the ice-age world of Akrol, you'll need to search Space Station One carefully - a thermal lance is hidden and only this will melt the cave's ice wall.

As you wander this freezing world, a little like Crawley in the depths of December, you'll come across a grumpy alien called Jekra. He says he wants some covalium. You may think this to be some sort of tranquiliser to take his mind off being in a place like Akrol, but it seems to be a mineral of some kind. Could it be found in the mines on the hi-tech planet you've just been to? Beam up and zoom back to Septule to have another go at getting into the mine.

There's a good Trekkie feel to the game with the various pieces of sci-fi machinery helping to build up the atmosphere. I could have done with a bit more creature interaction but this is always hard to achieve with the Quill system. At first you feel a bit lost in the usually empty cities and ports you visit, but you'll start to get more hooked once you've made a few connections and got used to the flying around.

Galaxias is a fairly serious adventure, written before Bored, so don't expect any loony humour. And don't press the red button in the defence bunker on Terminan - you'll end up as a space age Robinson Crusoe without Friday.

THE MURAL

Finally there's The Mural, which certainly does have a loony element tied in with an excellently off-colour plot. As you stroll along the high street, minding your own business, you're hurled into a cave on another world by two creatures clad in suspender belts. As if this wasn't enough you discover that your quest is to paint over a naughty mural. Suffice it to say that it involves 11 nubile maids and a gorilla in a tutu.

Yes, this is a zany one, fellow travellers, set in a bizarre little land where, on entering a cottage you'll be told, 'there is.. a well worn but comfortable arm-chair and a copy of the New Orc Times on a table. Also a C5 order form smoulders in the grate and there is a Lithuanian horror movie (with subtitles) on the TV. You can also see a carved wooden cuckoo."

Such scenes are commonplace in the world of The Mural and I must confess to falling about when, after examining a bucket stuck down a well, beeps came forth to the tune of, "There's a hole in my bucket, dear Lisa." After the tune has finished, the simple message, "Good, huh?" appears on screen.

It's a pleasantly daft, rude and appealing game which is bound to tempt addicts of games like Bored. It's not by McNeil but by Nic Ford. I shall be ever in his debt if he tells me just how I can snuff the giant sandwich-eating penguin which stops me escaping from the cave with the mothballs in it. Good fun.

MACHINE: Spectrum 48K
SUPPLIER: Global Software
PRICE: £7.95

Fourmost Adventures is a four-game cassette with an adventure theme. The four adventures which make up the cassette have been chosen and recommended by Tony Bridge, the adventure writer for Popular Computing Weekly.

Microman was originally released as a single, and reviewed by Paul Coppins in November, (Personal Rating 7), so it will not be separately reviewed here.

Out of the Shadows: This is not a true adventure, more a role-playing dungeons and dragons type game, in which you must search for treasure in one of six available quests, gaining experience as you go.

The game reminded me of The Valley, which appeared in Computing Today back in 1982, as a Basic listing for the Commodore pet, and was subsequently converted for a variety of other machines, There are plenty of options in the game, ranging from which race of creature to be, to choosing weapons, spells, and armour.

The display consists of a small figure (you) manipulated through a small graphics area showing your so immediate vicinity. The idea, of course, is to allow you only to see that which would be visible to you in real life. The rest of the screen shows information about your current status.

To describe the game fully would take quite some time, as nearly every course of action is included. Indeed, a few hours could be spent just learning all the possible commands, and herein lies the game's main weakness - there are too many commands and no PAUSE facility. By the time you've figured out which command to use, you are usually dead!

Apart from that, not a bad role-playing game.

The Mural: This is a text only Quilled adventure. The objective is to erase some rather naughty graffiti written on a wall, and to this end you find yourself inside a cave, having been knocked out and placed there by two men wearing suspender belts!

I hadn't been playing for long before I realised just how much I was wasting my time. Considering the text is written in English, I had thought it quite reasonable to assume that my commands should be entered in English. Not so, the parser of this adventure is the worst I've ever seen.

To illustrtate just how bad it is, I'll tell you about the newspaper. I wasn't allowed to pick it up, but I could read it, and thus discovered that it held a coupon. On typing READ COUPON, the reply was 'It's in the paper stupid.' Assuming, that I had to remove the coupon before I could read it, I found the necessary items to do so. But what happened was even more surprising. In response to my command to cut the coupon, I found myself deposited outside the location I had just entered.

This was not an isolated incident, either. Many times throughout the game my commands were misinterpreted completely, resulting in instant transportation to some other location, sudden death, or being told I couldn't move in a certain direction.

Finally, after every turn I was greeted with the words: 'Any more great ideas?' At first this wonderful prompt was amusing, gradually being replaced with boredom, and eventually, pure irritation. All in all, a fine example of how not to write an adventure.

Galaxias: This was written by Fergus McNeill, who brought us Bored of the Rings and Robin of Sherlock.

Beginning in a spaceport, once you have found your space ship you can explore four different planets, each with its own set of puzzles to solve. On my last count, I'd discovered 80 different locations, ranging from the top of a 1000 storey building to a mud hut in the middle of a jungle. I even managed to teleport myself to nowhere at all!

Galaixas makes good use of the Spectrum's capabilities, and the locations are well described. Definitely the best adventure of the four!

None of these adventures are special, though, and some are very poor. According to Tony Bridge, who chose them, they are all fine examples of the Adventure Writer's art. Sorry, Tony, but as a collection, I don't know how you dared to put your name to them!

Global Software
£7.95

There have been surprisingly few adventure compilation tapes, probably because adventure sales aren't as great as those for arcade games This particular one is endorsed by fellow adventure hack Tony Bridge, who says on the packaging "they are excellent examples of the adventure-writers art." I'm afraid I disagree.

The first of the four games on the tape (hence the title) is Out of The Shadows from Mizar. I wouldn't really call this an adventure it's a dungeons and dragons style thing, controlled by typing short commands, but not really a text game. Instead your little stick man judders round a graphically awful scrolling map. Other little stick creatures will attack you, causing one of those dreadful "Imp hits right leg. You lose 3 Hit Points" type routines.

There are no problems to solve, you just move around attacking things, opening crates and the like, and amassing various treasures. It looks very primitive, although the game is large. If you like this combat and endless searching idea for a game (which obviously some people do judging by the very enthusiastic reception another magazine gave it when it first appeared), this may appeal. Personally I think it's boring rubbish.

The other three games are Quilled. The Mural is probably the best of the lot. Your quest is for an obscene mural, which you have been instructed to paint over. It's another of those Pythonesque funny adventures made popular by Fergus McNeil in Bored Of The Rings, with lots of silly things happening, and even a direct copy from Fergus in a routine with a penguin. The game is short and seems fairly simple, the vocabulary could be better, there aren't enough responses, besides which I don't find this sort of humour funny in computer games, but if you do you may like this.

The Mural is more in the style of Fergus McNeil than his own work on the tape, Galaxias. This is a rather run of the mill sci-fi adventure in which you move around a hi-tech spaceport, then travel to various futuristic planets, searching for a crystal. It's not a spoof; rather too serious and dull in fact.

It features some reasonable graphics but a horrible typeface which is difficult to read. You seem to spend most of your time wandering around the large number of locations - there's little interaction or problem solving. The inlay rather cheekily calls this "a brand new game", although it was in fact written before his recent successes His style has definitely improved.

In Microman you are reduced to a tiny size, and have to deal with all sorts of problems as a result. A good idea which is reasonably executed, but let down by a far too restrictive vocabulary.

One good thing about the tape is the three true adventures do use the Quill very well, with attractive screen presentation, particularly in Microman with its split screen graphics.

None of the games really impressed me; three were average, the other I thought was appalling. At what works out at around two pounds each you might think this is worth buying; personally I'd spend it on one really good game which will keep you entertained for at least as long. Thus the potential is still there for a really good adventure compilation; this wasn't it. Disappointing.