Producer: DK'Tronics
Memory Required: 48K
Recommended Retail Price: £5.95
Language: machine code
Author: Don Priestley

Maziacs puts DK back on top form again in a highly colourful and eventful maze game. The aim is to enter the maze and find the gold, then bring it safely out again. You are told that the gold maybe anywhere, but at least 200 moves from the starting point. Embedded in the maze walls are several useful items like food and swords, and here and there a few prisoners who, despite their incarceration, seem to know the way to the treasure. You get what you want by trying to move into the square occupied by the object for prisoner). The food is essential it you aren't to die of starvation, and the swords are also essential if you want to survive the dreaded maziacs. These spidiferous creatures ramble about all over the place, sometimes in packs. Sadly a sword can only be used once, so avoid the packs - they move like greased lightning even in the lower levels of play.

If you ask a prisoner the route to the gold he tells you by turning the path yellow. This you can follow for a short time before it blinks out and you must then find another prisoner. Once the treasure has been discovered your problems really start. For one thing you can't carry a sword and the treasure at the same time, so it's best to try and kill off as many maziacs as you can on your way in.

A useful feature is called VIEW. The section of the maze on screen is only a fiftieth of the total, but pressing the key for VIEW lets you see a twelfth, and includes positions of swords, prisoners and food as well as maziacs. There are play levels where you can dispense with such sissy aids as this!

COMMENTS

Keyboard positions: good, but user-defined as well so you can set up for AGF and Protek
Joystick options: Kempston and cursor controllers via user-defined
Keyboard play: slightly hesitant
Use of colour: good
Graphics: excellent
Sound: continuous and imaginative
Skill levels: four
Lives: one
Screens: scrolling maze, set up randomly each game.

All the instructions are on screen, but they are very good and helpful. Although the keyboard layout is sensible you can opt to define your own keys. This is a sort of maze adventure and it's a good one. The graphics are excellent with plenty of animation - it's fun and addictive to play. I also liked its large library of comments when you lose a life.

Everything is very clear and colourful. The game has instant appeal because of its graphics. "You" are very well animated tapping your feet when standing still, even squatting down in boredom if you don't move for a while. The maziacs are also nicely done - they look and move in an evil way. If you encounter one (which you will) then the battle is fun to watch. Bound to be a success.

Plenty of appeal, with lots to do and good animation. Helpful touches like the VIEW facility can be a mixed blessing since you can't move while looking at the larger map, but the maziacs can! Addictive.

Producer: DK Tronics, 48K
£5.95 (1)
Author: Don Priestley

This pure find-your-way-through-a-maze-and-escape game is among the best ever from DK. Simple in concept, its playability lies in the lovely graphics and its speed of play. The aim is to enter the maze and discover the gold, which will be at least 200 moves away. Embedded in the walls are many useful items like food and swords. Keep your strength up by eating and use the swords against the dreaded Maziacs. There are prisoners also embedded in the maze walls and they will tell you the shortest route to the gold by marking the path in yellow. This only lasts for a few seconds however. The swords only last for one attack, and without one an awful Maziac will surely kill you ogg. Once you've found the gold your problems really start as you can't carry both gold and a sword, so it makes sense to kill as many Maziacs as you can on the way in. The playing area shows one fiftieth of the total maze, but the VIEW facility shows you a twelfth. Excellent graphics and animation with plenty of detail. User-defined control key, joystick: Kempston and cursor joysticks via user-define. 4 skill levels, randomly generated maze each game. CRASH rating: highly recommended, overall 82% M/C.

Producer: DK Tronics, 48K
£5.95 (1)
Author: Don Priestley

This pure find-your-way-through-a-maze-and-escape game is among the best ever from DK. Simple in concept, its playability lies in the lovely graphics and its speed of play. The aim is to enter the maze and discover the gold, which will be at least 200 moves away. Embedded in the walls are many useful items like food and swords. Keep your strength up by eating and use the swords against the dreaded Maziacs. There are prisoners also embedded in the maze walls and they will tell you the shortest route to the gold by marking the path in yellow. This only lasts for a few seconds however. The swords only last for one attack, and without one an awful Maziac will surely kill you ogg. Once you've found the gold your problems really start as you can't carry both gold and a sword, so it makes sense to kill as many Maziacs as you can on the way in. The playing area shows one fiftieth of the total maze, but the VIEW facility shows you a twelfth. Excellent graphics and animation with plenty of detail. User-defined control key, joystick: Kempston and cursor joysticks via user-define. 4 skill levels, randomly generated maze each game. CRASH rating: highly recommended, overall 82% M/C.

As summer poises, ready for the onslaught of fab new games around Christmas, CRASH takes a look back at some of the major games we have reviewed in the past to see if they (and the reviews) stand the test of time. MATTHEW UFFINDELL and LLOYD MANGRAM take keyboard and reputation in hand...

Maziacs was one of those vast mazes which began to be popular about this time (excepting the 3D types). CRASH said it had 'plenty of appeal with lots to do and good animation. Overall 82%.

This large maze/adventure game still has plenty of appealing qualities although perhaps the action seems a little on the slow side - fights become long and boring instead of exciting. Moving graphics are detailed but the maze is very uninteresting. This does seem to detract from the game although it didn't when I saw it first. In retrospect the game doesn't seem to be very colourful now. Key reactions are slow. Unaddictive and boring.
MU

Maziacs stands up now because with the exception of Chuckman (I'm sure Chuckman borrowed the graphics) there hasn't been another game quite like Maziacs. Everything is large and bright, if somewhat unimaginatively coloured, and the animation we raved about then, still looks amusing and good today. For its original and playability, I would still stick with the review even if a few of the ratings may have paled a little in comparison with later games.
LM

(Matthew) I would agree with the use of computer rating (80%) because the keys are not very responsive. I would also drop playability (84%) and addictive qualities (88%) - say down to the higher seventies.

(Lloyd) That seems fair - I know the use of computer was rated high because this was among the first games to have user-definable keys, but it's true that responsiveness to input has been improved a lot since.

ORIGINAL REVIEW

Use of Computer: 80%
Graphics: 78%
Playability: 84%
Getting Started: 80%
Addictive Qualities: 88%
Value for Money: 82%
Overall: 82%

THE PLOT THICKENS

The frantic zap of arcade software has given way to calmer play and strategic thinking. John Gilbert investigates.

TIME GATE
Memory: 48K
Price: £6.95

CODENAME MAT
Memory: 48K
Price: £6.95

STONKERS
Memory: 48K
Price: £3.95

HALLS OF THE THINGS
Memory: 48K
Price: £7.50

MAZIACS
Memory: 48K
Price: £6.95

The 'Zap-Em' type of arcade game, although still around, has undergone a transformation which started in earnest in the middle of last year. Games manufacturers with an eagle eye on the industry saw that the time would arrive when arcade games, such as Space Invaders and Centipede, would fade in popularity and that something had to be added to make them more appealing.

The one aspect which games such as those already had was strategy. In games such as Space Invaders, strategy is needed to evade the aliens and at the same time fire at them. A good game will infer a strategy to the player and a good player is one who can assimilate that method of play quickly.

Software houses decided that the most obvious way to increase interest in the arcade style of game was to emphasise the strategy aspect. That is done either by putting strategy games in an arcade format or by slowing the action to accommodate structured thought instead of quick-fire intuition. The move worked well and games like Time Gate, Stonkers and Codename Mat prove it.

Time Gate reached the market shortly after the Spectrum arrived in great quantities and it is one of the first games for the machine produced by Quicksilva. The game centres on a conflict between the peoples of the free universe and the incredibly evil and ancient race of Squarm.

At the launch Quicksilva promoted it as the ultimate sci-fi space adventure and, with its 3D representation of space through the window of a fighter and the depth of story deadline, it was at that time.

The strategy of the game is centred on finding the aliens using the instrument panel of your spaceship and then destroying them. It was given added depth by spreading the Squarm through space and time so that the player has to lock-on to a particular sector in space and spacewarp there.

In some ways Quicksilva produced a game which crosses Space Invaders with the mainframe computer game Star Trek. It was that aspect initially which drew customers who wanted something different and who were ever-willing to part with their money.

Unfortunately, Time Gate is an example of how the software scene can change overnight. A few months after its release the game attracted much criticism and the Squarm have made many players squirm.

At the release, about a year ago, Time Gate was described as incredible but since then players and critics alike found that it had limitations, not least of which was the plot. The storyline is too much like a revamped version of Star Trek. Time Gate is still available from Quicksilva and costs £6.95.

Codename Mat, for the 48K Spectrum, is a new release from Micromega which could be described as an advanced version of Time Gate or an extremely good interpretation of the Atari Star Raiders. The strategy element in the arcade game is obvious, as you have to plot your way through the solar system, passing through star gates to spacewarp into another system.

The solar system is broken into sectors which have a planet or satellite as bases. The planets are taken from our solar system and include Mars, Jupiter and Earth. Each of those planets is under attack from the Myons and it is your job, as a teenager with the knowledge of the universe, to stop them.

There are two levels of play depending whether you want to use a lone ship or whether you want to be the commander of a task force. The latter is the most difficult as you can engage in several conflicts at the same time by using subspace radio, which seems to have an immediate effect on the sector you have selected.

If all your ships in one sector are destroyed, the planet could be destroyed and you have lost part of the game. If you see the situation where you could lose ships in another sector you will need to use your cunning and skill to build a battle strategy.

The arcade part of the game occupies about 50 percent of playing time and involves shooting through space and chasing the enemy fighters and motherships. It can only be described as classic arcade action combined with moments of strategic thinking to scan computer banks for information about the movement of hostile craft and about which planetary system are in danger.

Codename Mat could almost be described as state-of-the-art in software and it is close to a simulation in space-game terms. One of the most notable aspects is that the routine to generate the 3D graphics is only 200 bytes long. The compactness of the graphics routines means that the author has been able to concentrate on developing the depth and storyline of the game and that is obvious from the start.

Unfortunately, although the game is more advanced than Time Gate, the storyline is weak, as it seems to be a collection of unoriginal ideas. Luckily those ideas fuse together well and the plot stands on its own. Codename Mat can be obtained from Micromega and costs £6.95.

Manufacturers and authors have not limited arcade strategy games to the depths of space. They have also done the opposite of giving arcade games touch of strategy and given strategy games on arcade feel.

Stonkers, for the 48K Spectrum from Imagine, is a prime example of that type of game. The player is given command of land-based forces, including tanks and infantry, which are grouped in the top right-hand corner of the screen. The enemy is based across the river on the other side of the screen and to reach a suitable combat position one or other side has to cross the bridge.

When you start to play, a map of the whole theater of war is displayed. You can issue commands to active units on the map by positioning a cursor over the map position you require.

One of two actions will occur. If you are on the big map you will zoom in to a detailed display of the location specified. If you are already zoomed in you can position the cursor over a fighting unit and by moving the cursor to the position you want it to take up, it will start to move towards that locality.

The use of a cursor to plot strategy is inventive and imagine has put much effort into the game. It should take weeks for a player to work out a plan of strategy to defeat the foe, mainly because of the immense landscape on which play takes place.

The game is a cross between the usual type of battle strategy game such as Apocalypse from Red Shift and the arcade game Battlezone. Imagine has succeeded in producing a game which combines arcade quality graphics and strategic action. Stonkers can be obtained from imagine for £3.95.

Maze games, such as Pac-man, have not escaped the eye of software houses keen to think of new plots. The munch-munch of the Pac-Man has been replaced by ponderings, such as 'Where is the treasure?' of the hero or heroine. That type of game is well-illustrated with such programs as Ant Attack, from Quicksilva, Maziacs from dk'Tronics and the irrepressible Halls of the Things from Crystal Computing, which still seems to be out-selling everything on the market.

Halls of the Things, in which the player has to collect a certain number of rings of power in a maze before being destroyed by the monsters, started a craze for the so called all-graphics adventures in which cartoon-style arcade graphics were combined with adventure plots. Most of those games take place in dungeons and feature magic and sword play. Several companies have followed the excellent crystal game, although unlike the state of play with arcade games nobody has copied original Crystal ideas as the area is so rich in concept material. Halls of the Things can be obtained from Crystal Computing and costs £7.50.

Maziacs, for the 48K Spectrum, is from dk'Tronics and is another example of the genre. It has a different graphics style from Halls of the Things which some would say is bolder and better and is more in line with the graphics which Ultimate Play the Game produces.

The plot involves finding a treasure chest in a maze which you must drag back home without being killed by the Maziacs, which can get into terrible sword fights with your player-character. To find the way to the treasure you have to make contact with the prisoners who are strung along the corridors of the maze. The fight sequences are incredibly detailed. You will again need to develop a strategy over a period of time to win. Maziacs can be obtained from dk'Tronics and costs £6.95.

To succeed, arcade-strategy games must produce an effect for the player like that produced by an ordinary zap'em game. It is the way the addiction is created which makes the difference. In an ordinary arcade game the effect is created through a need to destroy aliens and make a high score. Arcade-strategy games are different, as they rely on the user's mind. It is the strategy as well as the graphics which keeps the player returning for more.

The combination of arcade techniques and strategic thinking has made the arcade-strategy game very popular. The insurgence of that type of program means that the customer has two types of game in one and the reality of the plot, through the realism of the arcade graphics, takes the games industry one step forward. The main criticism for a long time is liable to be that the plots on which the games hang are not original enough. We are, however, just beginning to see a change in arcade style, where bang and zap are replaced by plot and thought.

MEMORY REQUIRED: 48K

Yes, Maziacs is a maze game as the title suggests, but it is nor a copy of 'Pacman' (sigh of relief). dK'tronics, who have produced other quality products, have done one large step forward from 'Pacman'.

To start, the maze is bigger, in fact, it has no edges, but hundreds of locations. Only about one-fiftieth of the total maze is normally shown on the screen with a full one-twelfth being displayed by the pressing of the appropriate key. A totally new maze is generated on each go, so making for a very varied game.

Dotted all over the maze are swords, prisoners and a pile of treasure, all set into the walls until you collect them. Only one sword may be held at a time, and just one Maziac can be killed with it. A Maziac is a horrible monster that has a tendency to attack you. There are an enormous number of Maziacs milling around all over the maze. If you are sitting down, they will attack and kill. If you are walking, without a sword, then you are more than likely going to be killed. On the other hand, if you are walking, without a sword, the Maziac will die. One of the nicest little things about Maziacs is the fearful fights which they will put up. The aim of the game is to find the treasure. This is not an easy job when you are in a maze of such size. Fortunately, the prisoners will light the way for a short distance. Once the treasure is found, getting it back is far from easy as a sword may not be carried, so the treasure must be dropped before conflict.

On the right-hand edge of the screen is an energy level indicator which can drop very rapidly at times. If it gets to zero you die. To keep energy up it is necessary to eat food also found in the walls.

Maziacs is one of the most exciting games I have played for a while. The graphics are very good, they are smooth and fast. With three levels of play it will be a long time before the game becomes too easy.

A great game and highly recommended.

NO OTHER MICRO HAS THE SOFTWARE BACK-UP OF SINCLAIR'S SPECTRUM. PETE CONNORS PLOUGHS HIS WAY THROUGH SOME OF IT FROM GRAPPLING WITH EVIL MAZIACS TO HELPING CHARLIE THE CHEF.

48K
DK'Tronics, Unit 2, Shire Hill Industrial Estate, Saffron Walden, Essex
£4.95

Every software house, from the giants to the leprechauns, seems to have programmers chained to terminals, frantically churning out products for the massive Spectrum market. For Spectrum owners the pot of gold under the rainbow is the now huge variety of software available: their only problem is distinguishing the genuine article from the fake.

One game you certainly will not need to bite into is Zzoom from Imagine. This is the Real McCoy, a quality arcade-style game of skill and destruction in the comfort of your own armchair. The game starts with the Dambusters theme tune, enough on its own to make you start twirling imaginary handlebar moustaches and warn Ginger about the bandits at 4 o'clock. You find yourself in command of an aeroplane whose gunsights appear on the screen; also displayed are a dibar to show your relation to the ground and a long-range scanner.

Before you have time to think, hostile aircraft are approaching from the east; they speed in and suddenly, unexpectedly, wheel 90° towards you, presenting the slightest of targets for your cannon. Those earthbound refuges you are trying to protect do not have much of a chance. Poor blighters, I wish I could have done more to help. After the waves of planes, the landscape changes. Now its the desert, complete with palm trees. Over the horizon come battalions of tanks. More skill is now required, as you have to dive low enough to shoot your earthbound adversaries without crashing to your doom.

After the desert - the sea, with enemy destroyers trying to blast the refugees' lifeboats. The standard of graphic display and excitement combine to make Zzoom a most exciting game, one that has deservedly become a micro-classic.

DK'tronics, though, has produced a game which could rival Zzoom's popularity. Maziacs may seem, initially, to be just another maze-game. In fact, it has subtle qualities which make it one of the best available in this genre. The scenario is familiar: you must get through the maze, collect the treasure and get out. You can ask the way from prisoners, and pick up swords to combat the maziacs.

What lifts Maniacs above the common land is its graphic sophistication. The monsters are the most grotesque I have ever seen on a micro; nightmarish squatting creatures, all legs and jaws who enjoy nothing more than gobbling you up. The prisoners are sad creatures, writhing in their shackles inside blue circles. One feels great pity for them but, sadly, one can do nothing to help. And you, the brave treasure-hunter, are a perky little fellow with a jaunty rhythmic step. You are never downhearted and your jubilation when you have destroyed a marine is quite heart- warming. These qualities give Maniacs that something extra, and make it a very compulsive game.

Best of the other offerings from DK is Hard Cheese, in which you have to eat your way round the board, creating your own maze, in order to get at the cheese in the middle. Naturally, you are pursued by monsters. Naturally you can shoot these monsters, but this is not so easy as they move very quickly and you must replenish your energy. Again the graphics are of a high standard, and Hard Cheese is almost, but not quite, as compulsive as Maziacs.

In comparison, DK's Road Toad and Jawz are rather dull.

The first needs no introduction and is as expected; though the graphics are, perhaps, a little clearer than usual, and the tankers are truly fearsome. Jawz is a disappointment; here you are underwater, firing at Sharks and Jellyfish. It is quite tricky to hit them as you have two cannons converging from either side of your control. Otherwise the game is low on interest.

Ultimate Play the Game has a reputation for quality software, and it does not besmirch it with Cookie and Tranzam. Cookie has one of the wackiest situations for a long time; Charlie Chef's ingredients have escaped from the pantry-yard and he must recapture them by dazing them with flour bombs and knocking them into his mixing bowl. As well as the runaways Crafty Cheese and Colonel Custard there are nasties such as Wally Washer and Terry Tack. Crazy, but true. The graphics are very good and Charlie is a sympathetic little figure in his white chef's hat.

It is very difficult to avoid the nasties; if they get you, you end up in a dustbin. Cookie is a witty and enjoyable game, but one which you might do well to use a joystick for. Tranzam is set in the year 3474; it is your Red Racer versus the Deadly Black Turbos in the search for the Eight Great Cups of Ultimate. The screen displays a barren landscape where the only land-marks are cacti and petrol stations. You guide your car around looking for the cups, while trying to avoid your enemies and the obstacles. This is a tricky business if you are doing 400 mph and steering on the keyboard; again, a joystick would be useful. Tranzam is an exciting game which gives a taste of the Mad Max experience.

GAME OR BLURB?

And so to Quicksilva. Do people buy their programs for the game or the blurb? Aquaplane's scenario begins "The contrasting blues of sea and sky provide a perfect backdrop as I relax with a Pernod and lemonade..." and goes on in the same vein for two sides of packaging. Indeed, Aquaplane's sea and sky are very blue, suggestive of hot Mediterranean summers. And, the game is very good. There you are, out for a bit of water-skiing, when the speedboat goes bananas. You are being pulled away to almost certain death.

Rocks, driftwood, tacking yachts, cruisers piloted by drunken play-boys, snapping sharks; get through all those and you have mastered the game. Aquaplane is made more intriguing because, as the boat accelerates, you are pulled to one side or another, thus increasing the risk of meeting a sticky end on a piece of driftwood. The graphics, too, are very colourful and realistic. Aquaplane is a highly entertaining game - almost as good as the blurb.

On the subject of watery graves, Bug-Byte has Aquarius "an underwater espionage game". As commander of a frogman team you must destroy the bombs planted by an enemy nation. Problems you will encounter are sharks and electrifying jellyfish. Your oxygen will run out and must be replenished by collecting fresh tanks from the sea-floor. While the undersea world is fairly convincing and the sound effects are genuinely squelchy, Aquarius is not a very exciting game, lacking the speed and variety top-class programmes.

ENCOUNTER WITH THE DARK ONE

In Styx, also from Bug-Byte, you are supposed to be battling your way across the mythological river to Hades "towards an encounter with the Dark One himself". In fact, it is a rather boring maze game, where the "deadly spiders" look like bits of dried grass and the Piranhas - did you know there were Piranhas in the Styx? - are most unconvincing. If they have micros in Hades as well they may well be playing Pool, another Bug-Byte game. The graphics are much better than Styx; a bright green for the baize and red for the bolls. Curiously, the object balls are all the same colour. Control is straightforward, using the cursor keys.

But perhaps these denizens of Hades might prefer CDS Micro Systems' Pool. I know I do, if only because the object balls are divided into blue and red. Otherwise, it is much the same as Bug-Byte's version, easy to control and pleasant to look at. Both programs are for one or two players.

Purer pleasures of the mind are entered for by Artic's Chess Tutor. The novelty of this program is that it not only plays chess - at three levels - but takes the beginner through three different opening variations; King's Indian, Ruy Lopez and Sicilian Dragon. There is also a section which demonstrates the moves of each piece.

This is indeed very useful and would be suitable for the absolute beginner. Unfortunately the board is none too clear, as the white pieces do not show up well on the light squares.

As a game chess is not in much danger of being overtaken by any of three new programs consisting of logical board games: Hanoi King from Contrast Software, Lojix from Virgin and 3-D Strategy from Quicksilva.

In the first of them you have three pillars on which are a series of rings. You have to transfer them to the third so that they are in the same order, moving only one ring at a time ind without placing a larger on top of a smaller ring. It sounds easy, and with only three or four rings, it is. More than that and it can become fiendishly difficult.

Lojix is a game in which you have to fit 18 irregularly shaped pieces onto a board. A sort if fiendish jigsaw puzzle, it is difficult and interesting. Virgin is offering a cash prize for the first correct solution.

3-D Strategy is billed as "a multi-dimensional mind game". It is 3-D noughts and crosses on a 4 by 4 by 4 cube. After 3-D chess Mr Spock might not have much trouble with his, but ordinary earthlings will find it very hard to beat. Despite being essentially simple ideas, all three of these games are well produced and will provide hours of entertainment for the puzzle happy.

Perhaps the most interesting new program for the Spectrum is The Forest, from Phipps Associates. This is a complex simulation of orienteering, the sport in which you have to follow a course over difficult terrain using only map and compass. The program comes with a beautifully printed orienteering map ind a long, but clear, explanatory booklet. The screen displays various topographical features and, using the map, you have to negotiate the nurse.

Thus, The Forest is not merely a game, but an help introduce people to map-making and the relation between maps and the physical features they represent. As the program notes say, this program will be of particular interest to students and teachers of geography as well as armchair orienteerers.

Plunder is a strategy game from Cases Computer Simulations. Set in 1587, the year before the Spanish Armada set sail, the game gives you the opportunity to be an English privateer whose task is to prevent gold from the New World getting back to Spain. You must also be more successful than your deadly rival Sir Francis Drake. There is more to this than mere yo-ho-ho and a bottle of rum; you must weigh up the chances of success in taking on merchant, troop and warships. Too much damage or too many lost crew and the game is up; it's Davy Jones' locker for you.

Camelot, an adventure-game from the same company, is not quite so good. As Arthur Pendragon you have been banished from Camelot by the Black Knight. Understandably you want to get back; who knows what Lancelot and Guinevere are up to round the Round Table? You have some warriors and money to help you find the necessary seven items. There are graphic displays of landscapes and obstacles, unfortunately rather crude. The "evil magician" looks rather like a conjurer at a children's party.

Those Spectrum owners keen to develop the machine's graphics potential should look at Melbourne House's 48K Melbourne Draw. This program will take you on a tour of the Spectrum's graphics, allowing you to choose colours, draw, and store graphic displays.

Once you have drawn your picture, you might want to make it say something, in which case you are referred to Abbex's Supertalk which, with no extra hardware, will enable your Spectrum to speak. The demo facility lets you hear Supertalk's Dalek-style voice exercising its small vocabulary. To enter your own vocabulary you record the words on tape and then feed them in, afterwards adjusting them to make sentences. First "Jolson Sings!" now "Spectrum Talks".

16/48K Spectrum
Novelty
£6.95
DK'Tronics

Blood-thirsty maziacs make your return trip to the adventurer's gold as uncomfortable as possible. For a successful outing you need plenty of swords, food and sound advice from the maze's hapless prisoners. Exciting, but luck often plays too large a role.