Producer: HAWK
Retail Price: £3.50
Author: M Adams & M Kennedy

I had a quick read of the letter accompanying this one, and if I got the facts right, HAWK is an acronym standing for Home Adventure Writing Korporation. The three-man team (the third is an Andrew Sherlock Heads who is chief tester) are only sixteen years of age - pretty good going when you consider this Quilled, lllustratored and Patched game isn't too bad at all - certainly one of the most professional mail order games received this month.

The inlay is of a professional standard, the storyline is most readable and the program skips along nicely. There's also a crafty bit of marketeering going on here (must be those business awareness lessons they have in schools in front of the news cameras) whereby the first 25 people to complete this trip to the almost forgotten Atlantis get a free crack at their next release. I would, however, take issue with one piece of business bureaucracy that should be left in the textbooks - allowing 28 days for delivery went out with the slide-rule in every office except those in the public sector (and estate agents of course, how do they get away with it?). Boys, unless you're training for a life in the Civil Service, I would send out games by return of post.

As you might glean from the intro, this is a cut above your usual mail order game; take the option of Side A and its black print on white background for masochists and the Side B option of restful yellow on black - yummy! The character set is clearly redesigned, which is a blessing after all the unreadable scrolls I've struggled through in recent months.

The story behind this one reads well, so let's have a look at it... Reports from the earth monitoring satellite, Intelsat, have pinpointed a source of radiation somewhere in the mid-Atlantic. Co-ordinates obtained from radio-thermal scans suggest a man-made source - yet there is no land within a thousand miles of the area! It is your good self who first propounds the theory of the lost city of Atlantis. and you become interested in the myths of Neptune and the Power Trident as told by that Greek raconteur. Plato.

The Trident gained its energy by concentrating a power from the green rays of the planet Neptune, giving the Sea God the ability to control the elements. Neptune descended to the depths for eternity, but left his trident in the hands of the Atlanteans. This great civilisation designed a vast security complex to house the treasure, and it has remained there ever since. Clearly, if you could grasp the trident and bring it back to England, the reality of Atlantis would be proven and your wealth assured. A light aircraft takes you to the scene of the radiation, and flying through dense grey clouds, you at last see the lost city, far below and basked in apparent sunshine.

You begin with an imaginative representation of a beach, which is smartly boxed in - showing a rather clean-cut and attractive screen image with the yellow on black option. Now, being a bit of a berk, or perhaps in the endeavour to explore all pathways, I went about the business of climbing into my Douglas light aircraft, inserting the key, pressing the button and shooting off for home. Unfortunately, I hadn't attempted the adventure and did not have the trident - but at least me telling you this saves you the bother of climbing into the cockpit straight away.

Having decided to at least have a quick look round Atlantis, I got on with the adventure, heading off east into the coastal forest with its low bushes and exotic berries. Examining the berries revealed them to be medicinal fruit, but picking them up wasn't acknowledged with the age-old OK, instead you have to resort to checking your inventory. So now you have a small key and a machete (from the start) and the exotic fruits. I don't think I'm giving anything away when I say that the machete is used to hack away the undergrowth around the ancient Atlantean temple, but getting over the precipitous edge of the lava pit there might prove a little more tricky. The path to the city of Atlantis lies another way.

The city of Atlantis is a highly advanced one - its marvellous structures and buildings are enclosed in a huge glass dome which is used to regulate temperature and climate. The urban area is divided up into blocks or sectors. Notable examples are the Cultural and Civilian sectors (neither title sounding appropriate when 'A robot dog comes up to you, lifts one of its legs and proceeds to oil all over your feet!'). Galleries and Museums are to be found in the Cultural Sector, while homes, gardens and parks lie within the Civilian Sector. The Atlanteans themselves are a kind and gentle race, who refrain from any sort of violence. Even so, crime does exist, hence all citizens wear identity tags which bear the symbol of the trident. These tags are inspected by robots who soon have you looking in from outside the perimeter fence should you be found without one. Avoiding anti-social mechanical dogs and robots, you will still find the city's drunks bumping into you, but you can wreak revenge by stealing some loose change from the people of the street on Beggar's Corner.

Forgotten City is a superb adventure for a game only available mail order from (HAWK ADVENTURING, 29 Hollowgate, Barnburgh, South Yorks DN5 7BH). The location descriptions aren't particularly long and evocative, and the vocabulary can be strict on occasions, but it has many strong points - not least of which is its ability to skip along merrily while keeping the adventurer thoroughly engaged. A sophisticated job lads, but really, I would consider putting back the deadline for your competition; I think February 1 is a bit early - for this review if nothing else!

COMMENTS

Difficulty: straightforward
Graphics: imaginative and colourful
Presentation: good options
Input facility: verb/noun
Response: fast Quill response

Another well-above-average adventure comes in the shape of Forgotten City! from Hawk Adventuring, and here too the graphics are very well produced - the amount of detail could explain why there aren't too many of them. The forgotten city of the title is Atlantis - if you can remember what that's famous for. If not, the excellent and professionally printed instructions will help you out. It seems that there are reports of radiation seeping out from somewhere mid-Atlantic, and you've gone to investigate 'cos if this is the lost city of Atlantis, there could be valuable treasure to be had in the shape of Neptune's famed trident. Well, you don't think you're risking radiation just for the sake of mankind, do you? We adventurers always like a little treasure to spur us on.

Once you've landed on a beach, the only way into the city that you find is via an underground cave network where a strangely-coloured river gives you radiation sickness before you can get very far. I tried eating the medicinal berries but they're obviously not that medicinal. Nor could I push, pull or otherwise move the switch in the decontamination room. Curses! I did wonder if maybe the vocabulary wasn't as extensive as it might be, but the network of locations show that the game itself is pretty extensive - at least as far as I was able to get before my nails crumbled, my hair fell out and I was no longer the pretty sight I normally am. (Since when? Ed)

Forgotten City! I has all the commands we know and love from games done on Quill, Illustrator and Patch, and I don't know how the loading screen was done, but that too is worth seeing, and the game itself is well worth buying.

MACHINE: Spectrum
SUPPLIER: Hawk Adventuring; 29 Hallowgate, Barburgh, DN5 7BH
PRICE: £3.50

Reports from an earth monitoring satellite have pinpointed a source of radiation coming from the open sea in the Atlantic. You become convinced that these emanate from the legendary lost city of Atlantis, and become interested in the many myths surrounding it if Atlantis does exist, then so might Neptune's Power Trident!

Here you get the chance to explore Atlantis, in this Quilled graphic adventure. Neatly presented on screen, with some nice detailed pictures and a smart character set, this is an above average home grown adventure.

Despite my own reservations about Atlantis, which I always thought to be under the Mediterranean (didn't the invading Treen spaceship blow up and let the Atlantic in through the Straights of Gibraltar? - Dan Dare. Eagle, December 8th, 1950) here is exceptionally good value for money.