Producer: Gilsoft
Memory Required: 48K
Retail Price: £5.95
Language: Machine code
Author: Paul Styles

Mindbender starts straight off after loading without any clear instructions as to what to do, or what is expected of you. You find yourself sitting in a small office pursuing the everyday tasks of your humdrum existence. There's a phone, a desk diary and a quill pen (!). Opening the diary, you see a proverb for the day which says, 'They who live longest will see most.'

Suffice it here to say, that after a few sensible moves, all becomes explained, and an instruction page appears informing you that you have become a victim of the Mindbender Machine. This is a powerful computer-controlled device which has fallen into the hands of a revolutionary group who aim to control the world by manipulating the thought patterns of the population. However, due to your incredible mental ability you have proved to be immune, which makes you an enemy of the rebels. Now you are to be thrown into their underground prison complex, and your avowed intent is to escape, and destroy the Mindbender Machine and save humanity.

This seems a little difficult to do when you find yourself stripped naked in a bare cell with a door and no handle...

COMMENTS

Response: instant
Graphics: text only

Mindbender is a text-only adventure but makes up for lack of graphics by being RAM packed with a dry sense of humour and a knowledge that a good adventure is one with a lot of things to do. And you don't have to wait much beyond the teasing pre-instruction sequence to find action all the way, as you do find your way out of the cell in a most lethally surprising way. The exploration that follows is both extended and wittily exciting, but beware of reading the small print...

The author has taken a risk with this adventure of kicking it straight off without an introduction. Still it is called Mindbender, so a little mental effort solves the problem and leads into to one of the most convoluted, entertaining adventures I have played in a while. The atmosphere is quite different from that of Africa Gardens, but it really works. Locations are easily moved between with a little care and thought, and this game does not suffer from a lack of things to do or places to get to. It effortlessly conveys the idea of using a lift (there are lots) with a sequence which tells you, the doors close... the doors open, and then tells you where you are. Like a good novel the action descriptions are to the point and very sudden. I was thrilled by the way I got out of the cell and past the first guard! Mindbender should provide hours of fun before the quest is solved, and at first it's fun simply to explore and see the satirical use to which so many familiar things have been put. Excellent.

Mindbender offers a diet of screaming guards. electronic scanners, torture rooms complete with old copies of Sinclair Users to read while waiting for that chilling ommand: "NEXT!". A whiff of James Bond seems to follow you round the heavily guarded corridors and lifts of the Mindbender complex. It also goes to show that text-only adventures can really work well, when they're scripted properly. As a result, this one is exceptionally entertaining, it doesn't force you to keep thinking in ridiculous circles all the while, and despite the unfriendly attitude of all involved, the game has a friendly feel. Very playable, and very good value.

IMAGINATION UNLIMITED

Is Gilsoft weak Quilled? Quentin Heath thinks not.

The Quill, an adventure game generator from Gilsoft, has evoked a mixed reaction from critics. The technical excellence of the program is not disputed but its spawn, the games compiled using it, have been treated with suspicion by both seasoned adventure players and critics.

The critics have been quick to say that the plethora of games generated by The Quill, and released by Gilsoft and others, are almost identical in structure and, in many cases, futile and uninventive. The argument is that anything which has been cloned from another program will be inferior to a program which has been handwritten from beginning to end.

Rather than taking the well-worn path and examining The Quill again, I decided to look at the final products from that program which Gilsoft has called the Gold Collection.

The adventures in the Gold series are varied in content and complexity. The six titles are Spyplane, a story of espionage; Magic Castle and Barsak the Dwarf, which lie in the Dungeons and Dragons field; Mindbender, for science fiction enthusiasts, African Gardens, an adventure for lovers of mystery; and Diamond Trail, for the specialist in detection and whodunnits.

Most of the adventures are easy to play but in an irritating way. A case in point is Barsak the Dwarf. You play Barsak, who must search an ancient castle for nine treasures and a visitors' book which you must sign to leave alive. According to the critics the game would be simply a case of wandering round a maze of locations, built around a standard structure, but The Quill is so versatile that it allows a designer to build extra facilities into an adventure.

For instance, in Barsak the author has created a sttuat ion where the main character will die unless he can find food within 17 moves. Once food has been found, in a lar of pickles, a quest for water must begin.

Barsak contains a quest within a quest. The dwarf must look continually for food while searching for treasure. There is no end, except for the limitations of memory space, to the number of quests which can be built into one package.

One criticism of The Quill which can be sustained is that the program has to put some restrictions on the way in which an adventure runs so that it can operate. The Quill limits input to a compiled program to one line at a time. For most entries needing one verb and a noun, that would be sufficient but if, for instance, you want to pick up more than two objects you must select the first two and press 'ENTER', then the second two, and follow the same process until all the objects have been collected. That seems to be the only instance in which The Quill affects an adventure in an adverse way.

To show the types of adventure The Quill can produce I compared Barsak to another adventure from the Gold series, Spyplane. The plot is certainly different and concerns a search for submarines which you see from your aircraft. By comparing the HELP and INVENTORY functions with those of Barsak you can see the differences between the two programs instantly.

Spyplane is more developed as an adventure. The descriptions are lengthy and the INVENTORY has been used more as an additional HELP sheet than as a list of equipment. For instance, you are told about the state of the instruments on that page.

The author has also built in an instructions option which gives hints on how to play a particular part of the game. With HELP you must take pot luck on a reply but INSTRUCTIONS is more informative.

Spyplane is more difficult to play than Barsak as you find yourself in an aircraft and are told very little about what you have to do. By using the instruments you will learn more about your task but at the risk of alerting the enemy.

The descriptions of the terrain are evocative but not over-long. There are no spelling mistakes in the text, which is more than can be said for some handwritten textual adventures.

Spyplane is also supplied with a leaflet showing a map of the area in which your aircraft is flying. That is a necessity, as you cannot use graphics, a growing area in adventure games, with The Quill. No doubt some people would find the lack of graphics, where necessary, a fault with the program. It could, however, be argued that setting-up graphics occupies much space within memory which could be used for more text and locations. The lack of graphics facilities in The Quill is therefore, a benefit to users in the long run.

Looking at The Quill it may be possible to see the way in which an adventure is fitted over a pre-defined grid of locations each time a game is created but the games produced by it hide the mechanical creation process well. It is a case of not being able to see the seams of an adventure, because of the way the author has the imagination to create something different. It is, after all, the programmer and not the program which controls the way a game progresses.

The limitations of The Quill are only those of formatting the screen and the way responses are put into the computer. The Quill is adaptable enough to cope with new ideas of the programmer, such as an instruction function in Spylane or the continual quests for food and drink in Barsak the Dwarf. Neither are there restrictions on the storyline. Games could be set in fictional or realistic surroundings - the program does not differentiate.

Essentially The Quill offers the programmer a new high-level language rather like Basic. Although Basic has only a set number of statements, the number of applications to which you can apply the language are endless and restricted only imagination.

In the proper hands, The Quill produces programs on a par with handwritten commercial programs and it is that qualification which has to be made clear. The Quill is a tool, just as is Basic. With skilled use it can do wonders.

This is one of the Golden Collection from Gilsoft, written using the Quill system. There's a whole lot of them, but the title of this one took my fancy.

Apart from a rather effective "title page", the game is text only and comes with no instructions in the inlay other than how to load.

The first location begs a course of action which is demanded rather than logical and the consequences are pure fantasy! At this point the objective is revealed.

Immediately this part has been played out, the Adventurer has a problem to solve, which is really a matter of getting the right order of actions for the desired effect - to escape a prison cell.

Once the door is open, things start to get really difficult - difficult until the right word is found. And so, after many attempts, I lost my location details, and thought I'd better have another look around.

This time I'm SURE I'm right! You can't look or examine anything, or regain your location details - unless the required instruction is extremely obscure. And as I said - there ARE instructions.

Once out of the cell, there are some interesting places to wander about and that's just what I did. The game does seem to wander rather, instead of concentrating the mind on a particular problem. I wandered around until I fell down an unseen and unmentioned hole, and got killed off.

HELP gives the reply "What do you think this is - the Hobbit?" and score tells you "England 0 Wales 0". Yes - one of THOSE games! Competent, but not out of the ordinary.

Mindbender is for the 48k Spectrum from Gilsoft, priced £5.95.

BUT WHERE IS WAYNE FONTANA

MAKER: Gilsoft
MACHINE: Spectrum 48K
FORMAT: cassette
PRICE: £5.95

Adventure fan Paul Styles wrote this puzzler with the Quill, and Gilsoft were so impressed that they marketed it! Being a 'fan' rather than a 'professional' author, perhaps Paul has kept his tongue firmly planted in his cheek as this adventure's descriptions and responses show a splendid sense of humour.

It all started in the office where I spend my "ordinary humdrum existence", furnished with just a telephone, a desk diary and (Aha!) a quill pen. Suddenly the phone rang! I answered the insistent purr to a listing voice which declared (a la Max Boyce) "Croeso y Cymru". The room span, my world vanished and I recovered consciousness inside a closed cell in the huge complex of Mindbender. Alone, unarmed, I had to seek out and destroy the terrible threat.

Paul has ignored some of the Quill's visual presentation (viz. highlighted directions and objects) in favour of the plainer Artic-style, and made singular but effective use of sound.

Not the most difficult of adventures so far, but an excellent introduction for novice adventurers: even seasoned veterans should find enough to keep them entertained. Anyway, I must get back to the kitchens and that food...

MAKER: Gilsoft
MACHINE: 48K Spectrum
PRICE: £5.95

Mindbender is another riot in cell block 11 opus. Having been warped through a telephone wire by an unintelligible Welshman (painful), you're casually entombed in an underground prison complex, captive of a dastardly bunch intent on world domination. Streaked with humour and free sudden death routines and cheap-shot mazes, Mindbender is quite a lark. For example those that dare ask for help are chastised with a terse: "What do think this is The Hobbit?" message. Expect more info as I wade deeper.

Gilsoft has demonstrated its faith in its adventure designer program, The Quill, by producing a series of adventures which have been written with its help. Each adventure is excellent and there is great variety in the series.

Africa Gardens is set in a haunted hotel, where voices can be heard in the next room but people can never be seen. Each unnerving location is described in depth and certain sections are illustrated. It is largely an adventure of exploration in which objects found help with movement to other locations.

Mindbender runs along very different lines. The player begins in an office notable only for its lack of interest. One movement, though, sends the bemused player into an intricate Welsh adventure.

Barsak the Dwarf demonstrates the ability of The Quill to set a time limit on an action. Soon after the game begins the player becomes hungry and must find a jar of pickles before starving. Once that problem has been overcome, thirst rears its ugly bead. Again, it is a good adventure but it does not reach the standard of Castle Blackstar, to which it is remarkably similar.

Diamond Trail is possibly the tightest-written adventure on the market. Every object has a use and every location must be visited at least once. Once again, hunger sets in early and there is also a homicidal maniac chasing you with a gun.

Another problem is that taking certain objects results in your being arrested. Can you survive to eat the hamburger, let alone solve the quest? One difficulty occurs late in the game. The author has been unfairly sneaky inside the railway station and once you are there you have almost finished the adventure. Save the game before presenting your ticker or you may find yourself having to repeat the entire adventure.

All in all, an excellent series of very different adventures, produced by Gilsoft, 30 Hawthorn Road, Barry, South Glamorgan, price £5.95 each.