Memory: 48K
Price: £5.95

Most adventure players will begin their travels by exploring and then constructing a consistent location map. If the locations are variable, appearing first in one spot then another, it may well cause considerable irritation at any point in the game.

Paradox from Runesoft seems to make a virtue of that problem. The insert claims that the magical world created in the program is full of nightmare and hallucination. Realities, and locations, change constantly.

How this has been achieved on the Quill interpreter is difficult to see but it certainly militates against the urge to explore. The reviewer after perishing miserably, quickly, on more than 50 occasions, soon lost his patience with the world of Paradox.

The program is a pure text adventure divided, we are told, into four main sections. They are the Tunnel, where death may well be the happiest way out, since quitting is not allowed; the Gamesboard, the Crystal Palace and the Rooms of the Magician. The Lords of Chaos have chosen you to guide their disorientated hero. Chaos certainly rules the program and you will need persistency and clairvoyance to get anywhere.

48K Spectrum
£7.50
Runesoft

There has been a surge in the number of Spectrum adventures, due mainly to the availability of Gilsoft's "The Quill" adventure generator. Paradox is such a Quill produced program, and a pretty interesting one it is too.

The environment you are invited to roam is divided up into four main areas: the Tunnel - where you start - the Gamesboard, the Crystal Palace, and the Magicians' Rooms. One feature of this adventure is that it only tells you of exits other than the one that leads back to whee you have just come from - and even then, you can't always guarantee that you'll be able to return the way you came.

The Tunnel is what you would anticipate - various interconnected chambers where you'll find useful objects or sudden death. You can't afford to fiddle around too long - a raging thirst drives you to find water.

The Gamesboard will provide clues and riddles - unless you solve them, you won't gain access to the Crystal Palace.

With 150 different locations and puzzles and paradoxes a'plenty, this text adventure may well keep you occupied until Christmas.