Producer: Taskset
Retail Price: £7.95
Language: Machine code
Author: The Taskset Team

Beyond the sun of Crenal lies the planet Megron. Its people were of genius 10; they practised both the art of sorcery and that of science. However their quest for knowledge became a dangerous obsession and they ventured into a realm of evil where they released the devastating power of Darkon. The people live in terror. Will they be the next to suffer the curse of Darkon? Only you and your faithful robotic friend, Komputa can free the people from this tyranny. But can you succeed where so many have failed?

Souls of Darkon is already in the shops on the Amstrad as I write, so whether or not you'll be able to buy the game in the high street is probably academic. The reasons for this game's acceptance by the shops is quite obvious as soon as you load up. Taskset have successfully met their task of taking the adventure and tidying it up. Gone are the messy lists of endlessly scrolling text and graphics. In their place we have here a neatly boxed-off picture set on the lower left hand side of the screen. Above this is the location description which does not budge an inch throughout quite an advantage over other adventures where you are constantly wondering where you are. Framed by the static picture and location description is a scrolling area carrying your input and the programs responses. The text has been clearly and atmospherically designed, in fact, what with the stylised, cartoon-like graphics, the whole program reveals a novel appearance.

One minor irritation is Task set's inability to get to grips with the Spectrum's input routine (the Amstrad version works just fine). Even when you are carefully typing the auto-repeat effect can catch you out with words like L O O O O K ending up on your scrolling list of past inputs (rather embarrassingly, the input recorded is the exact word you entered and not the word from the program's own word store).

Another gripe is an error which is common to many adventure instructions (Sorderon's Shadow did the very same thing last month). The error I refer to is the habit of listing a so-called example of the vocabulary going beyond the simple verb/noun couplings only to find that the program's input routine can't handle such a long sentence, for example, in this case, ATTACK THE WOODMAN WITH THE LUNAR AXE is too long to be accepted& Ac rious side effect of allowing the location description to remain on screen is the need for a LOOK command which tells you what you can see, eg a bottle, a mushroom, along with the exits. The reason for this, presumably, is the restriction of space on the location description. It may have been better to have made the adventurer work for his/her information with a more intelligent LOOK/EXAMINE command.

Programming the DELETE key to act without the need of the CAPS SHIFT is a nice touch as is the list of words in the vocabulary which comes up onto the screen and stays there while you try and match up some of the words from it.

Souls of Darkon is a very well presented adventure and a welcome change at a time when just about every mainstream adventure is Quilled. The cartoon-style graphics are very effective and suit the game well.

COMMENTS

Difficulty: easy to start, then the usual brick wall
Graphics: one colour - green-but attractive
Input facility: a little beyond verb/noun
Response: fast

Title: Souls Of Darkon
Publisher: Bug-Byte
Price: £2.99

Another re-release from the new budget Bug-Byte stable, Souls Of Darkon will already have been seen by lots of you so I'll keep the comments short. Darkon is the baddy in the land of Megron, where you've just landed with the faithful robotic friend Komputa, who hovers around you wherever you go. Destroying Darkon is obviously the mission, and while the adventure is not likely to be the hardest you'll ever come across, it's beautifully presented with plenty of simple but good graphics screens and a very friendly vocabulary. In fact typing in VOCAB prints out a list of the verbs that the program recognises, saving those occasional frustrations, while there's plenty around to EXAMINE.

With coins, swords, crystal fountains and blacksmiths, there's nothing very original in the early stages of the game, but that doesn't matter as the whole thing is well presented. I just hope no hardline adventurers allow themselves to be put off by a program which includes ZAP in its word list!

Publisher: Taskset
Price: £7.95
Memory: 48K

Heading back into the realms of text adventure we now come to the planet Megron - not a headache cure. Here you find the decaying remains of a high-tech culture apparently destroyed at its apogee.

These Megronians were just too clever and managed to loose Darkon onto their unsuspecting world. He, or it, is the manifestation of all evil and hate and, within a short time after his freeing, has become the absolute ruler of Megron. The land is now returning to nature but over all broods the shadow of sorcery and terror.

You, a bionic warrior accompanied by a faithful droid Komputa, have been transported to this none too pleasant place to remove the problem of Darkon. You aren't the first and will come across the remains of your predecessor along with his mangled droid.

You will immediately find several knotty problems to solve. The opening section involves the gathering of objects such as the helmet of your predecessor, foodstuffs and equipment such as a hover belt, a ring and, somehow, a crystal which falls from a surveillance robot which you must zap before it sneaks on you. There is also a standing stone and an altar concealing unnamed treasure. The major task is to discover enough gold to bribe a guide to take you past Darkon's monolith and into his realm.

The presentation is slick and the interpreter reacts quickly. My only real moan about the input buffer is that keys will repeat too quickly and even a light tap will result in a long string of the same letter which then has to be erased.

The descriptions are concise and deliberately intended to make you 'look' a lot and examine articles. Don't assume that things aren't there because the description doesn't mention them - there is a lot of hidden detail. That applies particularly to houses. They have doors but you won't see that stated in the location text.

The problems are not all simple and you will need some ingenuity to progress very far. I did feel that this was tied up with a relatively limited vocabulary, the main verbs of which are displayed if you type 'vocab'.

The graphics are very fast and are displayed on the left of the screen. They will react to some of your actions - the surveillance robot, for instance, is shown both before and after zapping.

The presentation is attractive, despite the key repeat problem, and there is sufficient interest in the early section to get you involved and keen to solve the riddle of the altar and the monolith. There is also action and the problems of dealing with other creatures who are not ultra-communicative unless you find their particular need or interest. Not bad.

SUPPLIER: Taskset
MACHINE: Amstrad, Commodore 64, Spectrum 48k
PRICE: £7.95, cassette

The brief background story to this game is rather ludicrous, for you are cast as a bionic warrior on the planet Megron, laid waste by the evil Darkon. With nothing but a faithful robot watching over you, you are presumably (for it doesn't say as much) sent to find and overthrow Darkon.

The environment in which you find yourself will pass for good old mother Earth anyday, with trees and mushrooms, not to mention a log hut complete with woodman, the remains of a brewery, a blacksmiths, and the odd fountain and monument here and there.

The game takes a bit of getting used to, as the text is so horribly gothic that it is almost indecipherable at first.

The screen has an unusual layout, the top half describing the location in a narrative sort of way, with a picture below it to the left. The computer's replies are shown to the right of the picture, whilst the player's commands are entered at the bottom of the screen.

Since the descriptions are narrative, it is necessary to type LOOK for a list of exits and objects. There are three facilities for HELP. One is to simply type the word, but more often than not you will be referred to the other two methods: LEGEND and VOCAB. The latter is simply a list of the valid words, whilst LEGEND may tell you a bit about the background of the location.

The graphics are a let-down, consisting of blue line-drawings on a green background, but they are fast, and they do serve to identify where you are without the necessity of having to struggle through the location text.

There are a couple of characters to be found early in the game - a toiling woodman, and a guide. Both seem rather wooden, for I have not found a way to make them listen yet, let along engage in a useful conversation, despite paying the guide for a service - he just accepts the money and then continues to ignore me! Perhaps I am using the rather limited vocab in the wrong way.

There seems to be a glitch or two with the replies, as when having typed GO OUT to leave the hut, the 'narrative location' text told me I was hovering over a swamp, yet the picture showed I had remained in the hut, a fact confirmed by the subsequent reply to typing LOOK. One or two other strange messages appeared from time to time, as well.

For all that, the game is quite a good one when you get used to it.

Bug-Byte
£2.95

This game was released at Christmas by Taskset, and would have cost you eight pounds if you bought it then. Now, just seven months later, Taskset have disappeared and it's re-released for three pounds, a far more suitable price.

You land on the planet Megron. With only Komputa, your robot, to help, you must destroy Darkon, The Evil One, who is using the awesome power of combined sorcery and science to enslave the people.

On loading you immediately notice the superb presentation. At the screens top is the location description, which is usually well written if not particularly informative, and remains static; as does the picture on the left. Your commands are entered at the bottom, and are scrolled up with appropriate responses and messages in the remaining screen space. Colour is perfectly used to emphasize the text, and there's an attractive character set. The good effect is spoilt somewhat when you start to type. The input routine repeats letters too fast, even when you tap the keys lightly, so commands like 'ZZAPP ROOBOT" are common.

The graphics are.. .different. They are green and black, and appear rather wishy wash and easily disregarded. Still, they are instant and hi-resolution, generally well drawn, and often respond to your actions which is a pleasant surprise.

Science fiction is such a hackneyed adventure theme that to hold my interest the game must be special. This one stands out because the technological mumbo-jumbo is blended effectively into the fallen civilisation of Megron, which has reverted to a simple, medieval style life yet still retains futurist sculptures and surveillance robots.

An atmosphere of bleak oppressiveness is created by the endless rain, the ancient ruins and strange relics. EXAMINE and LOOK must be used frequently to reveal important information, although the responses aren't always helpful. A command I liked was LEGEND, which, when used in certain places, describes their often sinister history and purpose.

That command is not mentioned in the instructions however, which are appalling. They're incredibly brief, don't explain unusual commands like ZAP, and are mostly nonsensical. To quote: "ENTER the commands. You will need to enter specific commands... SAVE saves your current position". The scenario is incoherent, and doesn't explain your powers enough or Komputa's function.

As with all the adventures reviewed this month, vocabulary is too limited at under 50 verbs. The parser is finicky about what it will accept and in particular character interaction is too difficult. Finding the right noun to examine is also tricky, and to enter buildings you must open a door which isn't mentioned in the text.

There are problems aplenty, some challenging, some obvious, and some a little too obscure. The vocabulary makes them harder, and the pedantic parser provides no indication of whether you have the right idea.

These faults are sadly common to a many recent adventures. Despite them, Darkon is an entertaining game which is sufficiently cheap for me to recommend to more experienced adventurers. Certainly one of the best budget adventures.