Producer: Legend
Memory Required: 48K
Recommended Retail Price: £14.95
Language: machine code

Before you can start playing Valhalla it's worth ploughing through the readable instruction booklet, not only to find out what you can do, when and where, but also to meet some of the more important characters who partake of your adventure.

The book tells you that you can have great fun simply watching Valhalla, and issuing commands to the characters. This turns out to be true in part. Life in the Nordic haven carries on much like Coronation Street with the inhabitants quarreling, fighting each other, offering food and generally behaving as if they were in the Rover's Return. But in the end this palls and you feel itchy to get into the action. There are six quests to find special objects; ofnir (a key), drapnir (a ring), skornir (a shield), skalir (a sword), Felstrong (an axe) and frimnir (a helmet).

Finding these magical objects is not simple, and some, if discovered, must be deposited safely as you can't carry all of them together. Added to that, if you die, which happens easily enough, you are sent to Hell (not to 'would you like another game') which turns out to be a location or two away from the more ordinary delights of Asgaard of whatever. Unfortunately if you go to Hell most of the things you've collected are removed from you and distributed randomly around the various locations, so you have to start all over.

When this is seen in the context of coping with large numbers of beings who are either well or badly disposed towards you, you begin to realise the complexity of even surviving in Valhalla, let alone finding the hidden objects. Getting on with our fellow Valhallans is surprisingly realistic. Unlike The Hobbit you can't type in 'Say hello to Elrond,' and expect a happy response but you can offer food or wine (which abounds - all over the floor), you can offer to sell or buy objects since you have money, swords, axes, shields etc. These are merely ordinary ones, not those you are questing for. And you can start fights only too easily.

All this activity is clearly visible in the remarkable graphics. Well drawn and highly detailed backgrounds form the scene in which the animated characters move around. If you type in, 'drink the wine', you will see 'yourself' raise the flagon to 'your' lips. At times it can be like Piccadilly Circus on a weekend as characters arrive and exit by the bus load.

Moving from location to location is simply a question of entering the compass point direction and a WHERE command will always supply the visible exits if you have forgotten them. Moving around within a location is done by the use of 'l' and 'r'. In some locations there are celestial undergrounds. If you have managed to pick up a ring (ordinary type) you can use these ringways to get to another location. Although if you're drawing a map of Valhalla, this can be less than useful, since you don't know where you are when you get there.

GENERAL

Valhalla comes complete with very good instructions. Loading time is four minutes. Keyboard response is fast, and a useful function is that you can type in commands at any time. If an action of some sort is taking place the computer waits and then processes your command when ready.

COMMENTS

Keyboard play: excellent
Use of colour: subtle and complex, excellent
Graphics: excellent
Sound: average

Compared to any other adventure game I've seen, the graphics of Valhalla are fabulous. It seems incredible that they have managed to pack so much detail into 48K. The scenery has a real sense of depth.

Considering how much detail there already is in the backgrounds, I'm astonished that the animation of the characters is as detailed as it is. I think my favourite is the Raven, who flaps his way in and lands occasionally. My basic disappointment with Valhalla stems from its coldness. Despite all the things "you" can do, the life of the place seems to go on without you. Apart from dying of starvation I found I could stand still for ages and no one bothered with me. There's a touch of a travelogue about it all - just walking about seeing things and eating loads of food. I think it might have had a better impact if there was more danger immediately.

A lot of program, no doubt about it, but much less excitement than I thought there would be. Still, if you like adventure games, this one is going to keep you occupied for hours and hours.

Producer: Legend, 48K
£14.95 (1)

Valhalla is much too lengthy and complicated to go into in a brief review. It boasts the best animated graphics in an adventure yet, numerous locations, lots and lots of inter-reactive characters who carry on with or without you, and kill each other off all over the place. Interrupt-operated text input allows you to type in commands while other actions are taking place and the program accepts quite complicated sentences. There are six separate but linked quests, although much fun may be had just living life as it comes in Valhalla. Accompanied by an excellent book which tells you all you need to know in no-nonsense language. Expensive but worth it, although there were mixed feelings about the ultimate value of the game's central objectives. Overall CRASH rating 82% M/C.

Producer: Legend, 48K
£14.95 (1)

Valhalla is much too lengthy and complicated to go into in a brief review. It boasts the best animated graphics in an adventure yet, numerous locations, lots and lots of inter-reactive characters who carry on with or without you, and kill each other off all over the place. Interrupt-operated text input allows you to type in commands while other actions are taking place and the program accepts quite complicated sentences. There are six separate but linked quests, although much fun may be had just living life as it comes in Valhalla. Accompanied by an excellent book which tells you all you need to know in no-nonsense language. Expensive but worth it, although there were mixed feelings about the ultimate value of the game's central objectives. Overall CRASH rating 82% M/C.

NEW PATHS EXPLORED IN NORSE ADVENTURE

Quentin Heath's latest round-up.

There is a change in direction for adventure games. The path taken so far by authors has been through text-only displays, which left a great deal to the imagination, through graphics adventures which looked like board games and then on to animated games.

The progression was by necessity rather than design. The first adventures were produced on large mainframe computers. The original Adventure, written by Crowther and Woods, occupied most of the memory capacity of one of those giant machines and included more than 200 locations. A micro version of the game is available from CP Software, Syrtis Software and Abersoft.

The reason it was text-only is that 10 years ago computers communicated mostly using teletypewriters or line printers. There was no room for graphics on those relatively primitive machines.

The arrival of the microcomputer and its reliance on fairly inexpensive television sets or visual display units gave adventure authors the opportunity for which they had been waiting. Few people, however, accepted the challenge of adding graphics to adventures.

There was a gap of at least two years before authors began to use the full potential of the machines. Until then users of micros had to tolerate text-only creations, such as the Artic adventures for the ZX-81 and the Spectrum.

The next step was into software which generated still pictures of some of the locations which could be visited during the game. That type included The Hobbit from Melbourne House, the Mysterious Adventures from Digital Fantasia and the illustrated games, such as Magic Mountain and Greedy Gulch from Phipps Associates.

A progression of the technique followed a few months later with the bunch of the Carnell Software Black Crystal for the ZX-81 and Spectrum. It is like a board game as it uses several maps of the terrain on which the player moves. In the proper circumstances the player can move into a castle on one of the maps and on to another map showing the castle interior.

Not content with that limited form of moving graphics adventure, some companies decided to go a step further and produce something which was a cross between the Hungry Horace cartoons and the original adventure game concept. The two companies to the fore of this move are Legend and Doric Computer Services.

Doric has produced Oracle's Cave, the Spectrum version of a ZX-81 game which bears some resemblance to the Wumpus-hunt type of adventures which were, at one time, all the rage in the ZX-81 market. It involves your player-character who has decided to explore a cave system in which an evil oracle stands guard over some treasure.

The exceptional aspects of the game include a set time limit of five game-days and the sprite animated graphics which depict your character and the monsters. As you move through the cave system the scenery scrolls up, down or sideways, depending on where you are going.

Valhalla from Legend, which is proving as popular as The Hobbit for many people, also uses animation. It is, however, closer to the original adventure goal of completing certain logical tests or solving some puzzles. Unlike Oracle's Cave, Valhalla also allows you to use English sentence structures to give commands to the characters.

Every scene in the adventure is shown graphically and when you ask a character to perform an action that character will move on the screen.

In many respects the game is more technically-advanced than The Hobbit, although much of the code is written in Basic. The graphics are drawn more quickly than those of The Hobbit and the characters taking part seem to have more independence.

Through a kind of time-sharing system between the gamer and the program it is possible for a player to be entering a command and for the computer to be moving one of the characters across the screen.

The author has used a novel command entry system. If part of the command is not in the command recognition database, or is unintelligible, the computer will mark it in red and not accept the command. It may, however, allow it to be entered and then make no reply to the player or forget about the last command.

The plot of Valhalla, in essence, is like that of Oracle's Cave. There are several quests you have to complete before you can go to the Norse warrior's Hell and live out the rest of your death.

You have to get a series of sacred objects, including a key, a helmet and an axe which will give you certain powers. To do so you have the help and the hindrance of the characters of Norse mythology including Thor, Odin and Loki. During the quest you have to eat and drink to stay alive.

The authors have not been content just to make your characters pick up food or drink on the screen. You can watch them put the bottle or meat to their mouths, mimicking the act of drinking or eating.

Next month I will be looking at Circus, an adventure from Digital Fantasia, and launching into the first part of the Penguin Korth Trilogy, Escape From Arkaron.

OLD GOLD?

One of the ways software publishers have breathed new life into old titles ie. more than six months since release, is to shove a few of them together on a tape for ten quid or so and call it something like 'Now that's what I call Software Solid Gold Hits II'. The truth about compilation tapes is that there are usually one or two goodish old games on them and a lot of dross.

Elite has launched a new range called Classics which gets around this problem by rereleasing the old games, singly, at a budget price - £2.99.

Elite is releasing one title a week, beginning on July 21, for the foreseeable future. Mostly they are old titles but there are a few new games thrown in here and there. Elite says the Classics label will feature only those of 'top quality'.

Looking at the first titles on Elite's release schedule I'd say they weren't entirely defined by the term but there are no absolute dodos and quite a few real bargains. The first four titles due between now and mid-August are all winners and well worth picking up if you missed them the first time round, or, as with Valhalla found them too pricey.

VALHALLA

One of the most controversial games ever released. For a time it looked like the start of something big for Legend, who developed it. Loved by some, hated by others, Valhalla was the first conscious attempt at a computer movie with animated figures representing different characters in a mythological saga of magical powers and bloody deeds.

You can communicate with each character in a form of conventional English syntax, telling them to pick up objects or give them to other characters, or go in a certain direction, or even start a fight.

The response you get to your instructions may partly depend on your previous actions and the personality involved.

Though the backgrounds have a certain sort of stylish coldness about them the foreground characters look rather simple being quite small and simply animated.

Nevertheless, I would say playing Valhalla is a unique sort of experience. You do get a feeling a little as though you are 'playing a movie', which after all was the intention.

Others, however, would declare the whole thing utterly tedious.

At £2.99 you can at last afford to form your own opinions - the original cost being £14.95 so whatever else it has to be a bargain.

KEEPING MARY AMUSED!

And now for something completely different! A graphics adventure where the action is played out before your very eyes!

Valhalla loads in a Spectrum under a striking title page and offers you six quests. These are to find special hidden objects: Ofnir (key), Drapnir (ring), Skornir (shield), Skalir (sword), Felstrong (axe) and Grimnir (helmet). These obnirs can only be discovronged in the above ordir.

The gameworld has a cast of dozens, and at any location you may expect to meet and perhaps cross swords with a range of gods and goddesses (including Mary), giants, dwarfs, wolves and dragons, of varying temperaments and abilities.

In search of the foreign objects, you move around issuing the usual Adventure commands, but may also play a 'wild card' by jumping on to a ringway if one is present. This is a magical method of transportation rather than a continuous urban dual carriageway, and to travel one you must be carrying, of course, a ring!

Where Valhalla is different from other graphical Adventures is in its display format - the screen is split into three bands.

On arrival at a location, the top half displays an excellent hi-res picture, drawn very quickly. I got the impression that these graphics were composed of modules, re-arranged to give many combinations of picture from the same blocks.

Next, the lower 25% shows the text replies, whilst the final band rather too slowly draws the characters and objects present. The centre band therefore appears to form a continuous picture with the top band, like a stage.

In some ways, this game is like Hobbit, for all the characters have a mind of their own, and appear, disappear, drop things and attack you and each other according to their whims. But unlike Hobbit, they actually move. Their little legs walk, they jump about whilst fighting, and lift their wine to their heads when they drink. As this happens, so a text commentary is written below. If you want to pick up an object, then your figure will walk across the screen and get it.

Of course, all this slows down the rate of play, but if you like watching it all happen, then you'll put up with that.

Valhalla has a range of special commands. WHO will list the characters in the text area, with an arrow pointing upwards to each image. WHAT will do the same for objects, HOW will tell you your current strength and so on. Should you type in anything untoward, you will be told Mary is not amused. A little fellow will walk on-stage, and in a very determined way approach you to remonstrate. This will cause your figure to blush severely!

Valhalla is written in Basic with some machine code routines. A look at the listing won't reveal much in the way of clues. And despite protection against looking at the listing, it is easy because, despite all the ballyhoo preceding its arrival, and a seven-strong production team, Valhalla has at least one bug, which will cause the program to stop and you to reload. But will YOU discover the words that crash the game?

Valhalla is from Legend, overpriced and overrated at £14.95.

Reviewer: Keith Campbell

MACHINE: Spectrum 48K
JOYSTICK: No
CATEGORY: Animated Adventure
SUPPLIER: Legend
PRICE: £14.95

Valhalla is perhaps the most ambitious games program yet released for the Spectrum.

Once upon a time we had ordinary text adventures. Then programmers began including graphics to illustrate the various locations. Next, they began improving the traditional two-word mode of communication.

The Hobbit took things a stage further with the introduction of characters which adopted a slightly different role each time the game was played.

Valhalla has all these features, but also shows the various characters on the screen doing the things described in the text.

If you enter the command GET HELMET, you will see the little stick character (which is you) walk across to the helmet.

Similarly, fights between different characters are shown, albeit in somewhat repetitive form.

Although this is extremely impressive, it has meant a sharp reduction in the number of different actions a character can perform.

There's little more than moving, getting and dropping objects, eating and drinking, opening chests or cupboards, and attacking.

There isn't any climbing, listening, running, shouting, or tapping.

This doesn't mean to say Valhalla is simple. It's extremely complex, mainly because there are 36 different characters involved, each with a different personality.

The world is that of the Nordic legends, and your task is to locate six special objects - a key, a ring, a shield, a sword, an axe, and a helmet.

There are a number of different locations, each of them shown in colour. Unfortunately, many of the pictures look similar, and I preferred the beautiful line drawings featured in The Hobbit.

I think The Hobbit also scores over Valhalla in the former's handling of language. Certainly Valhalla will accept some reasonably complex sentences such as: SELL HELMET TO MISTRA FOR 20 CROWNS or THROW LIGHTNINGS AT KLEPTO. But The Hobbit was even more impressive in this respect.

However, Valhalla gives more of the impression that it's being played in real time. If you don't do anything, other characters will - right before your eyes. So you can't afford to wait around for too long.

One word of warning. Valhalla is a difficult, daunting game - perhaps more so than other adventures. But if you're an experienced adventurer (and if you can afford the money) Valhalla will offer you many hours of novel and intriguing challenge.

LEGEND LIVES UP TO ITS NAME

MICRO: Spectrum 48K
PRICE: £14.95
FORMAT: Cassette
SUPPLIER: Legend, 1 Milton Road, Cambridge

About this time last year The Hobbit arrived and single handedly set the standard for adventure games to come, with its sophisticated mixture of advanced language analysis and beautifully detailed graphics. Now we have Valhalla.

Valhalla is undoubtedly a technical advance over its distinguished predecessor. Its characters exhibit far more independent life - who you choose as friends and who you help really does matter, in fact you won't even solve the first of Valhalla's six quests unless you have made one particular friend who I will leave you to guess.

Whether you regard Valhalla as superior to The Hobbit as a game will depend rather on your expectations. Valhalla is, in many important respects, quite different. There is no question in Valhalla of spending hours trying to rephrase the same command until the computer understands it, as there is with both Hobbit and the classic text adventures. A syntax editor would not allow you to enter anything the computer didn't have in its vocabulary which is listed for you in the manual.

Valhalla's problems are solved only by living in its world, making friends and enemies with the other 30 significant characters and learning from mistakes - maybe you will find Ofnir, the first quest object, but if Klepto is around... well that isn't his name by accident!

I finally managed to find the first object, Ofnir, after a) cheating (Legend, the game's makers gave me some clues) and b) spending around two hours trying to persuade one of the characters to do something - Valhalla is compulsive.

The most immediately remarkable aspect of Valhalla I have left until last: the graphics are animated. Every command you give, that isn't refused, has visual results. If you tell your character to drink he will pick up a wine jug and drink.

I recommend Valhalla without reservation. It makes some other programs look Neanderthal. The only point I would make is that you should not expect the equivalent of a standard text adventure with moving graphics. Valhalla is not like anything that has gone before.

One last thing, Valhalla has the funniest swear routine I've ever seen.

The second breakthrough in adventures following The Hobbit, Valhalla set new standards for the interaction of graphics and characters.

You are a minor Norse deity, and you must embark on a series of quests for special ritual objects. A large range of gods, godesses, giants, dwarfs and the like are also involved, represented on the screen as moving figures, fighting, eating and drinking. Each character may support good or evil with degrees of intelligence and strength, and to win their support you must convince them or your good - or bad - intentions. A sophisticated text interpreter and a strong plot rounds off a most unusual game.

Position 4/50