Battlemaster - PSS/Mirrorsoft RRP œ24.99
               (Fantasy, strategy game)

The world of the Four Kingdoms is in turmoil. The four races of
orc, human, elf and dwarf, are continually engaged in battle. Orcs
hate everyone, humans don't like anyone but hate orcs the most,
elves hate dwarves and orcs and dwarves hate elves and orcs.  It
doesn't sound too promising.... Only one thing can save the land -
the four largest shards from the Keystone of Life, shattered into
fragments many years before by the first King, Aran, must be
reunited.

The Keystone of Life originally adorned Arun's crown, but now each
of the four pieces is set into the crowns of the kings of each of
the warring races. Once the fragments have been collected, they
must be taken to the mysterious Watcher who dwells in Arun's
abandoned Tower and then a new age of peace and harmony will
begin.

You play the hero who must undertake this daunting task and at the
start of Battlemaster, you have a choice of 16 characters to play
- four individuals from each of the races. Some are thieves,
others magicians, warriors or merchants. Each will have a varying
number of accompanying troops at the start of the game.  Whichever
character you pick, you will have to travel through a large number
of scenarios to come, eventually, to the areas which hold the
shards.  Some regions are controlled by members of your own race
and in this case you can hire extra troops through the PARLEY icon
and also buy objects. In areas inhabited by a friendly race you
can choose to pay a small amount to get safe passage to the next
scenario. These options are, naturally, only possible if you have
enough gold to pay!

If you don't choose safe passage, you'll just have to fight your
way through, using a combination of long-range and melee weapons.
In each scenario, there are various problems to solve. These may
involve finding hidden areas, a key to unlock a door or finding a
particular route to avoid setting off pit traps or transporters.

Meanwhile your troops, if you have any, will follow you round,
doing their own thing. For example if you are attacked, they'll
fight back without being ordered to. In fact, if they have a lot
of successful kills, their morale will be so high that they'll
dash off to look for more opponents to attack! On the other hand,
if their morale drops, say through some of them being killed, they
will run from fights or lag behind you. This is where part of the
strategy element comes in. There are options available to rally
your troops to you and to get them into one of several formations,
such as wedge, column, line and also to select your position in
the group. Picking the right formation and tactics may mean the
difference between success or failure.

Once a scenario has been completed, the PARLEY icon will change
into a TRAVEL icon. Selecting this will bring up a world map,
showing which scenarios can be entered next.

As well as the normal inhabitants, monsters can be present in some
scenarios. These can be lesser monsters eg giant spiders, giant

monsters such as scorpions and various undead or magical
creatures. To aid you in your quest, extra weapons, wands, armour
and other useful items such as holy weapons, gems and the like can
be discovered and used.

The game screen is shown in slightly-angled perspective with the
playing area on the left and icons on the right. The graphics are
small and sometimes confusing. If you are playing an elf in an
elvish scenario, accompanied by a troop of elves and get attacked,
your leader is (as always during the game) shown with a red arrow
above his head but what of all these other elves? Which are yours
and which are the enemy? After all, you don't want to attack your
own troops!

However, the game plays very well with the early scenarios being
understandably easy and relatively simple to solve. Later, of
course, things get more complicated and the battles harder to win,
but the first few stages are sufficient to familiarize yourself
with the controls and, to a certain extent, the tactics involved.

I don't know how many different scenarios stand between the hero
and his goal but going by the map provided by the game, quite a
high number...about 50. Though the game includes many arcade
sequences because of the battles involved, I found it surprisingly
enjoyable. Usually anything like that fills me with dread but the
difficulty level at the start was easy enough to encourage me. I
wouldn't expect it to appeal to everyone but I think a lot of
people who normally wouldn't touch a game like this with a
bargepole will be as impressed as I was.

One final thing, not only is the disk double-sided but your save
disk must be too. Neither of these points is mentioned anywhere
in or on the packaging. 

                                            Sue