Shadowlands - Domark RRP œ27.99-œ29.99
               (RPG for ST, Amiga and PC)

         A third opinion By James Judge on an STe
           (And a brief preview of Shadoworlds)

After reading G. L. Wheeler's second opinion I felt I must
disagree with him about the magic system.  To begin with it may be
cumbersome but after a while it becomes easier and easier. The
only difficult (or should I say time-consuming) part of spell
casting is the transference of magic force. But this action can be
cut down in the time it takes to perform by placing 'spare' or
'unwanted' items in the wizard's backpack then you can easily (a
matter of seconds) place, say a stick, in the wizard's hand, drain
it of its magic force, put it back in his inventory, recharge the
scroll and you will still have plenty of time to aim and fire at
the monsters. This is only possible due to the speed the enemies
move and if they did move any faster you would be right in it!

I honestly don't know what I am doing that is different from what
G.L.Wheeler is but as soon as I came across the Waterball spell on
level three, I was able to use it straight away!?!? (I was only
using the occasional Light spell and a Fireball or two to decimate
the occasional monster).

To overcome the problem of killing your own men with spells have
your party in this order -

                        1) Main Warrior
                        2) Main Wizard
                        3) Other Character
                        4) Other Character

so when you do come across an enemy it is easy to move your
Warrior to the side, lob a few spells, then go wading in with your
three other characters. This way all of your characters get
experience and suffer minimal damage. If you come across a bow,
give it to your priest and have your party in this order -

                1) Wizard       2) Priest
                2) Warrior      3) Other Character

This allows you to use magic and the bow without damaging your
other characters. Then attack with the two rear people, change the
priest's weapon to a sword or something and attack with him. While
this is going on recharge your wizard's scrolls and have him act
as a rear guard ready with a fireball or two.

I do, however, agree with the point about those annoying rats
(scorpions on later levels). I, personally, think that they should
not have been included in the game or if they were, less numerous
- or at least a little bit killable.  It's extremely aggravating
seeing your party's life force gradually being drained away by
something you can do NOTHING about! (Except move your party, or
individual characters around).

The graphics, later on in the game, do change but not for the
first five levels.  They are basically the same walls and floors
coloured differently and on one of the levels you also have
statues scattered around the walls. Also the rats have changed to
scorpions and (I think) snakes.

Although most of the magazines gave this game their highest award
I must say this game is complete and utter rubbish! (My friend who
gave this to me also gave it a few of his favourite expletives).

Shadowlands follow-up - Shadoworlds - does look better from what
I've seen. It is set in the future where weapons in the galaxy
have been banned but, as you might have guessed, it hasn't stopped
a certain colony producing these machines of mass destruction
(guns, swords and the like). When Earth lost contact with them
they got a touch worried so they sent four burly commandos out to
the colony and these commandos are under your control.  You can
choose from eighteen different characters to make up your team
and, what makes a nice change is that they are not all male and
all human! They also have strange traits to boot (one woman hates
all people with ginger hair) so you must pick your team carefully
so they get on with each other!

As with Shadowlands your commandos start off with nothing in the
way of equipment but there are plenty of things just lying around
for you to get your mitts on.

Instead of magic force you now have batteries which power the
lights the commandos start off with and the weapons.

Photoscape is (unfortunately) used once again in this game.

This does look as if it is an improvement to the original but
whether it is any good gamewise is yet to be seen...