@~This section contains short reviews of the following games - @~Mystic Well (ST), What Personal Computer (PC), Sleuth (ST). @~Lure of the Temptress (3rd opinion, PC) and Susan (All). MYSTIC WELL by Jim Todd on PD 258 (RPG for ST) Reviewed by Ivan Broad "In a land far away a powerful wizard enchanted his life force into a golden skull and proclaimed himself to be a god. Then in a display of his malevolence he conquered the citadel known as the Mystic Mirror." This is the very brief storyline behind "Mystic Well" as given in the Readme file on the disk. You play an adventurer, of one character class chosen from Wizard, Rogue, Priest or Fighter, who has vowed to defeat the evil plans of this self declared god and thus prevent the destruction of the world. Each time the game is restarted new scores for certain abilities are selected by "dice rolls". The game itself was, as far as I could tell, well enough written and ran smoothly with very little disk accessing. No actual aim is given for the game, so to begin with I just wandered around searching for anything that may prove useful later. This is not a particularly easy task as the character is able to carry a very limited number of items in the backpack. It seems that keys are very important to the games completion, as are food, water, weapons and armour - so experienced adventurers should feel at home here! The game is Shareware and as such comes without a save routine which is frustrating to say the very least. As a very mediocre adventurer and "would be hero" I am afraid I didn't get too far into the game as I kept getting killed, sometimes for no apparent reason. Overall not a bad game and one worth getting if you like the Dungeon Master clones. However, a few points prevented me from rushing to send my $10 to Oregon for the full version. One of these was the poor quality of the instructions. I obtained the mouse version but all instructions were for a joystick with the bland statement " All joystick operations are duplicated by a mouse" which is not correct. Secondly there is a statement that a two player game is possible but I could find no way of achieving this. * * * * * * * WHAT PERSONAL COMPUTER by John Minson on PD 200 (AGT text adventure for PC) Reviewed by Ivan Broad What PC is a text adventure in which the player takes the role of a "software reviewer". Your aim is to obtain a copy of a new program which you are then to review. Obtaining the disk is not too easy as you might expect and involves dashing around London in an attempt to find disks and anything else that may prove useful. 'What PC' runs well with only one fault that I found - some lines would be duplicated on screen - but that did not detract at all from the appeal of the game. A novel storyline and some witty quips keep the attention and add to the enjoyment of the game. Many of the problems to be solved are relatively easy and gentle nudges in the right direction help. However, some are not so easy and I still have only got about half way through the game. One hint worth noting when playing is that whilst on the underground and changing lines the maze is very complex (don't expect to return to your starting point by back-tracking the way you came), just like the real thing! I tried to run this program on the Atari 1040 STFM using PC ditto as the emulator without success. * * * * * * SLEUTH by Gary Neal on PD 246 (Cleudo-type game for ST) Reviewed by Ivan Broad Sleuth is a Cluedo type game for the ST in which you have to find the murderer of Sir Harry Grimley. You also have to deduce at what time and in which room the "dastardly deed" happened. You are to achieve this by questioning the house guests. There are only a limited number of questions you can ask about the guests whereabouts. These will always be answered truthfully by the innocent but the guilty may lie. The solution is deduced from discrepancies between guests' stories. There are claimed to be well over three hundred mysteries to be solved - presumably, the total number of combinations of rooms, suspects and possible times. This claim may well be true but I had no inclination to find out. After solving a few mysteries in just over one hour I lost interest in the game. I found no bugs in the game other than the long loading time. Unless you are an avid detective there really is nothing to keep your attention in this game. The screens are visually boring, being a map or written questions and answers. It is really too repetitive to get away with this lack of visual stimulation. This disk has been relegated to the very back of my disk file and is really just waiting to be overwritten. Sorry, Gary, but not my cup of tea. * * * * * * Lure of the Temptress - Virgin Games (Graphic adventure for PC, ST and Amiga) A third opinion by Joan Dunn "Oh no, not another one?" ... Yes, I know this has already been reviewed twice. Graham Wheeler reviewed it in SYNTAX ISSUE 21, and Steve McLaren in SYNTAX ISSUE 22. It is Steve's review that made me want to write a few words. I will not repeat the storyline or method of play, as these have been well covered in the previous reviews. I thought Graham's review was great. He brought out all the important points and the sheer enjoyment of the playing the game. Steve's review too was excellent and it is very interesting to see two quite different opinions. I too enjoyed watching the characters go by, each busy with their own lives and listening to their conversations. You really got the feeling that there was a life outside the actual game. There were 17 characters plus some Skorls and I got to recognise them and know their names quite quickly. The graphics were superb. I have played all the King's Quest and Space Quest games to date and apart from the story of Rosella, which stood out amongst the others, (KQ4) I consider Lure Of The Temptress to be way ahead. You do need some help from characters to perform certain tasks e.g. without Goewin's assistance in the caves you would not progress any further. It is rather short on puzzles and most are solved by interaction with the other characters, and I do agree with Steve that the ending was rather a damp squib. I can see that a very experienced player might be disappointed and find this game too easy, but we all have different ideas of what an adventure should be like and I think it would be a shame if people were put off playing this game by a poor review. I am looking forward to their next game and have got Sue with her ear to the ground so she can let me know when it is available. I agree with Graham ... it's super, so go for it. @~Knocking the mud out of my ear, I can tell you that the next @~Virtual Theatre game will be a futuristic, Cyberpunk adventure @~called Beneath a Steel Sky and pushes the system much further, @~making a deeper game. Sue * * * * * * Susan - AGT (Text adventure for Amiga, ST(PD65) and PC(PD452)) Played on PC and reviewed by Alex McEwan When Sue sent me this game she told me that it was short, so when I found myself at work one day having to load up a machine with German OS/2 2.0 + Service Pack + LAN Server 3.0 + RIPL images, I thought it would help while away the boredom of feeding my server 70 + high density diskettes. (And you thought Leather Goddesses 2 was bad.) Unfortunately she hadn't told me just how short it was, 27 locations to be exact. The result was that I played the game, compiled a solution, and wrote this review before I had OS/2 itself installed. The game is supposed to be 'R' rated adult entertainment, and the best I can say about it is that it has been released without any request for a registration fee. The plot is basic, you have to 'score' with your girlfriend, the eponymous Susan. Those of you old enough to remember Soft Porn, the BASIC precursor of Sierra's Leisure Suit Larry, will recognise the theme, but will probably be too grown up to be interested in this infantile piece of trash. In order to achieve your goal you have to obtain three items required by Susan. If it wasn't for the time spent mapping a small maze (yawn) you would complete this onerous task in five minutes. As it was it took me nearly six. I finished it without saving once and amassed 110 points out of 100(?) The author claims that there is a real Susan, and although she is not his girlfriend he obviously would very much like her to be. He also states that the lady in question saw a printout of the game and gave her approval for its release. One assumes she did so out of pity. NB RIPL is Remote Initial Programme Load, used to allow a machine without a diskette drive or a hard disk to run an operating system and applications stored on a separate PC.