The evil warlock Krill is menacing the land, and he must be vanquished – but it is necessary to send an inexperienced Enchanter to defeat him, so the leader of the Circle of Enchanters, Belboz, has summoned you to undertake this quest. This is the first in the Enchanter series of games from Infocom, and in this game, you become more skilful at magic by finding scrolls and writing the spells they contain into your spell book. You'll need these spells to solve most of the puzzles; most of them are OK, but a few (particularly the one involving the map and pencil) are frankly illogical and confusing. Having to eat and drink regularly is also an annoying distraction, although you should pay attention to your dreams; they contain subtle clues to help you with the puzzles.

See also: Sorcerer, Spellbreaker.

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Ride an off-road motorbike across five stages of rough terrain encompassing forest, desert and marshland in this coin-op conversion. There are five stages to complete, each one filled with obstacles to avoid or jump over using ramps. However, you need to approach them at high speed to do this, and by the second stage, the ramps are too close together to allow you to clear the boulders below, which means that you will lose a huge amount of time. It doesn't help that the game is very unforgiving in this respect, and the dreadful Spectrum-like graphics and annoying sound bugs make this a poor game. I will never understand why the CPC magazines liked this game.

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You take the managerial role of an American football team. There is no music at all, and unlike some of the better known management games like Football Manager 2, there is no pitch to watch players running around on. You start with $30,000 in the bank and your goal is to win games, use the transfer market to build a better skilled team, and manage your finances and not go bankrupt, because if you do go bankrupt then the game is over immediately. There is a decent range of options, such as seeing where you are in the league, listing upcoming matches, and of course, the transfer market. News items scroll at the bottom of the screen too fast to read, unfortunately. The games consist of four quarters of fifteen minutes each, and results are displayed quickly so you don't get bored of waiting.

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The Earth has mostly been laid to waste, and only three areas of untouched land remain. Of course, the aliens are going to put a stop to that, so it's time to get your 'plane out and blast them... and that's all you seem to do. Blast some aliens, then blast a caterpillar-like alien, collect a bonus, go to the next level after blasting a number of aliens, and repeat. With nine levels in each land area, you can imagine that the game becomes extremely monotonous. The only other thing worth mentioning is the excellent music.

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It's the 1920s, the era of Prohibition, and the FBI are on the trail of a mob of gangsters who are manufacturing whisky. This is a three-level shoot-'em-up which was only released on cartridge. It was intended to be used with the Trojan Phazer lightgun (and was one of only two such games released for the Plus version!), but thankfully it can be played with a joystick as well. In summary, you must shoot the gangsters to score points, but shooting innocent people (including unarmed gangsters) causes you to lose points. Once you have reached a certain number of points, you can go to the next level. The game is over when you are wounded once too often. The graphics are absolutely wonderful and it's fun to play for a while, but everyone has seen this type of game many times before.

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7

103 years ago, the druid Hasrinaxx destroyed four skulls and banished the evil Acamantor from the land of Belorn – but now he has returned. Starting at the village of Ishmar, Hasrinaxx must travel through the varying landscapes of Belorn, find Acamantor's tower, and destroy him once and for all. This game is fairly similar in nature to its predecessor, Druid, but the area you can explore is a lot larger, and there is a much greater variety of spells to be collected. You will also have to remember what they do and when they should be used. This added complexity gives the game a more adventure-like feel in addition to the existing arcade elements. Some players may like this, but I feel that this sequel is not as good as its predecessor.

See also: Druid.

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Equinox
(Mikro-Gen, 1986)

The mining asteroid Sury-Ani 7 has been contaminated with radioactive waste, so a disposal droid (that's the thing you control) has been sent in to search the eight levels of the mining complex, find the waste canisters and send them down the vacuum disposal chutes that can be found on each level. Naturally, the complex is guarded by monsters which bounce around the screen and must be avoided as much as possible. The game is visually very impressive with great use of colour and very smooth movement, and the tune on the menu is also very good. The clever thing about this game is that although it looks like a straightforward shoot-'em-up, you have to think carefully as to where, and especially when, to use the objects and teleporters. This is an excellent game!

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9

Er*Bert is a purple bouncy creature, and he has to move around a screen consisting of cubes and change their colour. Out to get him are Boris the gorilla, Coily the snake, and a purple ball. To help him evade their clutches, he can use transporters or rotahats, both of which move him to other parts of the screen. There are ten difficulty levels, four stages on each level, and two speeds that you can use, but the controls are so strange and the enemies so hard to avoid that getting off the first level is extremely tough.

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Having rescued Princess Daphne in Dragon's Lair and killed Singe the dragon, our hero Dirk now endeavours to find the treasure within the castle before the Lizard King reaches it first. There are eight separate challenges in this game which will require nerves of steel and quick reflexes. Among the things Dirk has to do are negotiate a fast-flowing river, run down a tunnel with a boulder in pursuit, and play 'Simon says'-type games in the throne room and in a room with a tiled floor. The graphics are OK, albeit rather garish, and the music really sets the atmosphere as well. However, it's a bit too difficult for my liking, and it would be nice if you didn't have to go right back to the first level after losing all your lives.

See also: Dragon's Lair.

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7

Rescue the girls from the clutches of the evil Reptilons. It sounds like something out of one of those awful 50s B-movies, and that's exactly what the game is based upon. The Reptilons' base is laid out in an isometric view, and each room usually has a host of aliens to be shot, girls to be rescued, computers to be smashed, and lockers to be broken into and ransacked – although some of their contents may lose you energy. Every few levels, you have to destroy a very large Reptilon. The graphics are pretty good and it's a decent game with a lot of action, and another person can play too. The noise of your laser gun is immensely irritating, though.

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