Despite being in the 25th century, some things never change. The emperor Cophenix wants Mirdav to rescue the princess Doxaphin. Mirdav has to fight his way into the Kindos castle, from the dungeons to the upper rooms. Only the mighty sword he's carrying, Sgrizam, will let him take the princess back to his father. Sgrizam is quite a simple arcade game. Whenever an enemy comes to you there are only three possible actions – bend down, jump or brandish your sword. The graphics are quite big and colourful and the scrolling is smooth, although there is some sprite flickering. The sound effects are only average. There's a tune but thankfully, it doesn't play throughout the game. Sgrizam is reasonably difficult; it just requires a bit of concentration. Its main problem is that although the levels change, the gameplay remains almost the same.

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Many prisoners are being held in the dungeons of a mysterious castle, and you must rescue them. You must explore nearly 100 levels, shooting doors to release the prisoners, and finding keys to unlock other doors. There are also many monsters to impede your progress, although if you have some prisoners with you, they will be a bit easier to defeat. This is a Gauntlet clone and it's unfortunately not a good one. The graphics are poor and the scrolling and movement are jerky and slow, and the music on the menu is nothing special either. All the dungeons look very similar, and the game lacks excitement.

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Joe Musashi returns to fight more crime on the streets of America. One of your students, Kato, has been murdered, and not only that, but the Sauros are threatening to blow up a US space shuttle. You must prevent this from happening, and avenge Kato's death. Throughout the game, you are accompanied by your dog Yamoto, who seems to be totally invulnerable to any enemy fire. You have an unlimited supply of shurikens to throw at enemies, and you can also use magic to kill every enemy on the screen, although you can only use this a few times. The graphics are big and colourful, but the sound is rather limited and the music on the menu is irritating. The game itself is great to play, and having six credits and four lives with each credit is wonderful.

See also: Shinobi.

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Shadow of the Beast
(Gremlin, 1990)
Reviewed by Chris Lennard

Transformed against your will into a hideous mutant servant by the Beast Lord Maletoth and his evil mages, you resolve to use your beast-like powers to scour the land in search of him and to take vengeance for the death of your father. Fight your way through a seemingly endless barrage of adversaries in order to face the final confrontation with Zelek the Beast Mage, in order to regain your humanoid body and rid yourself of the shadow of the beast. The music here is of a very high quality, and combined with the detailed monochrome graphics this is a very eerie, yet appealing game.

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Captain Blatt was inspecting the outer hull of a massive mothership in his Shadow Skimmer, but the mothership's computers have malfunctioned, and the Shadow Skimmer is now being treated as a hostile invader! Can you guide Captain Blatt to the other side of the mothership and enter the hatch that will lead you to safety? This is a colourful shoot-'em-up that also requires a lot of exploration. On each of the three sectors, it is necessary to find and shoot an object that will remove the barrier that blocks the entrance to the next sector. Occasionally, you must explore below the hull using the hatchways, and flip your spaceship to pass certain obstacles. The graphics and sound effects are very good, the game is easy to get the hang of, and exploring the hull will keep most players interested.

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Shadow Warriors
(Ocean, 1990)

The streets of America are full of muggers and other criminals, and as the Shadow Warrior, your mission is to clear the streets and make them safe again. The Shadow Warrior's method of combat is a series of ninja-style kicks, and in fact, this is the only move that you can use on the enemies. You may not have to learn a lot of moves like other beat-'em-ups, but I think this is a bit limiting. It's a fairly standard scrolling beat-'em-up – the graphics are nice, but there's hardly any sound and there's nothing that makes it better than other games like it.

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This is an average karate game with four skill levels, in which you control Lo Yin. The story of the game is that Wang Chen, a pupil at the Changchun Academy, massacred all of his fellow pupils and teachers, and Lo Yin was the sole survivor. In reality, it's just a straightforward beat-'em-up, with you fighting against Wang Chen's men one at a time. On each level, you must defeat your opponent four times before he does the same to you. The first skill level is easy, but after that, it becomes a bit more challenging. You can also change the speed of the game to make it easier. The graphics are quite good, particularly the backgrounds, of which there are four selections available. However, there's no variety in the gameplay and it soon becomes repetitive.

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A gang of mercenaries led by Snide Gantree has stolen a Soviet submarine, and you must single-handedly battle your way through three enemy bases to recover the submarine. This is a dull beat-'em-up in which you take on several mercenaries, move right to the next screen, take on another group of mercenaries, move right to the next screen, and so on – and this goes on for what seems like an eternity. Occasionally you can collect weapons, but there is hardly any variety in the gameplay, and each level is so long that most people will want to switch off and play something better when they realise how boring this game is. The backgrounds are nice, though.

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Lee has spent much time mastering the mysterious martial art known as Chin's Shao-Lin, but he is trapped in a temple that is filled with hordes of Triads. Can you use the skills you have developed to defeat them and escape from the temple? Each level contains a set of number of Triads who you can knock out with a carefully timed kick – although if you get it wrong, the Triads will hit you instead. Halfway through the level, a Triad who is stronger than the rest must also be defeated, although it requires several kicks to knock him or her out. The graphics are nothing special, and the Oriental-themed music is not great either, but the game overall is fairly good, if perhaps a little lacking in variety.

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The background to this icon-driven text adventure is very weird and convoluted, but I shall try to summarise it here. A magical barrier known as the Cairnrue is preventing rain from falling on the land, but in order to dissolve the barrier, a magical stone called Inovar is required to invoke the Ritual of Decairn. Unfortunately it has been stolen, and only a tiny shard remains, so it is up to you, Varwield Secunda, to travel westwards and retrieve Inovar. All of these fancy names and rituals are very confusing indeed at first, and some of the puzzles are rather odd. However, the use of icons to select verbs means that solving most of the puzzles isn't too difficult, and if you stick with the game, you will eventually begin to make sense of it.

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