Draylon - God Killer

Vour distribution costs and sources. Your advertising costs and advertising income. The wages especially journalists' , 6. The photographic and additional fees. P Foster, Blackheoth, London, 1. The office we squat in has been wired into a streetlight across the road. The fax people haven't caught up with us yet- Total costs so far: On average we get through a hundredweight per issue. We simply pile all the finished magazines in Trafalgar Square at four in the morning when nobody's about.

Next time please make subtle fun of someone who can, with the move of the finger, naive your monthly income. Now that would be brave. I hope that under the thin layer of sarcasm and 'being tough', there are humans writing ZERO. Humans who know where to draw the line. Onto JeffMinter then, ft jfusf so happens that we all think he's an extremely decent geezer too - you seem to have over-reacted a bit.

Would this have been more to your tastes? Oh wonderful hairy one, you can do no wrong. Please let us touch your arms, legs, shoulders and toilet area. Oh, and it to a God Damn war we're writing about, by the way. Thirty eight people are kilted each week in the software industry. This offsets the potato expenditure. Ssshbhhhhi Don't remind them.

The journalists take all the photos. So there you go. We break even on every issue. With a bit of work on the distribution side, we could even move into the black! I have a couple of questions to ask of your, urn -what's the word you poms use? Oh yeah - your spiffing magaiine. We've run out of room. That'll teach you to beat us at Rugby. All letters win a ZERO badge.

I Imagine if Dungeon Master and HeimdatI got off with one another at a party, bonked' and Heimdtrll ended up in the club. What would the baby be like? Well imagine no longer, because the birth is scheduled for March , The child is going to be called Shadowtands, and the mid wives will be Teque London and Domark Okay, strictly speaking Shadowtands has absolutely nothing at all to do with either Dungeon Master or Helmdatt- but how can one help putting games in pigeon- holes?

It makes things so much easier, 0: So why will Shadowtands be like Heimdatf? As Simple, Because it's viewed from an isometric point of view and there are some cunning 'pu;zly bits'. It's s bit like The Immortal Cadaver and lots of other games too. Qi Why will Shadowtands be like Dungeon Master? Because you control four characters whose skills increase as tney learn Clicking on a character's portrait with the right mouse button brings up the inventory screen, where you can mess with the objects you've found: And you can fend your people and put them to sleep.

Blimey, it does sound like Dungeon Master- albeit in a Heimdall-ish or Cadaver-is h kind of way. Presumably it differs from Dungeon Master as well? At Of course it does - and what a pone ity- worded question. Anyway, let's take some major points The faces can be customised so yon can create your very own 'oh so real' adventurers. Call them Jeremy, Jeremy, Jeremy and Barry. Or something else, if you want. Gad knows where the others have been left - the only way to find out is to click an their icon and the view will centre to where they stand.

The light source is quite a bright one in this cose, but it still doesn't cover the entire room. You'll find out in a minute, if yau open that door, 7 Pits are your quick routes to the lower levels. OThe size of the game is going to be massive. There are five levels, and each of them will be the size of the whote of Dungeon Master. OYou control four people. Although they can be controlled as a group r each member of your party is indepen- dent.

It's something Shadowtands has that no other game has had before. Yes, you've guessed it, it's a 'Revolutionary New System' which just so happens to rhyme with Rotoscape. Still, it's not the same, What Fhotoscape means is that the lighting is extremely lifelike, Not only do larger 'wattages' of light cover greater areas than smaller ones, but there's a sort of umbra and penumbra effect too, which all moves about if the light source itself is moving.

This acts as a fantastic boost for the atmosphere, but there's more. Some of the traps and monsters in the game are actually activated by the light, with obvious repercussions. Photoscape in a nutshell. It's up to you to do what you want with them. Work on your fearless quartet's magic, fighting and problem-solving skills as they progress through the labyrinth, and don't get them killed- Ydli know the drill - it's called "personal involvement' and is the stuff RPG games arc?

It looks pretty good, doesn't it? We certainly think so, and we're going to be reviewing it the first chance we get - so keep 'em peeled. This gives us the chance la make our reviewers play a brilliant sport called 'Ocean Football. Oh, and you hove to have huge waves whipped up by force ten gales. Score goals without getting dragged out to sea. Don't fry this one at home, OK? Fcf, As Editor of the magazine, David was the obvious choice as team captain. Incoming waves can pick you up and slam you against the sea wall behind, before dragging you back out to sea.

So get your timing right, i "Jesus Christ," said Ameya as she watched the tidal surges smash with all their might against the gi an I concrete defences. All of a Sudden, she lurched forward and made her move. She'd covered barely 20 feet before she screeched to a halt, screamed, turned, and hurtled back, followed by a jet of foam, "I forgot the ball," she gasped, "but Cm not going back again - no wayf".

Patrick tottered then hesitated, watching another swell. Every seventh surge is a big one, The eighth one is quite small. After seven more swells Paul was off, dribbling the ball towards the posts. The ball rose into the air and curved off seawards, towards an oncoming wave. Paul made it back by the skin of his teeth. He wasn't being sarcastic - Paul had lost the ball to the sea, so Toby was off the hook. Then David reminded him of rule 13 b paragraph T96; "If the ocean takes possession of the ball, then possession must be regained.

NIL I For once Macca was weapon -free, fiut, weapons or not, if anyone could beat a storm-tossed Atlantic Ocean, it was he, Bounding onto the sand he took position - pushing his shoulderblades against the sea wall, bracing himself For the oncoming 20ft swell. The ball was bobbing about on lop of it. MaccH closed his eyes, spread his arms and gave a war try. The swell broke, cracking the wall In several places, then retreated in a surge of while foam.

It had J put one in the net'. Of Mecca there was no sign. Wot only did Duncan have to save the next goal, he actually had to score one to equalize - and the storm had become frenzied, with the waves peaking at heights of 30 to 40ft. Duncan took the same position as Macca, The sea surged forwards- it picked him up like a rag doll and threw him into the air. His head connected with the ball, which arced backwards onto land. IF so Execution will score well here. If you can't be bothered with all that ihen the Overall Mark gives you on of a glance summ a Now iF we've said It once we've s thousand times..

Things like that score here and they're marked out of Here you'll ge of new releases which aren't actually new ol oil because they're olfeody available on other Formats. Played a whole new batch of top software titles, that's what. Now it's payback time. Time to sit back and reflect on the year's software and choose our fave games of 1 More importantly, what are your fave games? Well tell you ours if you'll tell us yours. Read on, then cast your votes for dah dah It's definitely the best graphic adventure to date.

Cruise is an adventure too. The system is completely foolproof and the graphics engine is amazing. Bit of a crap storylines, though. Alien Breed is the best shooter ever on Amiga with great graphics, fab sound and dreamy game- pi ay. Chuck Yeager'sAir Combat gets second place because the 'Create Mission' facility is simply brilliant. Grand Prix combines instant appeal and lastability Chutk's Atr Combat. BitH and that's rare. First Samurai li injects new life into an old theme, and Secret Weapons Of The Luftwaffe is just like being there you can check my underwear to prove it.

Basically I'd part with money for all of these, and I'm as mean as. Kick Off 2 finally made it onto the PC and it was absolutely diabolical. It's disgraceful that the game was even released with the 'carpet' over the bottom quarter of the pitch. Prince Of tile Persia and he high standard ipt. And let's not forget Eye Of The Beholder. Honourable mention goes to Loriciei and Titus who broke their dodgy track records with the brilliant Psnia Kick Boxing and best platform romp of the year.

Worst game of the year for me, was probably Image Works' Blade Warrior. For a title that had received so much hype, it was unacceptable to me that the main action takes place in silhouette. Mot voting it game of the year is a capital offence in some countries. As for Speedball II, well I'm a bit of a sports- game fan and that just had it all - payability, sound and graphics were all superb.

It's also the only game! Operation Stealth and Prince of Persia speak for themselves, but what of Wings? Some irritating disk accessing, 'Americanised' storyline and lack of realism all made for a superb game However the atmosphere and sense of story won me over. It was nice to have a flight si m that started life on the Amiga. The dogfights were good fun too. Oh r and as for Predator 2, it's the sort of game that gets film licences a bad name. A completely standard, utterly pointless shoot 'em up. In short, nothing in it that hadn't been done about years earlier with a straw target and a bow and arrow.

Geoff Crammond's Formula One has everything you could want of s formula one sim - so enough said. Onto Populous 2 then, Okay, so it's a sequel, but if ever a game was worth an enhanced repeat- performance, it was Populous. Archer McCleSn'S Snooker is a piece of programming wizardry and boast I almost beat him at it - he only just won with 56 points to my Finally Panza Kick Boxing. A superb two-player Thai Boxing game with better graphics than Pit Fighter. And Accolade's I Gunboat? Obviously, the prospect of selecting my top five games of the year was far too perplexing, so as a viable alternative I decided to scribble the titles of every release onto a seperate piece of paper, stick them into a hat, and select at random.

So, at number one we have unfold First Samurai. Oh yes, what a great game that was. Undoubtedly my number one game of the year - bags of payability cunningly concealed behind lavish graphics. Almost as instantly playable and professional looking was my number two, er It was different, it was original, and it was jolly good. Terminator 2 - great film, crap game.

And that's it, really. Out if ever a sequel was worth its weight in gold, then that sequel is Populous 2. It's a game f never tire gf playing, and there are loads of girls in it sigh , Monkey Island was an absolute corker, too - brilliant graphics, fab adven- ture plot and even some 'funny' American humour. Onto 4D Boxing then, A bit of a weird choice for me. I hate Sport and boxing in particular 8ut Mindscape's boxing sim provided hours of endless fun, as you created your own Richard Madely lightweight or Pauline Quirk heavyweight Stun Runner - not very Stunning.

Crap actually 26 Defphine's Cruise For A Corpse had beautiful graphics and was a fun adventure, except the storyline was weaker than Qppo Stealth's and the hero less hunky. I hate snooker even more than boxing. But Jimmy White's Whirlwind SnookEr wss much more fun to play and certainly to watch than the real thing. Twenty quid for Stun Runner? Wei I, what more can J say? If our statistical skills are up to scratch Da you agree with the ZERO reviewers?

Fill out the form below with your favourite games of the year in each category, we'll compile all the results and print the overall ZERO Readers' lop games of the year in a future issue. As for you fat, all the voting forms will be placed in a large hat and mixed up, then the first ten to be drawn out will each receive a bumper bundle of ten software goodies each. Ever since ITV's award-winning series tor our screens, trie mm has been waiting challenged to solve complex puzzles logic problems 3rd riddles that reveal a rich for a computer game worthy of the name. The wait is over.

Your journey takes you deep into the dungeons at Dunshelm.

Whether Of not the meeting is terminal is up to wu You will need likenewts splashing around in a muddy puddle fjfkX wlSdom tenaoiy. Written bv Tony Convther. AN til I A For your local dealer, contact: So who better to review it than Duncan Mac Donald - after all, he's from another planet too. Another World- what a writer it is. Unless you're a new reader of course, in which case you haven't seen it at all.

What trouble you cause. What are we to do? Oh dear, and what about you ST owners who didn't get the demo either Let's sort you out into three groups. You con stand on the right. You can stand on the left. Okay, let's get group B and C over and done with together. Step forwards, would you please? All of you, all of you, yes - that includes you stragglers at the back. Come on, stop shuffling. Form an orderly queue at the front - speed it up. No talking at the bock. Lester's a young nuclear scientist who, during the lengthy and absolutely stunning opening animated sequence, cocks up a bit.

He makes the mistake of conducting his hi-tech experimental work during a thunderstorm. So guess what hits his laboratory at exactly the wrong moment? Yup - a boh of lightning, of course. Poor old Lester gets zapped through multi- dimensional space, and finds himself in 'another world'.

You as Lester don't know whether you're coming or going. You have to work it out for yourself. Group A - assemble here. In a straight line please. You've seen the wondrous graphics, heard ctie splendid sounds and been drenched in the unearthly atmosphere of Another World Scene Qne. Great, wasn't it- Did you complete with in a few minutes? If so, then well done. Mil took you absolutely ages, then not so well done. Be warned - things actually get quite a bit harder as you progress. Oh, you're not one of those sorry people who actually failed tc complete the piffling five screens of the demo are you?

Gather together with the other dorks and we'll call you Group D. Here's what you should have done.. C atth dow and Afte seer ban a! And that was the end of the first level. Now you know how you should have? Another World isn't just a shoot 'em up, as you obviously found out - it's an arcade adventure. You need to do things in the right order and in the right way. You need to own a brain. That's it - in you come. Make way for them, everybody.

Settle down now, because it's time for the Another Wortd exam. It's a multiple choice quiz in which you have to work out 'what to do next'. Group A will probably excel. Groups S and C might have to think a bit. Qri, and Group D may want to look at the a n swers first — th ey' re u psi de - down at the bottom of the page in Janet and John 'not-joined-up' writing. After having been shot at the end of scene one, Lester awakes to find himself hanging over a pit in a gage, He's not glone, though - there's an alien geezer sitting next to him. Jl Slap his forehead and say: Apples and pairs] Trouble and strife!

I come from a distant dimension, but I mean you no harm. In fact we seem to be in the same predicament. If you help me escape from this cage, I will teach you how to make things out of wood, It's true. I can teach you all the wonders of what we earth lings call 'carpentry', You need never buy a chair or cupboard again.

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The guard's been knocked out by the falling cage and Lester and the alien Ore free. The alien runs off to the right. B Slap the unconcious guard repeatedly round the face, saying "Wake up r wake up, the other prisoner is trying to escape. He was responsible for the cage falling on your head - I tried to stop him but he knocked me out too I'm on your side. I can teach you how to turn base?

The question is whether it's the alien he was in the cage with,, or yet another guard. My old man's a dustman! If, however, you are a guard, then I really can turn base metals into gold. And I really am an your side - not the other risoner's. You'll be rich beyond your Idest dreams But be warned - a guard in hot pursuit. If you've read absolutely everything befote this, you'll know whether you belong to group A, B, C or D.

LEDERMEISTER AND THE BIKER

If you haven't read absolutely everything before this, you won't - so I'll be able to sub-divide you even further and plonk you into what I'll call Group E. This review is split into four parts. You must know which group you belong to or things will become confusing. Be sure about your Group before reading on. You've jumped straight in and haven't taken the Another World test, This queue- barging simply isn't on and will do you no good. Go back to the very beginning and read everything -you'll find you're no tonger in Group E.

You're a bit crap really, aren't you, Group D? There's one thing that can be said about members of your 'tribe', and it's that you all failed to complete the Another World demo. There were only about 10 things you needed to do, but you obviously fluffed one or more of them up.

If yau thought the presentation of the game was fantastic and want to see more, you should ask yourself this simple question: Level one was the easiest part and you didn't even manage to see all of that. The chances of getting further are slim, to say the least. You haven't seen this game move, have you.

Well it's all done in vectors rather than bitmaps and as a result it's, er It's a bit hard to explain, really. Imagine the Prince Of Persia sprite enlarged a couple of times and rendered in triangles and things. That sounds crap I know, but if you look at the static pics and imagine them moving in a re a I -to -life fashion you'll be there, Mind you, I say real-to-life, but when Lester breaks into a run it's more a case of ponce-o-motion - he skips along as if he's got at least 18 daffodils rammed up his bottom.

Don't worry too much about this though, because for the main part the motion is superb - Lester, the alien, the guards, the nasties, the lot. So what about the sound? Well, it accompanies the evocative graphics perfectly. An alien wind wails in the background on the planet's surface. As you descend into the caverns, the hollow booming sound of distant mining machinery rises up. It all serves to make you feel helpless- which, of course, being in Groups B and C, you are. Thank God far Group A.

You know what Another World is all about already. But what's it like later on? More of the same but different Lots of changes in scenery, lots of problems much harder than those in the demo and lots of 'coo, look at that' noises from the impressed people you'll no doubt be showing it to when you've mastered it. Basically, this is not totally unlike a Don Bluth game. Is It a plane? The gameplay isn't quite 'linear' enough. You're not free to 'do what you want for as. There's an elemer of exploration but a lot of the game is learnt in little chunks which you're forced to repeat over and over again, till you get them exactly right.

Still, I'm being snotty, whingeing about a game which is really rather special. I'm going to have to put myself in a brand new group - Group F. I'm a git and I ought to keep my mouth shut. It's a four-in-one job. It shoots, shields and blasts. ZERO No, it'i a force field. He already had a tip off that the nearby village of Bistritz is home to some thirteen particularly foxy chicks - ust the number he was looking for! Unique control method mot] Different course offering different challenges. HVOh its HO Patrick McCarthy likes games that are sedate and thoughtful, with plenty of time between events to fully appreciate the ramifications of his actions.

That's why he's so fat. Smash TV should sort the porker out. Imagine, if you wilt, a game show so shallow and superficial that the horribly greedy contestants actually profit from stupid, immoral ond despicoble acts. Yes, that's it - The Price Is Right, Imagine another game show, in which those taking part are ritual istical I y hurt to provide the small- minded audience with cheap and nasty thrills at Other people's expense. You've got it - anything presented by Jeremy Bleeder. Now toke the concept of these two shows to their logical and more honest conclusion- contestants wont fame on TV and luxury consumer items, so they can just get in there and fight for them.

Never mind getting enjoyment from other people's minor sufferings - let's do St properly and enjoy other people dying. Sounds pretty good so far, doesn't it? By the kind of coincidence which you just knew was coming, that's what Smaih TV is all about. Fight your way through hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of muties, get power- ups and win cash and big prizes. If you've been in an arcade at all this year, you've probably seen it, SO why am I wasting time waffling on about it? Well, there are other people besides yourself, you know - people who may not be able to get into an arcade, Mr Selfish - ond they have to be catered for too.

It featured a nifty two- joystick control system and was pretty damn hectic. The big news about this conversion is that if you happen to be a two joystick family, Smash TV can also be controlled by one player using two joysticks. If you happen to be a four joystick family, two players can each play with two joysticks.

THE FURIES

There are also normal one and two-player options. It's a simple enough premise! Once you've cleared a room, you can enter bonus rooms which are even more hazardous than the regular ones, but reap bigger rewards. I've lost nine pounds in just two days. Mind you, you can't leave anything lying about around here for five minutes. If you're going to play the game in all its two-joystick glory one controls the direction you move and the other the direction you shoot , you're going to need to find a way of securing two joysticks to the table while you wrench them around with your hands.

Perhaps you could nail them down, or hold them with your revolting I y prehensile feet. Perhaps- you nan hrro a peasant from the local village to hold them for you. They'd probably welcome the chance to be warm for a few hours. If you only have one joystick, it doesn't really matter - the two-joystick bit is more of a 'replicate the arcade game' treat than a necessity, although it does make your expected life- span consid- erably shorter. Perhaps you can get a mate round to play as a team.

Last time I saw action this hectic and vio- lent stand on a mine and your eyeballs fly across the room wasat; car-boot sale in Peckham except the car-boot sale was margin- ally more vio- lent. The min- ions charge at you from ail directions. I wonder who they are?

And I wonder how the TV company hires these mutants to do the job of getting killed? If you think of them as ex-Oxbridge types, it just adds to the fun. I There are hundreds of speed-ups, power-ups, special weapons and end of level basts. The different mega-baddies - like Mutoid Man - can only be hurt by special weapons. Add this hyper-action to the multiple joystick-control system and you have something of a wow, If you liked the coin-op, you'll love this - it's very faithful to the original. Be prepared to get sweaty.

Smash TV- play the game and regain your figure. Was he having another of his 'funny turns'? No, he was getting into character to review WWF Wrestlemania, the new grunt 'n' groan sim from Ocean. Was it because the fights were obviously fixed? ITV dropped the wrestling because their market researchers told them that it was 'common' - only attracting brown ale-swigging grannies and fat men in cheap suits. This was not the sort of image that appeals to advertisers and it had no place in the dean-gut yuppie world of ITV.

So the wrestling was dropped. There's more razzmatazz, more style - it's got Youth Appeal'". The same as it ever was, except it's American. If you choose to take on the computer, then you stil get the choice of three fighters, but now you have to fight your way past five fighters going by such bowel loosening names as The Warlord and Sergeant Slaughter.

Al I fig hters are capable of kicking, drop-kicking, stamping and pinning their opponents into submission. The really ambitious can even clamber up the corner posts and hurl themselves at their enemy. However, what's far more important is each fighter's special move. These range from fairly innocuous things, like Pile-Drivers and Full Nelsons, to the frankly alarming, such as Sergeant Slaughter's Camel Clutch, The name alone is enough to make your eyes water. You can only do this when his energy bar reaches practically nought as a result of you having kicked his butt round the ring.

You can also defeat an opponent by making him stay outside the ring for 20 seconds. According to our reviewer, "huggable. Most of the fighting is straight- forward punch and kick. However, the really frantic action takes place? Both of you waggle away trying to get your power bar to reach maximum, The first person to make it gets to carry out his special move. Well, lucky old him, eh? The other frantic moment in the fighting comes when your wrestler hits the deck. Time to hammer away in a desperate attempt to get him on his feet again, before your opponent carries out facial improvements with his feet.

Nelson looking for hit camel. I naximum time you y pinning JConcfs. C f fyou to get If Paul: Let's get one thing straight- I hate WWF. Not the game, you understand. I'm hardly going to give something like that away at the beginning of a review, am I? It'd be like an Agatha Christie starting with "The butler did it, with the lavatory brush and a bottle of olive oil", There'd be no point in reading on.

I mean, what's the point of it all? A lot of fat gits poncing around a ring pretending to hurt each other. It's like a pantomime except it's the blokes who wear the tights. Give us a break. The first difference between WWF, the computer game and WWF, the slapstick comedy is that in the computer game the wrestlers actually hit each other. That's a step in the right direction for starters.

They not only hit, of course - they grip, trip and kick. It's all pretty exciting really. Each wrestler is well- drawn and animated although Hulk Hogan looks a bit like someone's Grandad and there's no shortage of fighting moves. Where the game is slightly let down is in the sense of perspective, This seems to be a problem with a lot of beat 'em lips.

The backgrounds look suitably 3D- ish, hut the wrestlers seem strangely two- dimensional and it's frustratingly difficult to line the two fighters up. Far too often, you find yourself punching or kicking fresh air. If you're sitting there waggling a joystick It can easily look as if It's i too dangerous and you might get hurt. Like most beat em ups, WWF really comes into its own as a two-player game, After all r it's a lot easier to hate people than computers, Trying to out- waggle a computer is a bit futile - they don't get tired, though in the earlier levels the computer isn't that quick, More importantly, there is a lack of variety in the player-versus-computer mode.

These WWF heroes never reached the top flight. Once the board of control realised he didn't actually , em 1st, be was banned immediately. I Nothing has boon heard of him? Not that anything had been. Spatial Move; The Late Train. Weighing only ' tlx-aod-a-half stone, and clad in sensible Marks A Spark t trousers and pullle, this bespectacled hero. Good for those who enjoy a good waggle on their joysticks. Spmtlal Move; The Peflfo Cough. Sure, each wrestler in WWF has his own special move, but beyond that there's only a very limited range of punches and kicks available.

Each of the different mission types, ranging from Aerial Reconnaissance and Interception to Bombing Raids and Troop Drops is open-ended. The possibilities are unlimited. Whichever you opt for, you'll be confronted by a frighteningly accurate simulation of state-of-the-art warfare. And whichever mission you choose, you'll find yourself flying into a real-world environment of continuous action taking place on land and sea.

Before you take off however, you must plot the positions of your enemies and conjure up strategies to destroy them. Then you arm your aircraft from a bewildering array of hi-tech weaponry. Once in the air, complex mathematics calculate the maximum limits your choice of aircraft could realistically attain, given it's weight, payload and aerodynamics.

Four years in the making, Argonaut Software have devised what Jez San describes as "the most realistic and dynamic world ever created". Lt Glii T'- ffrF Etfr. It's Norse legend time, and the Gods are in a bit of a pickle. Loki has nicked Thor's hammer, Odin's sword arid Frey's spear and he's hidden them an Earth, SoThor raises a magical storm aver the Viking lands and a boy is born to a young maiden who until that moment hadn't evert realised she was with child.

It's b-it like the Bible reaify, except Jesus didn't have to search the planet for a hammer, a sword and a spear. HeimdaH, born during Thor's thunderstorm, does. So now you know The Task'. Lucky really, because an RPG without a Task' is like a marmite sandwich without any marmite in nt. Heimdall is not aione in his quest -he's allowed to take up to five team members with him. But not all of them are partic- ularly excellent. So how do you ensure your gang is a useful one full of chaps that won't bottle out and who con 'handle themselves' when the going gets tough?

The first thing you do is to determine your attribute score which, if it's high, allows you greater choice when selecting your posse. You're in a tavern and are given ten axes. You have to throw them and cut off barmaid Helga's pig- tails, Unfortunately for Helga, you're totally pissed, I'm not joking. Jocky Wilson Darts ahoy. You're taken to a farm, where you have to catch a greased pig within a lime limit, Hard enough in itself, but when you consider that you're still wibbly from the ale in the tavern Running from one end of a boat to the other and grabbing a sack of coins sounds like a cinch, right?

There are several armed guards out to stop you. Now it all ready begins. A massive game set in three mythological Viking worlds: Midgard, the world of men; Utgard, the world of giants, and Asgard, the home of the Gods. Each world is split into islands which can be sailed to in turn - if you've picked up enough food to feed your party for the entire voyage. But when you get to each island? Lateral thinking problems, hidden traps, nasties-a-go-go and the discovery of sub-quests which have to be completed if you're to get anywhere with your main task.

But it's an RPG, don't forget. RPGs are always like that. If you leave everybody alone, you'N never discover if they were carrying anything, Besides, they're sometimes blocking exits and things. The enemy drops his guard. Oh, he hit you. Oh, he hit you again. Die, And so on. Like I keep on saying, it's an RPG. Almost - the real Heimdall wouldn't be able to save his 'position' to disk, so you've got one over on him in a way.

Class graphics - it's got 'em. Class gameplay - it's got that too, and heaps of atmosphere with brilliant fights. Heimdait shows that RPGs don't have to be boring - it takes the genre and puts it on a shelf where it's accessible to everybody. Right, have you got a "Games I must buy' list handy? Well, put this one on it then. In Bethlehem there were three wise men, but here at the ZERO office, which bears more than a passing resemblance to a stable, we could only find one. And that was only Mike Gerrard.

However, he was bearing three gifts for all you adventure lovers Edt Before you can join a fraternity, you have to undertake various assignments to prove your worth, like running across the road stark naked, which gives Ernie the first set of problems he has to cope with. You begin the game in the Sorcerer's Lab, where you're given yet another challenge - and only two hours to complete it. Yikes, what is it this time? Fill the Mage J s bathtub before he gets back.

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• Draylon: God Killer by Kenneth Balfour;

But lawks, what luck - here's a banana. Straight away, you're in the wonderfully daft world of author Steve Meretzky, as bananas sprout appendages, start running around the screen and breeding like rabbis, Sorry.. The bananas go bananas, every- thing gets out of hand, and within ten minutes you're really glad you started the game.

The system's just as it was in Spetlcasting , allowing you to pfay by mouse, using the arrow keys, or by typing all commands. You can click on objects in the graphics window to examine them and activate them, or, if you prefer the wordy approach, re arrange the screen so that the lower half is totally text. He has to find the sexiest woman in America.

Meanwhile, Passionate Patti - who you also get to play for a part of the game - is involved with the FBI in exposing corruption in the American music business. This is why you get a free copy of PteySpv magazine. But don't get too excited about the centrefold - more flesh gets flashed in the average issue of ZERO, After the usual lengthy introduction sequence you're dumped in the lobby of the porno headquarters building. You're working there as a iWMI'W humble technician till you're chosen for the job in hand so to speak. Despite the state-of-the-art, hi-tech system - requiring a hard disk with six trillion kilobytes of free space - the games are still a bit creaky, Cain you get Larry through the right door when you want to?

Nope - he sometimes stands and jigs about on the screen like someone desperate to get into a locked lavatory. Outside the building, you can spend ten minutes moving him all around the screen before you come to the con- clusion that there appear to be no exits. Give me the old text-only "There are exits east and north" approach any day. There's an extra icon at the top of the screen for this game, in addition to the usual Walk, Look, Speak inventory and so on - it's a zipper.

Guess what Larry tries to do if you activate that one though only in the appropriate place. By exploring the headquar- ters, you should be able to charge your battery charger and link it to your portable camcorder, ready for the video auditions you're going to carry out. You can also find the files on the three likely candidates for sexiest woman in the US There are clues as to where each of them might be found - it's all a bit hush hush, and I wouid tell you why, but some of the intro scenes which explain the plot were flashed on and off faster than a stripper's g -string, Larry 5 looks to be as good as the previous offerings, which means that you'll be playing it more for the fun andl frolics than the adventure challenge.

Fori the latter, look to something like Spetlcasting 20 T. But it's horses for courses, and it's Larry for lechy laffs. The name's Still Bonds - Sonny Bonds, a homicide detective in the Lytton Police, But this time the crime wave gets closer to home, as your wife Marie has been viciously stabbed. Can you keep your temper and follow professional procedures to help bring the criminal to justice? The Kindred uses the now familiar Sierra system of full-screen moving graphics, with a row of icons called up across the top by pressing the ESCAPE key.

Clicking on each icon changes the on- screen pointer to an eye to look at objects , a hand to manipulate something etc. It's easy to use once you get the hang of it. Methods we first saw in Heart Of China- sections of animated action using digitised images of real people - are also used. It's a pity the door to the Vice Squad at police headquarters is locked, but you can have a bit of fun exploring the rest of the buifding.

First, you have to get to the briefing room and do a few essential introductory tasks, like investigating a complaint against one of your officers, and masking a phone call to the Despatch Office. This is necessary, otherwise when you leave the building and leap into your police car, you'll have no idea where you're going.

The game comes with a Lytton Police Procedure and Operations Manual, which includes a map of the city. Although the Sierra games are getting bigger all the time - and you'll need a hard disk to play this one - the system still has some of the annoying problems that existed back in their early games.

To get out of a room through an open door. Sometimes the character goes into a de- mented jig as you try to manoeuvre him. Any extra speed you gain by running from a hard disk is lost as each screen now has much more graphic detail - so it still takes ages to load as you move from one place to the next. But what the Pofice Quest games lose on payability, they gain on authen- ticity, and you do get the feeling you're involved in a real investi- gation.

The sometimes grue- some graphics also add to the fee ling -just don't throw up over your hard disk or you'll never play an- other Sierra game in your life. Play out Indy's greatest moments of danger and triumph in this blockbusting game. Fighl off the enemy, dodge hazards and search for valuable objects in your quest for the world's most precious treasure - The Holy Grail.

His task - to rescue an important world leader kidnapped by aliens. If his legendary aero bat ic ability and swordsmanship are not enough lo get you through level after level of action, a blasi Irom his devastating high-velocity gyro laser gun may just do Ihe trick James Bond stars in a classic action -packed race againsi time to save the world from the crazed and power mad Karl Sfromberg. With one -to one arcade style shoot-outs, multi-level action and lop secret codes!

You all know what war- based flight sims entail. And then you have to land. A war-based flight sim. No further explanations are necessary, so we can get onto the planes.. In Birds OfPreytbe map is big, it's impressive and it's rather 'tough'. Not only do you study it during your briefing session, you can also summon it up wh ite you're in the air.

Now we can finally get onto the planes. The same cockpit instrument panel is used for each, but the handling characteristics and pay load capabilities are different to say the least. So what's on offer? In the blue corner: So there you have it. Another quality flight sim along the lines of most other quality f lig ht sims, but with an additional 39 planes for you to crash into the ground, it can't be bad, can it?

We don't know yet, Ed. But did we guess right? And if not, which plane should we have used instead? Answers on a postcard to: The winner will recreve a small blu-tctc model of Douglas Bader. What a piece of coke, We've plumped for this beauty. Mirth flying time later: They don't seem to be very scared at all. Our bomb target is miles away. It'd take oges to get there normally, but not in this X-l 5 Experimental Aircraft.

Apparently it car handle 4, mph without flinching. Much flying time later: There don't seem to be any bombs on board and we seem to be in orbit around Man. Aha The Tornado should be really great for dropping troops. It's gat moving wings too. Look, we can swing our wings. It'll be o bit like on Going live, with Trevor and Simon.

Much Hying lime later: Er, there only seems to be one 'troop' on board and he doesn't want to be dropped. They're probably easy to fly too - you can't crash if your jets are pointing towards the ground Hat ltiuih flying time later: No we're not, we're going upside-down, er Fly an aircraft to the limit of its perform- ance envelope and take it up to the stratosphere? The A- 10 Tank Killer looks the business for something like that. Catch the sue of those engines.

Much frying time later: It doesn't want to go above SO, feet for some reason. Photograph enemy installations without the enemy seeing you - that's the directive. What pre all those flashes of light? Someone down there must be having a firework party. Oh, we seem to be right in the middle of it. Argonaut Software started work on a ffjghj sim called Hawk. Hawk was going to be rather 'special' because It was going to have undulating terrain. Nobody believed that it would Then, five hundred thousand years later ie now.

Hawk finally did come out - and it didn't have undulating terrain. It wasn't even called Hawk anymore, it was called Birds Of Prey. If games were rated purely on their option screens, Birds Of Prey would score a million. Eventually you get to the main game, and there are two things which instantly let it down - the frame update and the control difficulty. Maybe I was being naive, but my guess was that as Argonaut had tried for so long to crack the undulating terrain problem, the least they would have produced in the process would have been tremendously fast polygon shifting routines.

So Ledermeister ordered beer for the Biker, who drank, and drank, and soon had drunk all the beer in the Palace.

Draylon - God Killer Kenneth Balfour Grosvenor House Publishing

Whereupon the Prince sent out for more beer from the taverns in the town, and the innkeepers broughtv their barrels, sweating and muttering amongst themselves, but still the Biker would not stop drinking. Then beer was brought from outside the city, from all the villages and townships and hamlets of Paraphilia. But the Biker ceased not to drink until there was not a drop of beer left anywhere in the land.

So Ledermeister led the Biker to an old, dried-up well in the Palace grounds. There he stripped and lowered himself to the bottom, and the Biker passed his water upon him until all the beer he had drunk was passed out and the well was filled and Ledermeister was drowned.

Whereupon Gidiemides, God of Distasteful Fetishes, took pity on Ledermeister and transformed his body into a urinal at a truckstop cafeteria. Called Furies, or more often by the euphemisms "Girlfriends" or sometimes "Critics", these heavenly avengers are responsible for punishing lapses in good taste.

When Tarquin, interior designer of the Western Holy Wood, was spurned by his lover Jeremy for the attentions of a callow youth without so much as an expresso-maker to his name, and prayed to Draylon, the God of Color Coordinated Fabrics to be avenged for this insult, it was the Furies whom the God sent to punish the errant lover. Melmonides of Saratoga offended the powerful witch of Ithaca and was cursed to suffer the pangs of unrequited love for a blond Bane of the surf who cared not for other men.

Consumed by love, the wretched man approached the Bane time and time again, offering gifts of money and fine jewels, but was each time rebuffed and sent home in misery. Finally Melmonides journeyed South to seek out Arneisias, prophet of the Western Holy Wood, who had in his time been both man and woman and whose wisdom in matters of this kind was said to be unrivalled.

Encountering the prophet at his duties in the temple of Callas, Goddess of Overrated Sopranos, Melmonides flung himself at his feet and begged piteously for advice. Then you must robe yourself in a white satin petticoat and a button-down dress of dark hue whose hem lies not more than one inch above the knee, and wear upon your head a pillbox hat with a short veil of concealment. When the Bane passes by, you must look at him thusly and say "Got a light?