DRUID

Romping around in the undergrowth outside the tower, the heroic Druid sees a Power Pentacle but can’t quite reach it...

Four skulls of immense evil have been brought together by the evil Princes of Darkness and placed in a tower. Gathered in the same location, their power to spread destruction, plague and dereliction is vastly amplified and the land is suffering. You, an aging mystical Druid, must destroy the evil skulls to thwart the Princes of Darkness.

The skulls reside in lower levels of an eight-level tower and the game begins in the fields surrounding the skulls’ new resting place. You must penetrate the tower, defeat the demons, destroy the skulls and make good your escape.

The action is viewed from above and the flip screens that make up each level contain walls, or hedges in the open country, which combine to make up a maze of passageways. Demons scurry round the screens and need to be eliminated rapidly — contact with them saps the magician’s energy and the longer he stays in one place the more demons turn up.

The Druid can move in four directions and can cast Water, Fire or Electricity spells with a press of the fire button — toggle between them with the P key. Each time a spell is cast the Druid’s capacity for casting that particular spell reduces, and the counter under the respective icon decrements. Selecting the appropriate spell for the type of demon being attacked is an important factor of the game.

Apart from the workaday fire-button-controlled spells, the Old One has four powerful spells at his command. Providing the inventory contains a supply of the appropriate spell material, these extra spells can be invoked with a press of the correct number key. The Key Spell opens doors; the Invisibility Spell hides the hero from the gaze of the demons for a while and temporarily immobilises them; the Golem Spell conjures up an assistant, and the Chaos Spell is a magical smart bomb that destroys all the nasties on the current screen. The Chaos Spell is the only spell powerful enough to destroy one of the skulls and has the pleasant side-effect of topping up the Druid’s energy whenever it is cast.

Energy is added to the Druid’s status bar when he stands on one of the Pentacles of Life that are scattered around the tower. Chests are a source of useful spellpower — all the Druid has to do is walk up to a chest and it will open to reveal its contents. Careful thought is needed before selecting an item from a chest, however, as the Princes of Darkness sense that one of their store cupboards has been opened the moment something is removed and destroy the chest and its remaining contents instantly.

If things are getting a bit hectic, casting a Golem Spell invokes a handy acolyte. The Golem can either be controlled by a second player or by separate keyboard commands and it really comes into its own as a bodyguard. Your assistant can be given three commands: send, follow and wait, and has its own Energy bar that is reduced by contact with nasties. On the plus side, the touch of a Golem is instantly fatal to demons!

To play the game efficiently, care must be taken to select the right object from chests once they are opened. A map will prove essential if you are to stand any chance of achieving the legendary Light Master status — at the end of a game, one of sixteen rankings available is awarded, and they start with Halfwit...