Now Orcs are a pain in the armpit. Ratty y'know. Mean too. Oh, and they have a thing about tearing people limb from limb. But, hey - nobody's perfect, right? However, Orcs are the problem just now. In fact they're in hot pursuit, chasing you through the forest. Luckily, you're pretty fast so it's no surprise when you lose the group around by the old fort. After resting from the chase you awake the next morning to find the Orcs blocking your escape route! What to do? Hmmm.

You always knew this was a silly idea. "Where has all the magic gone?" and "Without magic our lives and empty and void" were typical of the cries to be heard throughout the countryside. Magic was a handy thing to have around - and it relieved the boredom of a long day in the field. Hence you were nominated, by Merlin (who else?), to find out what the Sam Hill was going on and where all the magic had gone to. So that's the background and off you trotted. Now look where you are!

After the introduction and a short list of useable verbs, the game begins. Displayed with, largely, black text on a green background, Into The Mystic uses succinct location descriptions with a restricted use of the EXAMine command. That is, only where it is necessary to forward the plot or add essential atmosphere.

The principle feature of Mystic is the puzzle quality which is, on the whole, very high. There are one or two real brain teasers in there. I especially enjoyed the first puzzle which is quite logical. Although you are given subtle clues the solution remains obscure enough to drive you crazy. The eventual solution to the problem is quite intricate, yet very enjoyable.

Technically, the game is not the most advanced adventure I have ever played. Although you have a handy X command to replace 'EXAMINE', you cannot link commands via AND or punctuation.

However, Jack Lockerby is not known for his technical achievements. Instead, he has a well-deserved reputation for producing well-designed, very playable adventures that you can guarantee will provide a few hours of enjoyment.

Into The Mystic is a very good example, doubly so at this price.

One final note. Jack has used the Freeze Machine cartridge to store his adventure onto disk. This means that you load the adventure from a menu which then loads the game mucho pronto. Any prospective adventure authors reading should take note of Jack's good sense as there is nothing so frustrating as a slow-loading disk game.