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Here it is - The Bard's Tale - the first major role-playing game ever to be converted onto the Amstrad machines. Has it been worth waiting for?

Absolutely. The conversion is an excellent one. All the features of the existing disk-only versions have been preserved and the inevitable multi-loads are kept to a minimum.

The story goes like this: the town of Skara Brae is peopled by all sorts of vagabonds, rogues, and bounty-hunters, of whom you are one. Your objective is simple - uncover the secrets of the town, penetrate the dungeons beneath its surface, and survive long enough to come back with the goods.

To do this, you form a 'party' of companions - a group of fellow adventurers, each of whom possesses certain attributes (strength and intelligence, to name but two) who accompany you throughout the game (or until they get killed). You can create as many parties as you like, featuring different combinations of skills and attributes, and save them to tape or disk for future use. It's this creation and development of parties that sets The Bard's Tale apart from the normal, non-role-playing adventure. As you triumph over obstacle after obstacle your characters develop new skills and amass greater fortunes that can be used to overcome the opposition and purchase services and weapons from other computer controlled characters. This game which otherwise might lack complexity and variety of gameplay.

The Bard's Tale arrived just too late to give it the Amstrad Action treatment in this issue. Stand by for the definitive colour review next month!