Coming up trumps

Previous Next

Bridge Mentor II is the third reincarnation of a program first released in 1984 and, as a confirmed player myself, I was a little wary of introducing it to several of my non-computer owning Bridge club friends.

The program comes up trumps, or perhaps I should say no-trumps in the case of Bridge, in the user-friendly stakes. Clear, easy to use menus guide you through the considerable number of keyboard entries necessary to set up a new game.

You can play out the existing archive of deals inthegamelibrarywhich comes with the program, butfor true creativity and learning the facility to produce your own deal archives wins me over to Bridge Mentor II hands down.

Sixty deals are contained in the library and range from simple house rules conventions to the more complex conventions used in the Bridge-playing world.

Unlike several other games of its genre, BridgeMentor II is the product of several programmers' minds - this is obvious by the several conventions used in different playing deals. Since every self-confessed Bridge expert is only "expert" in at best two playing conventions, the program will appeal to all types of player - from the beginner through to the professional. Once a pre-programmed or self-programmed deal has been set up play commences with a nice on-screen graphical representation of the card table.

Since the program concentrates on hand analysis, each deal is not truly random since Bridge has defied the so-called logical analysis required for expert game systems.

Bridge Mentor II guides you through a series of logical menu choices, based upon an increasing amount of minimal information appearing, so that the ideal gameplay can be achieved.

In the event of a deviation from the programmed gameplay, the program does not simply browbeat you into accepting its play. Instead, a fresh sequence is created and, based on the human player's judgement, the fresh gameplay may be played right through.

If the playing of that deal turns out to be memorable, the option of savingthe played-out deal to a new library archive is offered.

This is one of the best serious games programs I have yet come across. It can cope with many variations and, within the not-inconsiderable limitations imposed by the BBC Micro's memory constraints, proves more than a match for any serious Bridge player.

Steve Gold