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If you've played Lords Of Midnight, then you'll have some idea what you're in for here. If you haven't, then stand by for a game with over 48,000 different screens, 128 characters, 128 objects to collect, and an evil witch-king's daughter to defeat.

In this, the second of Beyond's 'epic' trilogy, you use single-key commands, as indicated by a keyboard overlay, to control all characters loyal to your cause in your struggle against Shareth the Heartstealer, who has captured Morkin, son of Luxor the Moonprince.

Once you've selected a character, you can look through his or her eyes at the surrounding countryside as you march across the Frozen Empire, doing battle with giants, dwarves, and barbarians.

The landscape is far more detailed than in Midnight and covered with different features, from mountains to pyramid-like temples. There are 6,144 different locations and in each one you can look in eight different directions. The perspective is faultless and the atmosphere tremendous.

Lords Of Midnight fans will find Doomdark a far greater challenge than its predecessor. Not only is the country bigger, but each character is much more complex and there are icelords, barbarians, dwarves, fey, and giants to recruit or, if they're hostile, defeat.

There are many more options during play. Each character, for example, has a special object, and special options include 'Give' an object and 'Use' a special object. You can also enter underground caverns, take rest, or approach other characters (with a view to recruiting them).

Recruiting other people is a far more complex process, since each one possesses no less than eleven different characteristics, each of which will influence them in their actions and attitudes towards you.

Other ingenious touches include changing weather (watch out for the rolling mist!) that follows a 96-day weather cycle and flickering torches to guide you through the tunnels. The display changes colour according to the time of day - red/orange at dawn, blue at midday, and blue/black at night.

The biggest difference in Doomdark, however, is in winning the game. There are no less than five different victories, ranging from the simplest one of rescuing Nlorkin, to the 'overwhelming victory' of rescuing Morkin, killing Shareth the Heartstealer, and returning to the start with Luxor, Rorthron, Tarithel the Fey, and Morkin still alive.

At the beginning of the game you control only three characters: Luxir, Rorthron and Tarithel. Forces usually join in battle almost immediately and what's more the wolves, skulkrin, ice trolls and dragons don't just stay in one place in this game - they move about, making progress for individual characters more risky. Because of the increased complexity of the program, the game varies tremendously each time you play it, and victory is far, far more difficult to achieve than in Midnight.

There's so much one could say about this game, but it all boils down to one thing - go out, buy it, load it up, and spend hours, days, weeks, perhaps even months playing it. You'll enjoy every minute.

I wasn't too sure about the colour choice in this game. I like the idea of different colours for different times of day, but in practice I found the red/yellow combination rather murky on my TV. This was a pity because there's so much more to look at.

The other disappointment was the tunnels. It's a great idea being able to enter caverns and things, but again - in practice - I found that it wasn't quite so exciting. However, these are only minor quibbles. Overall, the game is extremely impressive.

Some of the colour combinations in Doomdark's graphics don't work too well. Apart from that, it's a worthy follow-up to Lords Of Midnight. The basic format is the same, but the game is much bigger, much more complex.

I especially liked the attempt to give characters more personality - each has a large number of character traits which vary according to events. And the underground tunnels with their flickering torches are an inspired boost to the overall atmosphere.

I wonder how much further the epic game can be expanded.

I really like the landscape in this game - there's so much more to look at than in Midnight, and you can spend hours just exploring the different places. The changing weather is a great idea too.

What really grabbed me though was the challenge of the game. There's so much more to the characters in this game, and so far I've found it very difficult to survive long enough to complete even the most basic victory. Difficult... but very exciting!