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A creepy castle, undead inhabitants, the return of a vampire and buckets of fake blood - the perfect combination for a trashy 'B' movie, but also the perfect recipe for a great fantasy adventure. Many of you may be familiar with the character Elvira. She has already appeared in a number of films. The provocatively dressed, well-endowed star is also the centre of attraction in this orgy of horror.

The story goes like this. On the demise of Uncle Emlo, Elvira inherited Castle Killbragant. Little did she know she was also inheriting a heap of trouble with it. When she visited the castle, she was imprisoned by the various creatures returning from the underworld to prepare for the arrival of Elvira's Great-Great-Grandmama Emelda. It turns out that Emelda made a deal with the devil to be resurrected in the future. The secret to stopping her resurrection lies hidden in a chest in the castle. As you can imagine, Elvira is not too happy about the return of her ancient ancestor. Not being a fan of family reunions, she advertises for someone to help.

After answering the advertisement, you arrive at Killbragant ready to start your quest. You must find six keys to open the chest and dispose of the creatures you encounter on your travels. The game is played with the mouse, using menus and arrows to control your movement. Picking up objects is a matter of pointing at them in the location window: you can find weapons, ingredients for spells and food to keep your strength up.

You can't play the game for long without coming face-to-face with some hellish creature, and combat with these is an essential part of the game. There are a variety of ways of polishing them off, though. You can cast spells you have had mixed up to weaken them, fire weapons from a distance or enter into hand-to-hand combat. The latter is a fight to the death with your animated opponent swiping at you in one of two ways: hence you have two defensive choices (block or party). Fend off his attack and you can choose between two offensive moves (lunge or hack).

So what part does Elvira play in the game other than that of page three lookalike? Well she has confined herself to the castle kitchen where she will conjure up any spell you wish if you have the correct ingredients in your pocket. These spells have some strange names (Cat & Dog Broth, Fire Sponge and Mushroom Tenderness) but can be very useful in restoring your energy and giving you special powers to use in combat.

What will really attract many players to Elvira are the excellently drawn and animated graphics used in every location. They really make the game come to life, or death! A warning has had to be given on the packaging of the game though, as you can come across some fairly gory scenes. The sight of an old gardener having what is left of his neck nibbled by maggots is not too appetising (pass the sick bag around at the back!).

Elvira's puzzle factor is a little tough. You are constantly bombarded by creatures taking pot shots at you and this severely hampers your progress at first. When you have mastered the basic art of fighting you can begin to explore Killbragant and its grounds. Things then begin to piece together, if you keep your eyes peeled - the slighest speck on a wall could be a vital clue to the completion of the game.

Elvira is similar in style to the authors' last game, Personal Nightmare (87%, Issue 53), but far superior in size and graphical quality. Anyone who has played that game will know about the endless disk swapping. Elvira comes on five (yes, five!) discs and needs one megabyte of RAM. Disk swapping isn't too annoying, though, as each part of the castle uses a different disk so at least you can anticipate when a change is about to happen.

Elvira is a must for all fantasy adventure fans. A blood-curdling, all-action game that will have you totally perplexed and enjoying every minute of it.