Adventure Sure To Succeed

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Knight Lore, from Ultimate, is the sequel to their first blockbuster, Sabre Wulf.

The hero of the first epic, Sabre Man, carries the curse of the wulf. so each day as the light fades he undergoes a dramatic transformation from man to "wulf".

In an effort to rid himself of the curse, he has travelled to Castle Knight Lore to seek the help of the old wizard.

He must find the wizard within 40 days or remain a wulf forever.

Ultimate have certainly not fallen into the trap of merely rehashing a winning formula by presenting Sabre Wulf in a castle.

Knight Loreis one of the best pieces of programming I have ever seen on the BBC Micro and it's light years ahead of Sabre Wulf.

The action takes place inside the castle. The graphics are merely two-colour, but the characters and objects within the room are drawn with such stunning 3D realism and per spective that you can almost touch them.

The controls for the game are - rotate left and right, walk forward, jump, and pick up objects.

When rotating Sabre Man, or the wulf, you are presented with an extremely detailed view of each of the character's four sides in turn.

As you search the castle you will find that some of the rooms contain objects.

These may or may not be useful in your quest, but if you don't pick them up you'll never know.

This is easier said than done, as the objects are normally situated in the most inaccessible part of the room and can only be reached by negotiating some fiendishly clever three-dimensional obstacle.

One such obstacle consists of a type of spiral staircase constructed from blocks of stone that are suspended in mid-air.

The first of the blocks is situated on the far side of the staircase and must therefore be jumped blind.

The rest of the manoeuvre consists of a series of rapid jumps and turns as each of the blocks begins to drift earthwards as soon as Sabre Man touches it.

Dawdle too long and you have sunk so low that you are unable to reach the next step.

Other hazards in the game include guards, ghouls, spiked floors, and huge spiked balls which fall from the ceiling.

All of these are drawn in superb detail and you are even treated to the spectacle of Sabre Man's very impressive transfor mation from man to wulf and vice versa.

Knight Lore pushes the concept of arcade adventure games to its limits and will definitely be one of the big sellers of 1985.

Jon Revis