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A few issues ago I reviewed Blockbusters. Well, here is Mastermind, another quiz game taken from a television program.

The complete game comes in two separate parts. The first part is a twin cassette pack which contains the program on one tape and the data or questions on the other. This package can be brought separately and played without the use of the other cassette, which I will come to later. From the twin pack you first load the program tape and you'll soon come to realise, that it's just like the Mastermind on the box.

Once this tape is loaded, you are asked how many contestants wish to play. You can have up to four players. Then, the first contestant is called and you are asked to enter your name, occupation, and specialist subject. This is where the second tape comes in. The second tape holds questions about films on one side of the tape and sport on the other. Each set of specialised questions is followed by general knowledge questions. Of course, you can only answer the questions that are on the data tape. So when asked to enter your subject, you then load the appropriate questions. There are about 100 questions per subject, so if four persons are playing you get 25 different questions each. As you are playing against the clock it would be rare to answer all 25. When the data is loaded, you are given two minutes to answer the questions. You also have the ability to 'pass' by hitting the Enter key and are told the correct answer at the end of your go.

One of the features I like was the computer's ability to recognise key words in your answers. If, for example, you answered Shakespeare, and the correct answer was William Shakespeare, it would in fact give you the point, and the words, "I can accept that" appear on the screen. If the second contestant wants to answer questions on a different subject then you will have a load separate data each time. The loading of data takes about three minutes. If four are playing and you all have different subjects it tends to take the fun out of the game as you are forever loading data. A microdrive version of the game is not planned, but if there's enough demand... who knows?

After the first round you then load the general knowledge questions and answer in the same way. Scores are shown after the first round and a hard copy can be made if needed. Now, back to the other package I mentioned. This is called Mastermind Quizmaster and is made to be used in conjunction with the Mastermind game. This is a single cassette which enables you to write you own questions. Once loaded, this is easy to do using the menu-driven system. You can also use keywords, as in the pre-recorded tapes. I'd just like to mention that, although it follows the TV version very closely, it does not come with a leather chair.

The Mastermind twin pack will cost you £9.95 and the Mastermind Quizmaster will set you back £5.95. Both are written for the 48K Spectrum.