Underground adventure

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Walter Cobra - amateur inventor and part-time adventurer - has discovered an ancient map, the contents of which reveal the location of a fabulous treasure known as The Golden Dragon. So eager is he to begin his quest that he enters the labyrinth without the map - and now, hopelessly lost, he desperately needs your help to explore the caverns and locate the treasure.

Absent-minded he may be, but at least he remembered to pack the rest of his adventuring gear - eight stun grenades and a pair of anti-gravity boots. The function of the stun grenades is twofold - they will immobilise the majority of the robotic guards that you'll encounter, and they're also very effective at demolishing nuclear reactors, of which the labyrinth contains three.

The playing area is laid out in grid fashion. This is eight screens wide, but I am unsure as yet of its vertical extent. The designs are many and varied, but they are all immaculately drawn and cleverly constructed - each one creating the maximum difficulty with the minimum of effort.

Merely recovering some golden relic would be far too easy a task for an adventurer of your calibre, so Superior decided to complicate matters. In addition to the Golden Dragon, you must collect twelve power crystals, destroy three reactors, interrogate eight computer terminals, and solve a series of puzzles in the special rooms.

There is often more than one exit from a screen, and consequently more than one route through the labyrinth - but only one is correct. You will soon discover that many of the paths are barred by locked doors - a symbol displayed beneath the door can be used to help identify the relevant key.

Walter's mode of transport is determined by the properties of the current room. His jet boots are only operative when there is a large triangular shape present, otherwise he is restricted to running and jumping. It is useful to remember that the left and right keys remain operative when falling, thus allowing you to control Walter's drift during his descent.

The alien inhabitants of the labyrinth display varying degrees of aggression. Some will go about their own business, ignoring your presence, and the rest are just downright nasty. You are unlikely to outrun such an alien in a horizontal plane, but the turbo boost on your boots should enable you to escape vertically.

Stun grenades are only effective against mechanical adversaries. You are advised not to use them indiscriminately as abadly timed detonation can leave a concussed android blocking your exit. On the other hand I found that a robot, if halted in the correct position, could be used as a platform to gain extra height when jumping.

It is obvious that Superior's programmers have put a great deal of time and effort into creating Quest. It has the polished graphics of a first rate arcade game and the frustration factor of a top class adventure. What more can I say?

Jon Revis