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A few years ago, Hewson made a name for itself with a series of games by Steve Turner based around Dragontorc. These games had an intrepid hero battling through a maze of dungeons in a 3D "Atic Atac" sort of way using magic, fighting various guardians of the peace and generally making a nuisance of himself.

Recently, Gauntlet has been a great success in the arcades and in the home market. The various Gauntlet clones that appeared before and after it were equally as successful. The format of a vertical plan view of a dungeon level with all the nasties and heroes is now the current fashion. Gauntlet was the simplest - all good ideas are simple but the clones had to have something extra to let them compete with the original in a fair fight.

Ranarama has a great deal extra, combining elements of both games. The instructions go on, and on, and on. Even then, they only scratch the surface of what's going to happen. If the theme of Gauntlet was treasure, then the theme of Ranarama is magic. Starting off as a menial apprentice, you gain in power and ability as you progress through the dungeons.

Whilst playing with his master's magic potions, Mervyn, the sorceror's apprentice and hero of the game, has turned himself into a frog! To add insult to injury he has also transported himself into an evil warlock's dungeon! Your job is to help him escape whilst causing as much mayhem as possible.

Your little frog has a number of spell types - offence, defence, power, and effect. Offence level dictates the power of your shots, and defence relates to how much the enemy shots can hurt you. Power is your general energy provider. More powerful offence and defence spells will draw power faster and require a better energy spell. 'Effect' gives you a special effect spell that gives you extra powers. You start off with 'find', that will locate hidden doors in a room, though you can acquire spells that will allow you to teleport or summon demons. Unfortunately you can only use one of these types of spell at a time.

To raise a spell by a level you have to engage a warlock in ritual combat. To do this you must run up and touch him. The screen then changes to show the runes which spell out 'Ranarama'. These then re-arrange themselves as your 'life force' is calculated. You then have until the life force counts down to zero to re-arrange the runes to form the original word. If you don't then your power spell zaps back to 'mortal', making you vulnerable - or, if you are already mortal, you die.

If you are successful, the warlock dies and will drop some runes. You then have a short time to pick them up before they fade away.

In the dungeon, you also find glyph flagstones. These are symbols on the floor that you stand on to perform one of several functions. The Glyph of Seeing gives you a map of all rooms in the dungeon that you have already visited. The Glyph of Power will destroy or damage creatures in the room that you are in and the Glyph of Travel will transport you between dungeon levels. The final glyph is the Glyph of Sorcery. This glyph is the one that allows you access to new spells and powers. When you activate this glyph you get a screen showing you what active spells you possess. From this, you can scan through screens of information on spells both active and available. You can then 'spend' the runes that you acquired earlier on spells of greater power.

The part of the game that makes it really different from the other Gauntlet clones is that the plan view of the dungeon only shows the rooms that you have been in. As you go through a door the room appears on screen, complete with lots of nasties in it, and will re-appear each time you enter that section of the dungeon.

There is an awful lot to this game. Which spells to use and when, where to go, which warlocks to attack and when to travel down to other levels. The invisible rooms are a great idea. I mean, you wouldn't know what was in a room until you had been in it, would you?

This is a great game and there is no reason why it shouldn't go straight to the top of the charts. Hewson produced a couple of games around the Dragontorc theme. Let's hope that there are more Ranarama games too.