Available on cassette or - at £1 more - on disc, Scope comes in a video-type box with a smart spiral-bound manual, and describes itself as a games designer. I'm not too sure what that is.

This is really a new language and compiler. It enables you to write sound and graphics routines which can be compiled into machine code and then run independently of the Scope program.

The Score commands cover sound, low-resolution graphics and sprites. High resolution graphics aren't supported, which is a great shame. The commands are written in Basic REM statements. Command words are similar to those used in Basic, but the structure of the language seems to be closer to that of assembler.

Scope provides an easy method of writing machine code routines to speed up the operation of Basic programs, but its limitations would make it difficult to use for writing a complete program of any complexity. Only integer variables are supported - no strings! - and mathmetical functions are limited to addition and subtraction.

An interesting utility, and one that's well worth looking at if you don't want to bother learning machine code.

M.N.