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This is a bit of a weirdie. Soul Of A Robot is the follow-up to an earlier game, Nonterraqueous, and although a lot of work has clearly gone into it, I'm still a bit unclear of what it's all about.

The plot, as detailed on the cassette inlay goes as follows: the citizens of the planet Nonterraqueous have created a robot with the mind of a man in order to destroy the crazed computer which rules the planet. The robot however seems to be suffering from a touch of existential angst, as its tormented soul seeks the release of death.

But it can only die once it has completed its task which is to locate the computer's lair and then to detonate the bomb that it carries (that reminds me of a novel called Mockingbird, by Walter Tevis, 'though that's neither here nor there...).

The lair is located somewhere in a 16 x 16 maze, subdivided into three sections. To move from one section of the maze to another, the robot must first locate the key to the relevant transporter room. The robot can fly and jump around the cavernous sections of the maze and collect obects along the way.

There don't seem to be that many objects though, and I'm not sure what they're for anyway. There are some pyramid-shaped objects, and a number of what look like small space crafts, but I haven't managed to do anything with, or to them yet. The instructions don't give you any clues, but perhaps some more time spent on the game will enlighten me.

The graphics are quite interesting. They're a sort of combination of gothic architecture and high-tech spacecraft reminiscent of the H.R. Giger designs used in the film Alien, and must have taken a lot o work to get them looking just right.

The playing area is confusing as the sections of the maze don't always appear to be connected in a logical (and mappable) sequence. I'm not really sure what to make of this game. It's quite atmospheric, mainly because of the style of the graphics, but it does all seem to be rather obscure.

Or perhaps I'm just thick.

Still, it seems well worth the price, and perhaps that very obscurity will prove a challenge and ensure that the game provides many hours of playing time.