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Stormlord's dreams have been answered: the busty young fairies in his original adventure have changed to full human-size (and still don't like wearing clothes!). But rather than trying to get them banned, the evil black Queen has had them imprisoned in Hell. Only Stormlord can save the fairies, and the fact that Hell is a fairly dangerous place isn't going to discourage him...

Stormlord's original quest was an arcade adventure with numerous puzzles to solve. The sequel is much more of a horizontally-scrolling shoot-'em-up. The basic objective is to fight your way through to the end of the level with as many fairies as you can rescue. These life-size beauties float across the screen and are collected by jumping at them. On later levels demons will try and grab them off you.

The demons come in plenty of different shapes, including persistently swooping bats, fireball-throwing trolls, zombies which rise out of the ground and fast-moving dragons. There's also acid droplets, rivers of fire, acid bubbles and avalanches of falling rock.

Initially Stormlord is armed merely with a fast-firing fireball, but previous adventurers have left plenty of other weapons to collect such as a crossbow, bouncing bombs and grenades. These all have limited ammo and are activated by holding down fire. Stormlord can also do special mid-air leaps, pressing up three times provides a mega-leap! Even better, Stormlord can ride on a small dragon, if he prevents her eggs falling.

The game has six levels in all, in three loads. At the end of each load a special code is provided which allows you to continue on the next load with the same amount of fairies and score. There's also a bonus level where the fairies Stormlord has saved float above his head. They're grateful to Stormlord but shy, so he must leap up - on the hearts which he drops - to capture them before they will give him a coin, two of which buy an extra life.

Any game containing nude women gets my vote! Whoops, where have I heard that before? Anyway, the sprites are generally top-notch, though their size means the game is a little slow - rushing about and blasting gets you nowhere!

Although very playable, the game can be frustratingly tough at times, until you learn tactics to cope with each of the varied enemies, but you do get nine lives and plenty of extra ones can be obtained in the delightful bonus section.

The innovative scorecode system is also an advance over the original, avoiding annoying level repetition. Overall, Deliverance delivers the goods with a good dollop of sauce. Yum, yum, I like it!

After getting away with the slightly risque graphics of the original, game designer Raff Cecco has made the naked fairies even bigger as well as keeping plenty of nude female statues to enliven the scenery. It's all good clean fun, and it can't harm sales, but it's gameplay that matters.

The original was an above-average arcade adventure with some maddeningly difficult arcade bits, and it's the latter which form the basis of the sequel. This means it's very frustrating to begin with, and nine lives go very quickly indeed.

Patience is required, which can detract from the blasting action. On the positive side the levels are all very different and packed with variety, one level even having an Asteroids-influence! The game *is* very tough, but the scorecord system means you only have to beat two levels to get onto the next load and continue from there.

Recommended for all those people who completed Turrican on their first go!

Presentation 80% Very useful scorecode to access loads two and three, sensible keys option and a free sticker!

Graphics 81% Large, impressive sprites move well across a nicely detailed and smoothly scrolling landscape.

Sound 84% Choice of good FX or excellent Maniacs Of Noise soundtrack.

Hookability 76% High difficulty level makes it initially very frustrating...

Lastability 82% ...but six extremely varied levels provide a very tough but rewarding challenge.

Overall 79% A variety-packed blast-'em-up.