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TALOS stomps across the pleasant pastures of rural England to recover the Crown of Eternity, and restore balance to nature or some such nonsense. All the little furry squirrels and chirpy grasshoppers are going bananas, and the old battle robot is the last chance of stopping the rot.

Trouble is, Talos has been dismembered and lies scattered in seven pieces. You start with just the great metal hand, and must find the other bits to reassemble yourself before finally getting the crown.

The screen shows fields surrounded by fences, and the occasional stretch of road - there are over 200 such screens, fairly spacious, in which the rabid creatures appear. Your main problem is running out of energy, which can be restored by collecting coins, candles, and parts of your body.

You get a magnet which you can drop and which activates the compass, bottom right of the screen. It is a useful marker if you find part of your body but, alas, not one which will link up with what you have already.

Talos is a highly competent maze game, though not exactly original. The monsters are not much of a problem, and you can usually ignore them if you move swiftly enough. More important and difficult is the business of finding all the various bits and pieces. Some only appear after others have been found.

What is fun is the way the robot changes each time a new part is added. It provides a good incentive to find the next piece, and we expect you will be clamouring for infinite lives POKEs before very long.

Chris Bourne

Publisher: Silversoft Price: £7.95 Memory: 48K Joystick: Sinclair, Kempston

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