C&VG


The Magician's Ball

Publisher: Global
Machine: Commodore 64

 
Published in Computer & Video Games #51

The Magician's Ball

To free the ruler's daughter, and to escape with her from the Dark Lands of the evil magician, is your task as Caro in this unusual adventure.

The story starts in a rather strange house, whose kitchen leads into a room containing a diabolical demon encased in green slime. Another room houses a witch - a bit of a pickpocket on the quiet. It is up to you to discover how to encourage her to steal that which is not essential to your task!

Eventually, after a sticky encounter with a spongy floor, the action moves on to a forest. This is where I deducted a few atmosphere points, for here I discovered that my main ally in thwarting the magician is a giant tree!

The Magician's Ball

Admittedly I was under the influence at the time, but I found the concept of taking a tree into carrying me around and doing the deeds of which I was incapable too bizarre to gel with the plot.

The fact that the tree talked in Arborian didn't really help either.

There are two characters, Caro and Azul, who are interchangeable throughout the game. Of course it had to happen, and it did! Type AZUL and you become Azul, type CARO and yous become Caro.

The Magician's Ball

The visual presentation of the game is fast and clean. A split screen is featured, the top half showing a mini-graphic, often animated, with a text description of the location to the side.

Despite being so small, the graphics contain an amazing amount of detail, and serve to help the player instantly recognise into which location he has moved.

The publishers, in describing the game, make a great thing of the 'unforgettable music of Oldfield's Tubular Bells' - excerpts play throughout the game.

I suppose there has to be music at any ball, but it came over as an irritating dirge, and I soon turned the sound right down.

With the "Bells" cast into oblivion, the game is a pleasure to play - it is so user-friendly.