Computer role-playing games are often reviewed in 'Manoeuvres' and from the sceptical standpoint of a live role-playing purist - convinced that a form of entertainment that relies on human interaction and is practically a kind of improvised theatre couldn't possibly be reproduced on a computer - I have come to enjoy this sub-genre of the strategy gaming world greatly. A good computer RPG can offer hours of continuous absorbtion, being less frustrating than text adventures (which, like cryptic crosswords, stop being fun when you get stuck) and less serious and technical than straightforward wargames.

But having had a fair number pass through my disk drive, I have also got tired of the cliched, unimaginative and humourless settings and plotlines ofered as standard. Far too many RPGs use scenarios that would have seemed antiquated even in the early days of D&D.

Having complained about this loud and long in recent issues, I'm delighted this month to have received Wasteland for review. Wasteland comes from EA, who also publish the more conventional Bard's Tale series, and is an RPG set not in the orc-infested pastures of Fantasia but the irradiated wastelands of post-holocaust America.

In a few explanatory paragraphs, the game designers boldly root their scenario in the immediate future. Ten years from now, in 1998, America is to have completed a space station which the Russians insist is a military launching platform. Tensions grow, and the nations of the world line themselves up behind the two superpowers. But two weeks before it is due to go into operation, the space station transmits a distress signal and, mysteriously, all the satellites orbiting the planet disappear. The response of the superpowers is carefully considered and rational: they discharge their nuclear arsenals at each other. Civilisation As We Know It is neatly destroyed, though convenient pockets remain here and there in a state of anarchy most conducive to adventurers.

The player takes on control of a part of Desert Rangers. The Desert Rangers follow in the great tradition of the Texas and Arizona Rangers, and were formed to help survivors of the holocaust rebuild their communities. They come from the strongest and most successful of the surviving settlements, descended from a group of Army Engineers who were working in the southwestern deserts when the nuclear attack began. Seeking shelter, they turfed out the inhabitants of a newly-constructed federal prison and invited the surrounding survivalist communities to join them. This prison is now known as the Ranger Centre.

There have been disturbances in the desert recently, and it is the duty of the Desert Rangers to go out and investigate them. The player is given no more information than this in the introduction to the rulebook, which lets down the atmosphere just a bit; surely the real Desert Rangers would know the nature of the 'disturbances', and have some theories about who or what might be causing them and how serious they were?

The brief is really 'explore the desert and its scattered pockets of civilisation, and discover what you're supposed to be doing as you go along'. Fair enough.

Many games of this type insist that the player has a blank formatted disk to hand to use as 'character disk' and very often an extra one is required to save the game. I always find this irritating, for blank disks, like safety pins and policemen, are never around when you need them. Wasteland absolutely requires you to have four disks. Four! And unless you have them, you can't play the game at all.

The reason for this lies in the nature of the gameplay, which constantly alters the state of the map and the position of objects and the lives of NPCs - and at least the requirement is clearly advertised on the front cover. The first two hours after purchase are spent copying four sides of data onto the disks, and silently vowing to be very cross indeed if the game itself turns out not to be worth the wait!

Once you have finished you do at least have the comfort of knowing that the original two disks spend most of their time safely in the packet, and you're working with back-up copies. And, if anything goes disastrously wrong in the course of play, you can repeat the process and go right back to the beginning.

Initially, the player commands a party of four Desert Rangers. The party can be expanded to seven by the recruitment of three NPCs met in the course of play. For the player who wants to get straight on with the game, four pre-generated characters are provided. New characters can be created in the Ranger Centre.

Characters have a standard set of RPG attributes: strength, intelligence, luck, speed, agility, dexterity and charisma. Most of these affect the character's ability in play in some way or another, and they can all be used directly in situations where the player things they might be of some advantage; using strength, for instance, can force open a locked door, and charisma can charm an NPC into talking. Attributes are generated at random, and you can 'roll' continuously until you get a set you want. Hardened PRG-ists might regard this is as cheating, but it seems unimportant in a computer game. The character has a number of skill points initially equal to his intelligence rating, and the player uses these to buy a variety of skills from a generous selection detailed in the rulebook. The skills are an important part of the game. Their availability is restricted by the characters' IQ. While someone with an IQ of 3 can learn to swim or fire a rifle, an IQ of 16 is required to learn cryptology. The most advanced subject is metallurgy. Skills are all fairly cheap to buy at level one, and it's possible to get the entire range between the four characters. Raising the level of the skill costs double what the previous level cost.

Once the party is assembled, exploration can begin. The wilderness map is conventional and reasonably attractive, showing an overhead view of a landscape that conspicuously fails to look threatening or irradiated. The party crunches across plains and desert, heading for interesting-looking features in the horizon. The three nearest settlements to the Ranger Centre are Highpool, the Agricultural Centre and the Rail Nomad's Camp - these are mentioned in the introduction as places to search for clues - but there are plenty of other mysterious and dangerous locations to get killed in. Wandering too far into the radiation zones is fatal, but I suspect that equipment as yet undiscovered by me will enable the party to survive such tripe. Random encounters with belligerent inhabitants of the wasteland such as Nuke Pooches and Wasteland Warriors hamper progress but not irritatingly so.

Combat is smooth and swift. Each character starts the game in possession of a basic firearm and a clutch of cartridges, and when a hostile group is encountered the player is given the choice of several actions for each character in the coming combat round. These orders, and the opponent's response to them, are processed in order and described in a scrolling message. Once a character loses all his hit points he is rendered unconscious, but recovers spontaneously if left alone by the enemy. Combat, particularly with large packs of unintelligent monsters, can sometimes drag on too long to be enjoyable. Once the party's weapon skills have improved, accurate and damaging firepower usually gets rid of the enemy in a couple of rounds. These are clumsy aspects to the combat system - it's frustrating difficult to run away, for instance - but on the whole it's satisfying.

The real meat and interest of the game is contained in the locations, which, when entered on the main map, resolve into a smaller and much more varied map. The "towns" of Wasteland are not the standardised cityscapes of games like Ultima, but excitingly different and unexpected Highpool, close to the Ranger Ventre, seems to be the remains of an American summer camp and is populated by a disturbing race of mutant teenagers. The Agricultural Centre lets the player's party loose on fields of giant turnips, carrots and wheat, infested by equally large and vicious bunny rabbits. The rail Nomads live in trucks and tents. Further to the north-west is the city of Quartz with streets of dangerous buildings these places, buying and selling equipment, and healers who will cure diseases and restore hit points for a price. Often the use of skills and attributes will uncover hidden entrances to underground mines and concealed passageways, and there are many different characters to meet and converse with. The screen display is enhanced by frequent passages of text describing what the party sees, and this is supplemented by the ingenious use of a book of 'paragraphs' supplied in the packaging. When appropriate, the game prompts the player to a particular numbered paragraph in the booklet and information too wordy to be contained on the disk is imparted in the time-honoured way. The only problem with this system is the temptation to cheat and search through the paragraphs for clues!

The variety of different places to be explored the generous use of text, the complexity of the interlocking clues and quests and the sheer sense of excitement and anticipation make Wasteland the best computer RPG I've seen for a long time. My favourable reaction is not entirely due to the 'originality' of the scenario (there's nothing particularly original in an absolute sense about a post-holocaust setting) but I think the background provides more scope for interesting objects, characters and situations. If you can afford it, buy it; there's hours and hours of entertainment in it.

Presentation 85%
On the whole excellent, though there are a few awkward moments in combat and a strange bug that sometimes doesn't require a character to have bullets in his gun when he fires it.

Graphics 81%
Above average for the game type, with stylish artwork for various monsters encountered.

Rules 87%
Every aspect of the game system is well laid out and explained in detail, and the book of paragraphs is an ingenious idea.

Playability 92%
The sense of anticipation is very great.

Overall 95%
A thoroughly absorbing game.