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You have somehow found yourself in the evil Valley of Gad which is ruled over by a particularly nasty reptilian specimen called Archveult, aided by three allies: Kritos Bloodheart, Ka-Rim and The Demiveult.

It seems that there's an annual contest in which a slave (that's you) gets to be the human quarry. You must make your way through the fourteen or so locations of the valley, fighting off all the nasties that are thrown at you, with the aid of the usual set of spells and things. Most of the locations are outdoor but there are a few actual places, like Gap Town, Wixard's Tower and the Monastery.

The storyline may sound pretty naff, but what makes Blood Valley a cut above the rest is the fact that it's a one- or two-player game, with enough contrast between the two to make it all worthwhile.

In one-player mode, you, as the quarry, get to play one of three characters: Priest, Barbarian or Thief, and are set tasks to complete as you fight your way round the Valley. The Priest's only got to defeat Archweult, destroy Malefice the Prince of Vampires, destroy the Undead Warrior Lord Tobias and slay the Demiveult. The Thief also has to steal a few items.

Whichever character you choose, you spend most of your time fighting off cohorts of funny blokes, some of whom drop food and treasure when you nobble them. Not being stupid, you pick them up. There are also bags of gold and spells to be had. Spells can be activated at any time, and you can also call up a directory listing all the items you've picked up.

You have to travel through a whole scene before being allowed to go to the next location. When you reach the required transfer spot, you have a choice of directions in which to go. Scrutinising the map supplied with the game should help you decide which direction to take.

Not surprisingly, two-player mode is much more fun because one of you plays the hunter, and the other the hunted. At the beginning the hunter gets the opportunity to deploy his three allies at whatever map locations he thinks you'll visit on your travels. But you can't place them just anywhere, the instructions tell you which locations each character is restricted to.

When you get back, you can choose, as in the one-player game, which of the three victims to be. The same set of tasks still apply for each victim.

In two-player mode, the screen is split horizontally, with both players continuously nobbling nasties. Whenever the hunted enters a location in which you've placed an ally, you take telepathic control of the ally to do battle with the hunted in the upper screen. If you get nobbled, it's back down to the lower screen and the usual reptilian form. By the way, you have just five days to slay your quarry.

Gremlin have put some nice touches into this game but the whole thing, to my mind, is let down by the inadequate joystick controls for fighting. Since sighting is what you do most of the time, Gremlin might have put in a few more moves. All you seem to get is lunge and stab.

The graphics are generally good, but they're a little bit too intricate to be clear, especially on the C64.

Bearing in mind that there are not many two-player games around, this one makes a pretty good stab at fitting the bill. And the game is pretty big, definitely in the midnight oil league. One annoying point is that, if either of the two characters gets nobbled, the game is over. So you'd better choose your friends carefully.