[{"TitleName":"The Dungeon Builder","Publisher":"Dream Software Ltd","Author":"Richard Parratt","YearOfRelease":"1984","ZxDbId":"0006228","Reviews":[{"Issue":{"Name":"Your Spectrum Issue 8, Oct 1984","Price":"£0.85","ReleaseDate":"1984-09-20","Editor":"Roger Munford","TotalPages":90,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Roger Munford\r\nManaging Editor: Bruce Sawford\r\nDeputy Editor: Tina Boylan\r\nTechnical Editor: Peter Shaw\r\nEditorial Consultant: Andrew Pennell\r\nSoftware Consultant: Gavin Monk\r\nContributors: Ron Smith, Leon Heller, Stephen Adams, Dr D C Threlfall, Simon Goodwin, Peter Freebrey, Ross Holman, Dave Nicholls, Mike Leaman, Bill Shaw, Penny Page, The Saltcoats Computing Club, Mark Roberts, Sue Denham\r\nArt Editor: Hazel Bennington\r\nArt Assistant: Steve Broadhurst\r\nGroup Advertising Manager: Jill Harris\r\nAdvertising: Shane Campbell, Nik Saha, Dave Baskerville\r\nTypesetters: Carlinpoint\r\nProduction Manager: Sonia Hunt\r\nGroup Art Director: Perry Neville\r\nPublisher: Steven England\r\n\r\nPublished by Sportscene Specialist Press Ltd, [redacted] Company registered in England. Telephone (all departments): [redacted]\r\nReproduction: Graphic Ideas, London\r\nPrinters: Chase Web Offset [redacted]\r\nDistribution: Seymour Press [redacted]\r\n\r\nAll material in Your Spectrum ©1984 Felden productions, and may not be reproduced in whole or in part without the written consent of the publishers. Your Spectrum is a monthly publication.\r\n\r\nCover photography by Ian McKinnell"},"MainText":"DUNGEON BUILDER\r\nDream Software\r\n£9.95\r\r\n\r\r\nThis program, consisting of 15K of pure machine code, allows the user to design graphics adventures using the displayed map. There are also extensive save facilities; created programs can be run without Dungeon Builder.","ReviewerComments":["Adventure designers are not at all original, but this one has been very highly developed and should enable adventure programs to be created that are every bit as good as the user's imagination. I, for one, will be rushing out to buy one straight away. One of the most interesting features is the way you can produce your own screen graphics, and then use any of the Spectrum's colours.\r\nAlex Entwhistle","It's a pleasure to use, with fast response times to your commands, complete freedom in things like graphics designing and choice of colours. The most valuable feature is the way it allows a complete adventure to run without Dungeon Builder being present. Also very good is the 100-page manual which explains clearly how to make the most of the package.\r\nAlan Grier","A utility that actually works quite well, but could have been better. It's similar to other programs like The Quill and Dungeon Master, coupled with a crude drawing program. The graphics take a good deal of time to produce, but they're pretty good when complete. Compared with other similar offerings, this one rates favourably, but overall appeal depends upon whether you like writing adventure programs.\r\nAlan Hunter"],"OverallSummary":"","Page":"60","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Alex Entwhistle","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":"HIT"},{"Name":"Alan Grier","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":"HIT"},{"Name":"Alan Hunter","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":"MISS"}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":null,"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Crash Issue 5, Jun 1984","Price":"£0.75","ReleaseDate":"1984-05-24","Editor":"Roger Kean","TotalPages":126,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Roger Kean\r\nConsultant Editor: Franco Frey\r\nProduction Designer: David Western\r\nArt Editor: Oliver Frey\r\nClient Liaison: John Edwards\r\nStaff Writer: Lloyd Mangram\r\nContributing Writers: Matthew Uffindel, Chris Passey\r\nSubscription Manager: Denise Roberts\r\n\r\nTelephone numbers\r\nEditorial/office [redacted]\r\nAdvertising [redacted]\r\nHot Line [redacted]\r\n\r\n©1984 Newsfield Ltd.\r\nCrash Micro is published monthly by Newsfield Ltd. [redacted]\r\n\r\nNo material may be reproduced in whole or in part without written consent from the copyright holders.\r\n\r\nPhotosetting by SIOS [redacted]\r\nColour origination by Scan Studio, [redacted]\r\nPrinted in England by Carlisle Web Offset Ltd, [redacted].\r\nDistribution by Comag, [redacted]\r\n\r\nSubscriptions: 12 issues £9.00 UK Mainland (post free)\r\nEurope: 12 issues £15 (post free).\r\n\r\nWe cannot undertake to return any written or photographic material sent to CRASH MICRO unless accompanied by a stamped addressed envelope.\r\n\r\nCover by Oliver Frey"},"MainText":"MERLIN'S RECIPE BOOK\r\n\r\nTo create a Dungeons and Dragons game can be as much fun as to actually play it. With programs such as THE QUILL by Gilsoft or DUNGEON BUILDER by Dream Software, very little programming knowledge is required. Let there be warning however that a logical and skilful mind is essential, as even the most simple detail of the program requires careful planning, if our hero, the player, is to stand a chance against the pitfalls and Dragons of the adventure. If you have a preference for graphical adventures, the Dungeon Builder is your comrade in arms. Discover the secret weapons at the reach of your fingertips...\r\n\r\nThe curious cassette box hides a 100-page manual containing hidden secrets and instructions and a single cassette loaded with the latest dungeon construction gear and dragon breeding equipment. The cassette also stores an hors d’example adventure to whet your appetite and to get you started on the right track..\r\n\r\nThe manual reads like Merlin's recipe book, advising you of the eight powerful menus at your disposal and introduces you to every single command feature with an example, which gradually allows you to build up a simple doorless two-chamber horror quickie to the most sophisticated multi-level dungeon mansion with all mods and cons such as self-locking doors and cliffs, trap doors and spiral staircases, secret passages and spacewarps, wall-to-wall treasures and blood curdling monsters...\r\n\r\nThe central playing ground is the Main Display Screen displaying a portion of a 40 x 40 cell map. Each cell is octagonal and represents a room with eight walls. A cursor pinpoints the editing location and the co-ordinates of every cell are displayed. In the upper right-hand corner is the memory gauge, indicating the amount of free bytes left. Below appear the various menus with command selections.\r\n\r\nUpon selecting CREATE from the Outer Menu, all cells are restored with all walls intact and all objects destroyed. The basis of the system is to modify or knock out the walls of the cells, to create descriptions and if required screen pictures for the cells, create objects, etc. The player, all living beings, treasures, stairs, doors, keys, etc, are all treated as objects and must therefore be created individually. To any object is allocated a name, a score, a weight, a (starting) position, commands from the verblist to which it reacts and descriptions, when encountered in a room.\r\n\r\nSeveral action commands may be allocated to one object, for example 'Open door' or 'Close door' and depending on the command taken, one of the following actions may be taken:\r\n\r\nSAY: Prints a message, ie 'The door is locked'\r\nDIE: Object is killed\r\nMOVE: Moves the object to a new position (Any, Carried, Here, Select)\r\nSTATUS: Changes the status of the object (ie from closed to open)\r\nJUMP: Causes player to move to a position specifIed.\r\n\r\nFor each status a different description of the object may be given. Each command recognised by an object increases the Verb List. Each command can be made dependent on a given condition and the action is to be specified.\r\n\r\nThis sounds all very complicated, but in fact is made very easy by the automatic prompting of the program. Depending on the previous action a new menu is displayed and makes sure that no logical errors occur.\r\n\r\nBasically the creation may be subdivided into the following main activities:\r\n\r\n- Create and modify the individual cells (Description, Screen Picture, Score, knock down or modify walls, etc.)\r\n\r\n- Create and modify objects (Name, Description, Score, Commands, Position. Weight).\r\n\r\nThe commands recognised by the objects make up the Verb List. Since the command processor checks on the status of the object and various commands can be allocated to one object, multiple actions are made possible.\r\n\r\nThe cell walls are double-sided and may be broken through on one side only for access in one direction only. Conditional movement through a wall of the cell is possible, where the command processor makes the movement conditional to the status of an object, an open or closed door.\r\n\r\nA wall of a cell may be made to react to the approach of the player, the action involving Say, Die, Move. Status or jump. With jump a spacewarp effect can be achieved, whereby the player will leave the room and appear at any given position on the map. Say will allow a message to appear when the wall is approached. For multi-level adventures it is necessary to create pseudo objects. These start with a dot and are therefore not printed on an Inventory or an entry into a room.\r\n\r\nStairs may be created as a pseudo object, which recognises up and down commands and acts accordingly. When in the middle of a cell, the menu asks for a description or picture. Selecting picture will activate the Picture Creator.\r\n\r\nThe facility includes apart from the usual paper and ink colour selection the drawing of lines and the painting of solid triangles. The cursor is controlled by the cursor keys (Caps shift for eight pixels per keystroke). Once completed the resulting picture will be displayed whenever the room is entered.\r\n\r\nThe unfinished program may be saved to cassette and reloaded. An excellent facility is provided for saving the completed adventure game in machine code, so that it can be loaded and played independently of Dungeon Builder.\r\n\r\nIn conclusion, the DUNGEON BUILDER is an excellent Graphic Adventure games creator, which simplifies the generation of even the most elaborate adventure and thus provides a possibility for the less expenenced programmer to create an adventure masterpiece.","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"","Page":"54,55","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Franco Frey","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":""}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[{"Text":"MAIN DISPLAY SCREEN\r\n\r\nPassage cause consequence list to be executed. (Shown in yellow).\r\n\r\nY coordinates (Ramge 1-40).\r\n\r\nCentre editing menu (Displayed when the cursor is on the centre of a cell).\r\n\r\nOpen diagonal passage.\r\n\r\nNumber of bytes free for your game.\r\n\r\nX coordinates (Range 1-40).\r\n\r\nConditionally open wall. (displayed in red).\r\n\r\nSingle wall permits one way movement from W to E.\r\n\r\nFlashing cursor.\r\n\r\nEdge editing menu (Displayed when the cursor is on the edge of a cell)."}],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":null,"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Sinclair User Issue 33, Dec 1984","Price":"£0.85","ReleaseDate":"1984-11-15","Editor":"Bill Scolding","TotalPages":244,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Bill Scolding\r\nDeputy Editor: John Gilbert\r\nConsultant Editor: Mike Johnston\r\nStaff Writer: Chris Bourne\r\nIllustrator/Designer: Craig Kennedy\r\nAdvertisement Manager: Rob Cameron\r\nDeputy Advertisement Manager: Louise Fanthorpe\r\nProduction Assistant: James McClure\r\nAdvertisement Secretary: Claudia Viertel\r\nEditorial Assistant: Colette McDermott\r\nSubscriptions Manager: Carl Dunne\r\nAssistant Publisher: Neil Wood\r\nPublisher: Gerry Murray\r\n\r\nSinclair User is published monthly by EMAP Business & Computer Publications\r\n\r\n96,271 Jan-June 1984\r\n\r\nTelephone\r\nEditorial and advertising departments\r\n[redacted]\r\n\r\nIf you would like to contribute to Sinclair User please send programs or articles:\r\nSinclair User\r\nEMAP Business & Computer Publications\r\n[redacted]\r\n\r\nOriginal programs should be on cassette and articles should be typed. We cannot undertake to return them unless a stamped-addressed envelope is included.\r\n\r\nWe pay £10 for the copyright of each program published and £50 per 1,000 words for each article used.\r\n\r\nAll subscription enquiries to\r\nMagazine Services,\r\nEMAP Business & Computer Publications\r\n[redacted]\r\n\r\n©Copyright 1984\r\nSinclair User\r\nISSN NO. 0262-5458\r\n\r\nPrinted and typeset by Cradley Print PLC, [redacted]\r\n\r\nDistributed by EMAP Publications Ltd."},"MainText":"BREATHING LIFE INTO FANTASY\r\n\r\nRichard Price examines aids for adventures\r\n\r\nAfter the last goblin has been offed or the top secret plans recovered from some rusty casket in the quicksands, do you sit back with a mild feeling of dissatisfaction and wonder whether you couldn't do just as well yourself?\r\n\r\nEven if you can barely manage to program a nested loop in Basic it does not mean you cannot translate your feverish imaginings into electronic reality by creating your own adventure. You could be surprised to find your own game design is at least as exciting as a lot of the average and uninspiring offerings now on the market.\r\n\r\nDon't kid yourself, though, that over a weekend you're going to churn out a program that will knock spots off the The Hobbit. Whether you write your programs or use tailor-made utilities, design and careful planning will require a great deal of time and paperwork before you even get started on the keyboard. Assuming you have a theme and a convincing setting the first priority will be a location map and its accompanying descriptions.\r\n\r\nDrawing the map is a time-consuming process and it is best to use graph paper, leaving plenty of space between each box for notes, messages and so on. Print 'n' Plotter make a handy Adventure Chart with pre-drawn location boxes which should help simplify the task. The size of a large sketch pad has been produced primarily for players, but should be just as useful for games design.\r\n\r\nOnce a preliminary map is completed you will feel your fantasy world is taking shape. Adding descriptions will help put living flesh on those bare bones and, if the text is inventive, informative and atmospheric it will increase the game's playability enormously. Take a look at the superb Level 9 games to see how detailed text can add to the overall effect.\r\n\r\nA word of warning - if you are a complete novice don't attempt a giant scenario with hundreds of locations. It's easier to practise on adventures with few locations and simple plots. Remember, too, that the Spectrum memory is limited and may not be able to cope with your dramatisation of War and Peace or the two thousand page Chronicles of Ganglewoop you have written in your spare time.\r\n\r\nThe next step is to work out all the likely interconnections between the locations, listing them meticulously. Objects and treasures - some obvious, some hidden - must be scattered around and you must decide what purpose they will have for the explorer of your world. It is probably that area of design which produces most difficulty as a game will stand or fall on the originality of its problems and puzzles. If they are too tough or obscure players are likely to give up in disgust. If they are too simple there will be little challenge or incentive to continue.\r\n\r\nIf you realise that a deduction problem will be impossible without help then put cryptic clues in the descriptions or the Help data. Anyone who has played Mountains of Ket will remember the magic word 'Polo' which gets you past the wall in 'mint condition'. Touches like that increase a program's attraction. Once again, you must keep track of all puzzles and the objects or conditions needed to solve them.\r\n\r\nNext you face the task of developing the game vocabulary. It is essential to provide a variety of synonyms wherever possible. That increases versatility and should mean that players will not constantly see 'I can't do that' or similar reports on screen. It is occasionally useful to include an action which can be achieved only by a particular word combination but there is nothing more aggravating to the adventurer than searching through the entire Oxford English Dictionary for some obscure synonym.\r\n\r\nHaving created that large interlocking network of places, characters, objects and actions the major problem of getting your creation into the computer then pokes you in the eye. Don't panic. The market is well provided with books and programming utilities to help you. If you have little programming experience it is essential that you do some preparatory reading and practise. Many routines used in adventure are standard and, once learned, can be re-used time and again with new data.\r\n\r\nNot all books on adventure programming are as useful as they may claim on the back cover. One of the simplest and clearest is Write Your Own Adventure Programs from Osbourne. Jenny Tyler and Les Howarth have made no assumptions about their readership and write in an uncomplicated style, taking you step by step through the entire process. The book is not Spectrum-specific but includes a section showing all the necessary conversions into Sinclair Basic. ZX-81 owners will find that they also have not been forgotten. Like most other books it takes a model adventure as its base and uses pleasantly daft illustrations to demonstrate the various processes. At £1.99 the paperback is extremely good value and contains as much information as many of the more expensive tomes on the shelves. However, because it is not machine-specific it does not run a section on graphics - as if they mattered anyway.\r\n\r\nSpectrum Adventures - Sunshine Books, £5.95 - by Tony Bridge and Roy Carnell is more sophisticated, more expensive. Like many of the large books it includes a history of the computer adventure whilst the main body of the book concentrates on the creation of a graphic adventure.\r\n\r\nIt is not to be recommended for beginners but if you want hints on the use of graphics it may prove useful. It contains information on combat sequences, in true Carnell D & D style, and has the full listing of a 48K game.\r\n\r\nAdventures do not always stick to the preset location style. Robert Speel's paperback New Adventure Systems for the Spectrum - Fontana, £3.95 - gives listings and advice on a number of formats. Speel makes things easier by slicing up the programs into sections, each of which can be added to a foundation program. He tends to gloss over how the routines work and the use of Sinclair printer listings makes reading a bit daunting.\r\n\r\nOne of the best and most user-friendly guides is Peter Gerrard's Exploring Adventures on the Spectrum 48K - Duckworth, £6.95. The three sample programs are pure text games and the author discusses data handling concepts with clarity and some sympathy for those who wriggle in panic when phrases like 'numeric arrays' are bandied about.\r\n\r\nAs a general guide, beware of books which contain vast listings and precious little else. Those programs take time to type in and will not necessarily teach you much about the structures they use. Always go for books which provide adequate explanations.\r\n\r\nIf you are not prepared to devote the time required for developing programming skills you will have to obtain a commercial adventure-writing program.\r\n\r\nThe Quill is now justly famous and can produce machine-coded games of high quality and fast response. At £14.95 cheap it isn't but it offers the embryonic games designer a means of creating complex scenarios quickly and slickly without any programming knowledge at all. The program is menu driven and includes a comprehensive instruction booklet, and though the style is sometimes difficult it is worth persisting until you understand it.\r\n\r\nAlthough a simple graphic set is included in the package The Quill is not intended for games needing complex graphics. You will find that there is room for about 30K of data, enough for lots of locations and fine detail. With imagination you will be able to make commercially viable adventures as others have done already - look at the software ads and you will see.\r\n\r\nDungeon Builder from Dream appears slightly more user-friendly than The Quill. It features a graphics capability using a sketch pad style to draw screens. The functions are manipulated by menus and the location map is shone on screen using a system of interconnecting cells. Regrettably, its available memory is quite limited - around 10K - and that is a disadvantage in creating large adventures.\r\n\r\nThe Dungeon Master - Crystal Computing - is a different kettle of fish. This game program allows you to create a monster-bashing scenario set in an underground labyrinth. All the hazards, treasures and options are predefined and give little scope for exercising your own imagination. You will not be able to use it to make standard text adventures but you should find it entertaining if you enjoy a bit of hacking and smashing.\r\n\r\nIt is often said that computer gaming is an essentially passive occupation, stunting the imagination and critical faculties. Anyone who has played adventure will know that to be an unjustified and sweeping generalisation. If you decide to go further and create your own adventures you will certainly extend your imaginative range and logical skills. You might even trawl a little brass on the way.","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"","Page":"160,161,164","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Richard Price","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":""}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":null,"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Big K Issue 7, Oct 1984","Price":"£0.85","ReleaseDate":"1984-09-20","Editor":"Tony Tyler","TotalPages":116,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Tony Tyler\r\nAssisted By: Richard Burton\r\nArt Editor: Ian Stead\r\nFeatures: Nicky Xikluna\r\nContributors: Andy Green; Kim Aldis (Features); Steve Keaton; Richard Cook; Richard Taylor; Bernard Turner; David Rimmer; John Conquest; Nigel Farrier, Paul Walton; Tony Benyon; Trevor Spall\r\nPublisher: Barry Leverett\r\nPublishing Director: John Purdie\r\nGroup Advertising Controller: Luis Bartlett\r\nAdvertisement Manager: Robin Johnson [redacted]\r\n\r\nEditorial Address: [redacted]\r\nTelephone: [redacted]\r\nAdvertising: [redacted]\r\n\r\nPublished approximately on the 20th of each month by IPC Magazines Ltd. [redacted]. Monotone and colour origination by G.M. Litho Ltd [redacted]. Printed in England by Chase Web Offset, Cornwall. Sole Agents: Australia and New Zealand, Gordon& Gotch (A/sia) Ltd.; South Africa, Central News Agency Ltd. BIG K is sold subject to the following conditions, namely that it shall not, without the written consent of the Publishers first given, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise disposed of by way of trade at more than the recommended selling price shown on the cover, and that it shall not be lent, resold or hired out or otherwise disposed of in a mutilated constitute or any unauthorised cover by way of trade or affixed to as part of any publication or advertising, literary or pictorial matter whatsoever. IPC MAGAZINES 1984."},"MainText":"DON'T LOOK NOW, BUT YOU'VE BEEN HAD\r\n\r\nDream Software\r\n48K Spectrum\r\n£9.95\r\n\r\nPLUNGE IN TO THIS DUNGEON\r\n\r\nTHE ALREADY obese Spectrum adventure market seems set to swell some more with the arrival of a neat new game generator from Dream Software. Like Gilsoft's highly rated Quill system The Dungeon Builder enables you to write your own machine-code adventures without any previous programming knowledge - but differs sharply in that it's designed to accommodate 4-colour graphics. Author Richard Parratt tells me that this has caused other publishing houses to show considerable interest. In fact (I'm told) Artic like the system so much they're using it to write their next batch of adventures.\r\n\r\nParratt based TDB on an earlier text interpreter written for a mainframe. It took approximately four months to complete and as you might expect it's menu-driven. An Outer Menu leads to an Edge Editing Menu, where you can define your map, and this in turn leads to Centre Editing Menu and Object Editing Menu, where you can script the locations and place the objects.\r\n\r\nThree final menus, Verb, Position and Command then allow you to implement the machinery necessary to make your piece work.\r\n\r\nSTATUS\r\n\r\nThe main screen display is exceptionally clear. At the top is a status line indicating the amount of memory free for the game. Early issues of TDB offered around 10K of usable memory but mark 2 versions, identifiable by a fancy loading screen, boast a more healthy 13.5K. Be sure to check before you buy. Below this is a lattice of octagonal cells which correspond to the directions N, NE, SE, S, SW, W, and NW. This is your map. You've a total of 1600 cells to play with and breaking the links between them creates adjoining locations. The accompanying manual takes you through the process step by step.\r\n\r\nBelow the grid is the Design Menu which can be accessed using a key letter, Hit 'O' for open on the Edge Editing Menu, f'rinstance, and you'll be able to bulldoze a path between the cells with your cursor. Hit 'D' for describe and you'll be able to type in a description for the cell your cursor happens to occupy at the time. Curiously you're only permitted to enter one upper case letter per sentence. This is due to TDB's byte compression system. A worthwhile idiosyncrasy. Less tolerable though is the screen full of garbage that results from including a question mark in your descriptive text. When told of this elephantine bug the guys at Dream were suitably apologetic and promised to hold onto stocks until it had been exorcised. Owners of bugged Builders are advised to return to their cassettes (but not the expensive packaging) for replacement.\r\n\r\nHaving laid and scripted the game you're then required to establish conditions and consequences. This involves a modicum of intelligence and so temporarily baffled your humble scribe. An altogether inordinate amount of time was spent putting a door in one of the cell walls! I could open the blamed thing all right, but not close it; I never did find out what it was I was doing wrong.\r\n\r\nGRAPHICS\r\n\r\nAdding the graphics is less confusing. You just punch the 'P' option on the Centre Editing Menu, select a background colour and manipulate the drawing cursors with your trusty cursor keys. Instant masterpiece!\r\n\r\nYour adventure is then completed by loading the saved database into the 'Make' utility on the cassette's flip-side. The thing gulps down the info, swills it around and regorges it as a genuine stand-alone adventure. Unfortunately it comes complete with a truly hideous loading screen that proclaims in bold type that the game was created on 'The Dungeon Builder'. It even gives Dream's full address! Decidedly OTT. I put this gripe to Richard Parratt who was understandably defensive. \"It's all part of the protection device,\" he said, \"although we would be quite happy to remove it if we could come to some sort of arrangement for an alternative credit.\"\r\n\r\nHmmph. Perhaps some of you wizard readers know of a faster solution? This and the question mark bug apart I found the whole system very impressive. Response time on the finished product is perhaps a bit sluggish but the graphics facility more than compensates. It also helps you avoid the factory-farming effect of The Quill. A microdrive version and users club are promised soon.","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"","Page":"40,41","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Steve Keaton","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":""}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":null,"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Personal Computer Games Issue 8, Jul 1984","Price":"£0.75","ReleaseDate":"1984-06-21","Editor":"Chris Anderson","TotalPages":132,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Chris Anderson\r\nProduction Editor: Roderick George\r\nArt Editor: Ian Findlay\r\nTechnical Editor: Stuart Cooke\r\nStaff Writers: Steve Cooke, Peter Connor\r\nEditorial Assistant: Samantha Hemens\r\nSoftware Consultant: Tony Takoushi\r\nCartoons: Kipper Williams\r\nScreenshots: Chris Bell\r\nCover Illustration: Jeff Riddle\r\nGame-of-the-month poster: Mark Watkinson\r\nGroup Editor: Cyndy Miles\r\nArt Director: Jim Dansie\r\nGroup Publisher: John Cade\r\nPublisher: Mark Eisen\r\nAssistant Publishing Manager: Jenny Dunne\r\nAdvertising Manager: Sara Green\r\nAssistant Advertisement Manager: Jan Martin\r\nGroup Advertisement Manager: Mike Caroll\r\nAdvertisement Production: Simon Carter\r\nAdvertisement Assistant: Coraline Turner\r\nSales Executives: Ian Cross, Marion O'Neill\r\n\r\nPublished by VNU Business Publications, [redacted]. Typesetting by Spectrum Typesetting, [redacted] Origination by Fourmost Colour [redacted]. Printed and bound by Chase Web Offset [redacted]. © VNU Business Publications 1984."},"MainText":"DO-IT-YOURSELF WIZARDRY\r\n\r\nFed up with rip-off games? Has life in other universes lost its sparkle? The answer's simple - write your own adventures and refresh the parts of your imagination other games cannot reach.\r\n\r\nUp till now you couldn't do this without a good knowledge of programming - preferably in machine code - and a few months to spare into the bargain. Now you can turn out a competent machine code adventure (even one with graphics) in less than a day - without having to poke a single byte.\r\n\r\nPrograms that enable you to do this are called 'adventure generators' and there are now two of these on the market. At the moment you'll need either a Spectrum or Commodore 64 to run them, but versions are being considered for other machines.\r\n\r\nGilsoft's Quill is probably the best known. It costs £14.95 on either the Spectrum or Commodore 64 (£19.95 on disk for the 64) with BBC, Atari, and (possibly) Oric versions available later this year. It comes with an excellent 40-page manual and although it's text-only has a number of useful features.\r\n\r\nThe first is that it leaves you with 30,553 bytes of spare memory (Spectrum version). This means you can produce a very decent-sized adventure on it without running out of space.\r\n\r\nOther useful options include easy control of colour when printing your text on screen, and the option to list your adventure on a printer if required.\r\n\r\nHaving designed your game, you then work your way through the locations in order, typing in the description for each one, adding objects, traps. monsters etc, as you go along. One very useful feature is a set of 'status flags' which allows you to test for certain conditions and alter the game accordingly.\r\n\r\nFor example, you may decide to include a snake in your game which bites the player. However, you don't want him/her killed straight away, and decide that the adventurer should be given five moves to find an antidote. Using the 'status flags' you can test for the number of moves made and act accordingly.\r\n\r\nThe Quill is a very professional product that will enable you to produce first-class text-adventures, Gilsoft will even help you put them on the market if they're good enough, and you'll find a game written using The Quill reviewed elsewhere on these pages.\r\n\r\nDream's Dungeon Builder works in a rather different way to Gilsoft program. Instead of typing in your location descriptions one by one, the screen displays a huge grid of octagonal shapes, each one representing a location.\r\n\r\nUsing a keyboard you manoeuvre a cursor from one octagon to the next, and follow the different instructions presented to either enter text, remove walls (to create doors and passages), or edit locations.\r\n\r\nThe main advantages of this are first that you have a useful visual representation of your adventure 'map', and secondly that you don't have to enter the locations in any particular order. This does mean, however, that you have to be very disciplined in the way you make your entries, otherwise you can lose track of which rooms you put where.\r\n\r\nThe disadvantages of Dream's program compared to The Quill are the lack of available memory space on the Spectrum (only 10,000 bytes) and the slightly confusing manual which needs to be worked through very carefully to get the best from the program.\r\n\r\nThe memory won't be such a problem for 64 owners, however. What's more, there's a microdrive version coming out for the Spectrum that will enable you to get round the lack of space by saving different sections of your game onto tape.\r\n\r\nHowever it's the graphics that are the biggest attraction of Dream's program. You can include a picture for any location if you wish, and since each line you draw takes up only 3 bytes of memory you can fit in a surprising amount. There's a special drawing aid included in the program, that allows you to draw line and 'fill' different areas with colour.\r\n\r\nEven if you're not interested in drawing pictures, this is an important facility that will enable you to include maps, diagrams, and other visual elements in your game.\r\n\r\nOnce I'd mastered the manual, I found Dungeon Builder a joy to use. It doesn't have as many features as The Quill - no 'status flags', for example - but if you're clever you can use the facility for 'conditional commands' to get round this.\r\n\r\nAt £9.95 it's considerably cheaper than its main rival, and the added attraction of graphics makes it a very tempting package, especially if you can get hold of a Commodore 64 or microdrive version. If you want to market your games, Dream won't charge you any royalties providing you credit them on the packaging and in the program.\r\n\r\nGilsoft's Quill offers the Spectrum owner more space and more facilities, but no graphics. Dungeon Builder has graphics and is £5.00 cheaper. Both of these programs are excellent products and offer exciting possibilities to the imaginative adventurer.","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"","Page":"91,92","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Steve Cooke","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":""}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":null,"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Big K Issue 9, Dec 1984","Price":"£0.85","ReleaseDate":"1984-11-20","Editor":"Tony Tyler","TotalPages":132,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Tony Tyler\r\nAssisted By: Richard Burton\r\nArt Editor: Ian Stead\r\nFeatures: Nicky Xikluna\r\nContributors: Andy Green; Kim Aldis (Features); Steve Keaton; Richard Cook; Richard Taylor; David Rimmer; John Conquest; Nigel Farrier, Duncan Gamble; Tony Benyon; Fin Fahey; Gary Liddon\r\nPublisher: Barry Leverett\r\nPublishing Director: John Purdie\r\nGroup Advertising Controller: Luis Bartlett\r\nAdvertisement Manager: Robin Johnson [redacted]\r\n\r\nEditorial Address: [redacted]\r\nTelephone: [redacted]\r\n\r\nPublished approximately on the 20th of each month by IPC Magazines Ltd. [redacted]. Monotone and colour origination by G.M. Litho Ltd [redacted]. Printed in England by Chase Web Offset, Cornwall. Sole Agents: Australia and New Zealand, Gordon& Gotch (A/sia) Ltd.; South Africa, Central News Agency Ltd. BIG K is sold subject to the following conditions, namely that it shall not, without the written consent of the Publishers first given, be lent, resold, hired out or otherwise disposed of by way of trade at more than the recommended selling price shown on the cover, and that it shall not be lent, resold or hired out or otherwise disposed of in a mutilated constitute or any unauthorised cover by way of trade or affixed to as part of any publication or advertising, literary or pictorial matter whatsoever. IPC MAGAZINES 1984."},"MainText":"THE EXTENDED SPECTRUM\r\n\r\nFin Fahey checks out a smattering of utility programs for Old Rubber Keys.\r\n\r\nSystem Software, as we old computer industry hacks call programming tools, is hardly destined to set the world alight. It smacks of hard work and late night sessions over a hot keyboard and seems light years away from the glamour and fun of, say, a new Melbourne House adventure release. But for people interested in stretching their minds, and their machines, some of these trusty workhorses may well turn out to have hearts of gold.\r\n\r\nBut why go beyond the facilities offered by Sinclair BASIC? (One may well ask.) Quite simply, no machine, and particularly no BASIC interpreter, fills all the needs of the budding programmer, and for a lot of requirements like arcade games, just hasn't got the speed.\r\n\r\nThere area fair number of - packages which just add a few useful commands to BASIC extensions r programmer's toolkits, these generally give you the sort of goodies you've always needed to develop your BASIC programs. There's no line Renumber command on the Spectrum, and for this you'll have to buy a toolkit. The same goes for many other 'system' commands. Trace, to give you a continuous listing of program lines being executed, Map, to tell you which variables have been specified, and Block Delete, so you can get rid of more than one line at a time, to name but a few.\r\n\r\nSuper Toolkit, from Nectarine, has all of these plus such things as a Crunch command, to get all those useless spaces and REMs out of your program before running. It clocks up a total of 12 commands, as does Toolkit from IMS Software, which includes an Auto line-numbering routine. Slightly fewer facilities on CP Software's Spectrum Extended BASIC, only 10 commands in this case, and the only one unique to this package is Find, which will look fora specific string text in your program. CP, however also do Supercode, a machine code toolkit, incorporating a hundred off-the-shelf machine code routines. These include an impressive range of scrolling effects, high-resolution diagonal scroll, low-resolution shutter and ripple scrolls and many others. There are four sound effects generators too, but the truly impressive thing is that you can include CP's code in your own BASIC and machine code programs, an amazing bit of altruism. Each routine has full in-program documentation and a demo mode shows you what they can do. It's got to be good value.\r\n\r\nFrom off-the-shell machine code to creating your own. If you've decided that BASIC's too slow for your program design, then you'll probably want to write machine code. Some people seem quite happy programming this byte by byte as BASIC POKEs, but for really effective development you'll need an assembler. Assemblers allow you to put Z80 code in assembly language, a much more understandable form, even though it's a lot more obscure looking than BASIC. A good assembler will allow you to specify addresses and constants as meaningful labels which makes the code a lot easier to follow. In such a symbolic assembler, the JP instruction (equivalent of BASIC GOTO) could be rendered JP LOOP instead of giving an actual address, say JP $4000.\r\n\r\nBut before actually using one of these things, you may need to learn what it's all about. To help you, there are a number of tutorial programs, and some of these actually allow you to set up and test code. Sinclair's Beyond BASIC offers a tutorial on the internal structure of the Z80 plus lessons on each assembler instruction. These are illustrated with simple moving graphics. There is an experimenter section where you can watch the effects of your own code on memory and registers. Sadly, this one doesn't cover the entire instruction set.\r\n\r\nMore complete is New Generation's Machine Code Tutor. This comes on two cassettes and covers everything. Once again, you can write your own code and 'run' it on a diagrammatic simulator. Although this is rather harder work than Sinclair's, I think it gives a closer feeling to using an actual assembler.\r\n\r\nDream Software also have a simulator. This has much nicer printed documentation than the other two, but unfortunately it describes an imaginary chip which resembles the Z80 in many respects. I think that this may be unnecessarily confusing, but as long as its borne in mind, the transition to the real chip shouldn't be too hard. So now you can get down to some real coding... Sinclair themselves market the Zeus Assembler, which allows full symbolic instructions. Lines of code are entered much as in BASIC, and editing is similar, so this should be an easy one for beginners to move to.\r\n\r\nPicturesque's Editor/Assembler, on the other hand, has a rather better editor than the Spectrum, but the key response seemed a bit slow to me. This latter program is very tolerant about the format in which you enter code.\r\n\r\nVery different from these two is Oasis Software's Spectre Macro-assembler, and I certainly wouldn't recommend this one for beginners. It's a very professional product, but using it is more like learning a new computer language than anything else. It doesn't use Z80 instructions directly; they have to be set up as procedure definitions much as in high-level languages like Forth or Pascal. This makes it very powerful, since it's just like building your own interpreter. But, as I say, not for newcomers.\r\n\r\nAn indispensable tool when developing machine code is some sort of Monitor. A Monitor provides easy ways of getting at memory, moving it, changing it, searching it for particular values, that sort of thing. You can also usually get dumps of Z80 register values and step through a machine code program.\r\n\r\nThe Zeus assembler has a reasonable monitor with it, but Sinclair do a more extensive version as a separate product. This also allows you to Disassemble code, which means to translate machine code back to assembly format. Useful for looking at the ROM, but maybe you'd be better off buying one of the 'Spectrum ROM disassembled' type books which also give explanatory notes. Picturesque's Editor/Assembler has no attached monitor and you have to buy theirs separately, although both programs can be loaded at the same time. Agai, there's a disassembler.\r\n\r\nAssembly language isn't the only way of getting fast code. Scope II, from ISP, is a simple language aimed at producing fast machine-code animation. The makers call it a medium-level language, as it's mid-way between BASIC and assembler. I feel it's rather closer to machine code, but it's certainly a lot easier to use. Once you've written code in SCOPE II, it is boiled down by the program to machine code routines, which can be run without Scope being present, so you develop commercial products, or give copies of your games to your friends without fear of committing piracy.\r\n\r\nThis process of boiling down machine code is known as compilation, and it's possible to do it to BASIC. The only BASIC compiler we had available to look at was Softek's. This is certainly fast. From running a few simple loops, it looks roughly about 150-200 times faster than interpreted BASIC. It does have some serious drawbacks, though. For one, there a quite a few BASIC functions it can't translate, floating-point arithmetic and arrays among them.\r\n\r\nMore seriously, compiled programs will not run without Softek's run-time routines being present. Unfortunately, the company is being quite prickly about this, and are claiming that if you develop your program and compile it with their program. then they've suddenly acquired a share in it, Whatever the legal position, this seems a little dubious to me, and it's certainly a discouragement to using Softek's product for commercial development.\r\n\r\nThe final approach to fast code is to use Forth. This high-level language is closer to machine code than BASIC, and for most purposes runs up to ten times faster. Not spectacular maybe, but it can make a difference. The speed saving is nice, but it's not really the central point about Forth. The language takes a fundamentally different approach to BASIC, and one which provides a much sounder design discipline. It would certainly be easier to write good machine code after a grounding in it.\r\n\r\nForth is known as a 'procedure-oriented' language. That means there's no more complaining about there not being a command in BASIC to do something. If it's not there in Forth, then you just write your own command, which is compiled into the language vocabulary. Although you can theoretically do this in BASIC by using subroutines, compiled procedures are much faster and easier to use. Forth is easier to structure too.\r\n\r\nThere are at least four versions of Forth available on the Spectrum. It's hard to decide between them, but Melbourne House's Abersoft Forth is the only one recognised by the independent Forth interest Group. Sinclair also do a Forth which to my relatively untutored mind seemed much the same, both in terms of speed and usability. Both versions have minimal printed documentation, since they rely on the user going out and acquiring a Forth manual. The sad thing about Forth is that. unless you're a fan of the ill-fated Jupiter Ace, you can't market any of your programs since they won't run without someone else's product.\r\n\r\nWhile on the subject of languages, Logo has been stirring up interest as a teaching language, particularly for younger children. Unfortunately, the version I looked at, Snail Logo by CP Software, really merited its name. Logo is high-resolution graphics oriented, and the user commands a 'turtle', or in this case a snail, to draw shapes on the screen. The CP interpreter turned out to be written in BASIC, so every command is interpreted twice. Slow? I can't imagine anyone, adult, or child, having the patience to work through the manual, let alone use it.\r\n\r\nSomething of a weirdie, but one I find particularly fascinating, is Micro -Prolog, from Sinclair. Prolog represents yet another direction in new languages, and is particularly suited for Artificial Intelligence and linguistic purposes. Its very odd to use after command oriented type languages like BASIC, or even Forth, because a program in Prolog (it stands for PROgramming in LOGic) is mostly a way of organising data, not of setting up a fl ow of commands. Now I've got the point, I want to know more about this one. Sinclair Micro-Prolog's documentation isn't bad either.\r\n\r\nDr Ming back to the problem of generating programs, if you're an adventure game writer, you haven't really got one, The Quill, from Gilsoft, and Dream's Dungeon Builder can both be used to generate adventures of any complexity. We've reviewed them before, and they're both good value. Dungeon Builder has the edge in user-friendliness, and can be used to add graphics to adventures, while Quill has a more mechanistic approach. Both Gilsoft and Dream are perfectly happy for people to market games produced with their packages. Right on!\r\n\r\nOn which cheery note I'll roll the credits and fade to black, but not before noting that this is far from being a complete survey, so if you've discovered an utterly wonderful, or unspeakably awful bit of useful/useless software in this field let us know.\r\n\r\nBASIC EXTENSIONS:\r\nSUPER TOOLKIT from NECTARINE\r\nTOOLKIT from IMS Software\r\nSPECTRUM EXTENDED BASIC from CP Software\r\nPrice: £9.95\r\n\r\nSUPERCODE from CP Software\r\nPrice: £9.95\r\n\r\nMACHINE CODE TUTORIALS: BEYOND BASIC from Sinclair\r\nPrice: £9.95\r\n\r\nTHE COMPLETE MACHINE. CODE TUTOR from New Generation Software\r\nPrice: £7.95\r\n\r\nMACHINE-CODE FOR BEGINNERS from Dream Software\r\nPrice. £0.00\r\n\r\nASSEMBLERS:\r\nZEUS ASSEMBLER from Sinclair\r\nPrice: £12.95\r\n\r\nEDITOR/ASSEMBLER from Picturesque\r\nPrice: £8.50\r\n\r\nSPECTRE MAC-MON from Oasis Software\r\nPrice: £14.95\r\n\r\nMONITORS:\r\nMONITOR/DISASSEMBLER from Sinclair\r\nPrice: £12.95\r\n\r\nSPECTRUM MONITOR from Picturesque\r\nPrice: £7.50\r\n\r\nCOMPILER from Softek\r\nPrice: £9.95\r\n\r\nLANGUAGES:\r\nSCOPE II from ISP\r\nPrice: £11.95\r\n\r\nFORTH from Sinclair\r\nPrice: £14.95\r\n\r\nABERSOFT FORTH from Melbourne House\r\nPrice. £14.95\r\n\r\nSNAIL LOGO from CP Software\r\nPrice: £9.95\r\n\r\nMICRO-PROLOG from Sinclair\r\nPrice: £24.95\r\n\r\nADVENTURE GENERATORS:\r\nTHE QUILL from Gilsoft\r\nPrice: £11.95\r\n\r\nDUNGEON BUILDER from Dream Software\r\nPrice: £9.95","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"","Page":"69,70","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Fin Fahey","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":""}],"ScreenshotText":[],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":null,"CompilationReviewScores":[]},{"Issue":{"Name":"Micro Adventurer Issue 8, Jun 1984","Price":"£0.75","ReleaseDate":"1984-05-17","Editor":"Graham Cunningham","TotalPages":48,"HasCoverTape":false,"FlannelPanel":"Editor: Graham Cunningham\r\nAssistant Editor: Carmel Anderson\r\nSoftware Editor: Graham Taylor\r\nMaster Adventurers: Tony Bridge, Mike Grace\r\nEditorial Secretary: Cleo Cherry\r\nAdvertisement Manager: David Lake\r\nAdvertisement Executive: Simon Langston\r\nAdministration: Theresa Lacy\r\nManaging Editor: Brendon Gore\r\nPublishing Director: Jenny Ireland\r\nTelephone number (all departments): [redacted]\r\nUK Address: [redacted]\r\nUS Address: [redacted]\r\nSubscriptions: UK £10.00 for 12 issues, overseas surface (excluding US and Canada) £16 for 12 issues, US and Canada air-lifted US$33.95 for 12 issues.\r\n\r\nMicro Adventurer is published monthly by Sunshine Books, Scot Press Ltd. Typesetting by In-Step Ltd, [redacted]. Printed by Eden Fisher (Southend) Ltd, [redacted]. Distributed by SM Distribution, [redacted].\r\n\r\nISSN 0265-4156\r\n\r\nRegistered at the Post Office as a newspaper.\r\n\r\n© Sunshine Books 1984"},"MainText":"WHEN DREAMS COME TRUE\r\n\r\nTony Bridge compares the latest adventure-writing aid, The Dungeon Builder, with The Quill.\r\n\r\nHalfway through the latest adventure from Level 9 or Scott Adams do you ever wonder: \"Could I write a program like this?\" or how about: \"I wish I could do that.\" Now you can.\r\n\r\nIn the January issue of Micro Adventurer I looked at a program that has transformed the adventure world for the Spectrum at least: The Quill, from Gilsoft. It is, quite simply, an adventure-writing program which enables the user to design and code his own machine language adventure.\r\n\r\nMENU-DRIVEN\r\n\r\nA new program has just been released, written by Dream Software, and called The Dungeon Builder (Ye Graphic Adventure Writer). Now, I was very impressed with The Quill. Let's see how they compare.\r\n\r\nBoth programs are menu-driven. The Quill opens with an 18-point menu, and as the user progresses with designing his adventure, several sub-menus are encountered. Figure 1 shows the main display from Dream's Dungeon Builder. This is where the user finds himself after loading the program, after a short sub-menu (\"the outer menu\" in figure 2), which asks the usual LOAD/SAVE/ CREATE questions.\r\n\r\nWhenever the user comes to this display from another menu a cursor is situated at top left (cell X01-Y01). The display is a window on a much larger, 40 x 40 grid, and the grid scrolls across or up and down the screen as necessary. The cursor can then be placed at the edge of a cell, or in the centre, and the menu beneath the grid reflects this.\r\n\r\nAs you can see from figure 2 a different menu is available in each case. When setting up an adventure, the cursor should be placed in the centre of the starting cell (this can be any one of the 1600), and \"D\" (description) chosen. The text describing the room can then be typed in - if an object is to be placed in the room, this can be done using C\"R\"eate object, and \"S\"core will obviously give a score, of the designer's choosing, for the player finding the object (a score may also be given for the player just finding the room). Should your tastes run to scary monsters the object does not have to be inanimate.\r\n\r\nMore Menus (see figure 2) then allow the creator of the adventure to specify all the various parameters of the game - from commands associated with each object (\"TAKE\" or \"GET\"), to the weight of each object (500 units may be carried at any one time).\r\n\r\nThis editing procedure includes \"conditional\" commands, for example the player may \"KILL WEREWOLF\" only if he carries the jewel. The conditions surrounding each object may be as complex as desired (subject to memory constraints).\r\n\r\nHaving set the object parameters in the cell, the cursor is moved to one of the four edges, at which point another menu (the Edge Editing Menu) is displayed. This allows for movement between the cells or rooms. At its simplest level and the menu allows a passage to be opened between any two cells, this is seen on-screen as design progresses.\r\n\r\nBut the designer can be more devious and set up \"conditional\" openings, which will include doors that can be locked and need to be opened in some special way, as well as 'Consequential\" movement, in which the player is transported from one room to another, remote, room if he attempts to exit by a certain route.\r\n\r\nI won't go through all the facilities available during the editing process. Suffice ,to say that the adventure designer can build up a complex network of locations, with any kind of interconnection (even \"time tunnels\" should he so wish), filled with all sorts of puzzles, objects and monsters.\r\n\r\nThe interpreter, that most important part of any adventure program that takes the player's input and decides if it is valid and how to act upon it, can be seeded with the designer's own messages.\r\n\r\nMESSAGE COMPOSED\r\n\r\nThus, the usual \"YOU TAKE KNIFE\" may be edited to say \"YOU PICK UP THE GOLDEN KNIFE, WHICH THEN COMES ALIVE iN YOUR HAND\". Similarly, if the player does something to cause his death (\"EAT THE WEREWOLF\"), then too, a special explanatory message can be composed for that particular event. In this way, an original and individual adventure can soon be built up.\r\n\r\nBut wait a moment. What's this option on the Centre Editing Menu? \"P\"icture? Dream's Dungeon Builder is \"Ye Graphic Adventure Writer\", remember, and this is where \"P\"icture takes a bow.\r\n\r\nMASTERPIECE\r\n\r\nWith the cursor in the centre of a cell, selecting \"P\" will present the designer with a Sketchpad. This is blank except for a cross-hair at screen-centre, and a status line at the bottom of the screen. This contains a palette of colours, with the selected INK colour shown, and the X and Y coordinates of the cursor.\r\n\r\nThe drawing routine is pretty simple, allowing lines to be drawn between two points, as well as triangles between three. These triangles can be painted or filled in. More complex shapes must be built up of several triangles.\r\n\r\nNot many facilities, then, but enough to draw simple pictures, that are quite quickly drawn. Scenes like those in The Hobbit, for example, or Dream's own adventure, The Quest for the Holy Grail, are quite possible.\r\n\r\nA program on the B side of the tape allows an adventure written with The Dungeon Builder to be run without the main program, so that your masterpiece can be passed around your friends. If you decide to sell it, then Dream Software, like Gilsoft, only require a mention of The Dungeon Builder in your program.\r\n\r\nHow do the two systems compare? You'll notice, in figure 1 a readout, top right, showing the amount of free memory left. The Quill starts off with about 30K to play around with, while The Dungeon Builder starts with something like 10K - some difference. And graphics will eat up this pretty quickly. Another disadvantage with The Dungeon Builder is that objects have to be described with eight characters only, and any more than this number are truncated.\r\n\r\nIn my first foray into The Dungeon Builder, I described a room with \"a number of spacesuits\". I wanted the player to be able to pick up one of the spacesuits. How to describe one of these spacesuits in just eight letters? \"Suit\" isn't quite right, though would have to make do - \"spacesuit\" is easily accommodated by The Quill. Room descriptions, too, have to be carefully thought out in Dream's program, and have to be executed in black on white, whereas The Quill allows the designer to compose his text in any colour and any combination of FLASH and BRIGHT. Text editing is quite sophisticated, too.\r\n\r\nThe main display of The Dungeon Builder, as you can see in figure 3, is extremely useful in aiding the designer in writing his adventure, while The Quill is rather more difficult to work with. The graphic capability of The Dungeon Builder will be a great bonus to many users; graphics are not supported by The Quill, although clever programming can be pressed into service to give rudimentary displays.\r\n\r\nThe manuals, too, accentuate the different approaches of the two programs. That of The Quill is rather oblique, and difficult to understand at first, although I must admit it is thorough. Dream's 100-page manual is much easier to read, and covers everything no less than three times: once in a \"press this key to see this result\" fashion, followed by a more thorough discussion of each command. The manual finishes with a summary of all the commands. An added bonus is the example program, relying heavily on the original colossal Caves (Spelunker Magazine and all), to show the user how The Dungeon Builder will look.\r\n\r\nSo each of the two programs has its own character. I could live without graphics of the nature of those in The Dungeon Builder, and find the text composition of The Quill easier. But The Dungeon Builder is much easier to work with.\r\n\r\nShould you prefer the Dungeon and Dragons type of game, you will find your tastes catered for in a program from Crystal Computing, called The Dungeon Master. Part of this program allows the user to build a simple dungeon and fill it with magic potions, monsters and wizards.\r\n\r\nThe game mechanics follow D & D conventions (HIT POINTS, CHARISMA and so on all making an appearance), and characters created by the player may be carried through any of the dungeons created.\r\n\r\nCATALYSTS\r\n\r\nAdventures written with the aid of an adventure-designing program all necessarily tend to be rather similar. This is no less true of Scott Adams in the US and Level 9 and Channel 8 in the UK, than of Quill'd programs, or those written with the aid of The Dungeon Master and The Dungeon Builder.\r\n\r\nAs these latter programs free the authOr from worry over the coding, he must ensure that his imagination and originality compensates for the family likeness. This is easier said than done, alas. Although I think that programs like the above act as catalysts in the creation of good adventures (and I look forward to seeing many of them), it would be a pity if all originality were lost.","ReviewerComments":[],"OverallSummary":"","Page":"37,38","Denied":false,"Award":"Not Awarded","Reviewers":[{"Name":"Tony Bridge","Score":"","ScoreSuffix":""}],"ScreenshotText":[{"Text":"Figure 2 shows menus that specify the game parameters."},{"Text":"Figure 1 which shows the main screen display from Dungeon Builder."}],"BlurbText":[],"TranscriptBy":"Chris Bourne","ReviewScores":null,"CompilationReviewScores":[]}]}]