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A text adventure with graphics that plonks you onto a lush island in the Bermuda triangle. There are strange goings-on, odd letters cut into the landscape or hanging in mid-air and all manner of mysterious people to interact with. As ever with Level 9 adventures, the locations are vividly rendered, with the additional bonus of graphics in this case. The vocabulary is huge and you'll rarely find yourself having to rephrase your commands. An attractive and captivating game, but one that some Level 9 purists consider to be a little too mundane.

Level 9 need no introduction, unless you've been languishing in the Goblin's Dungeon for the last few years. Their latest game, Emerald Isle, marks something of a departure from their previous releases however in that it costs only £6.95 -- £3.00 cheaper than the others.

The lower price is because the game has been designed to be slightly more modest in scope than the company's other blockbusters. Still, you can't complain -- it has over 200 pictures on the 64 version, which sounds to me like good value for money. It's certainly not as tricky as, say, Snowball, but don't let that put you off -- this game is no doddle by any means.

Emerald Isle lies in the Bermuda Triangle, which means essentially that it's one of those places that are difficult to get to and impossible to leave. You start the game hanging ignominiously from a tree top, dangling by your parachute chords . . . and before you can say 'Knife' you've ended up as a tasty meal for a jungle predator.

In fact, saying 'Knife' won't do you much good because you haven't got one, but there you go. Once you've sorted that one out, and made it down to terra firma (which isn't very firm at all) you've then got to find your way out of a charming little maze of mangrove trees. Yes, just as in Return to Eden, Level 9 are showing sadistic tendencies by dropping you into the soup right at the beginning of the game.

Your objective on Emerald Island is no less than supreme domination, since the only way you'll be able to leave is if you become king (or queen). The reward for failure, needless to say, is rapid decease. The program uses split screen graphics which can be toggled on and off using the commands 'words' and 'pictures'.

To be honest, the White Wizard doesn't think Level 9 are too hot on the graphics. The pictures are OK, but no more than that. Worse, there's the famous Commodore split-screen glitch flickering away in the centre of the screen -- surely something that should have been ironed out before releasing the game, but I suppose you can't have everything.

And there is a lot here, make no mistake. If you can get over the occasional inconsistency, like entering 'Examine wall' and being told that you can't see a leather wallet, then you're in for a great time.

The island may be hidden in the Bermuda Triangle, but that doesn't stop it from having its own train network to whisk you from location to location (on payment of the appropriate fare). Giant spiders, preoccupied monarchs and speeding trains are all there to greet you, and should you have a fatal argument with anybody you are simply resurrected elsewhere with all your possessions intact.

Emerald Isle is a lot less daunting than other Level 9 games and I'm afraid that for a number of seasoned Level 9 fans the program will be something of a disappointment, though of course one must remember it costs rather less. The White Wizard has to admit that a couple of misprints in the text combined with the slightly flickery display and imprecise word checking mean that this game really isn't up to the standards of it's predecessors.

Level 9, of course, would probably say that it isn't meant to be up to the same standards, but I can't help thinking that I'd rather pay a bit more for a game like Lords of Time than a bit less for one like Emerald Isle. Nevertheless, for more inexperienced adventurers it may be just the ticket, and remember that a slightly inferior game from Level 9 can still beat the pants off most of the competition.

Atmosphere 65%
Interaction 55%
Lasting Interest 78%
Value for Money 85%

EMERALD ISLE

Producer: Level 9 Computing
Retail Price: £9.95
Language: machine code
Authors: Shaun Abbott and Pete Austin
If Level 9 were in the pop world they would be somewhere up there with The Police because their success is grounded in a deep understanding of their subject coupled with an uncanny knack of always remaining commercial. To stay at the top by standing on old successes is not enough, a fact with which Level 9 are fully aware, and so here we have their eleventh release and it’s not only good — it is perceptibly better.

The packaging is now a distinctive trademark; large, crisply printed with the familiar Level 9 logo and that substantive, rather expensive feel. No booklet to wade through this time though, only a few concise instructions on the reverse of a stylish drawing, a half-poster size version of the one on the front of the box. Admittedly art work can be expensive, but when it is of a high standard it really does add to your enjoyment of a game (and arty types always liven up a computer project).

Loading up reveals much made familiar by Return to Eden but one aspect is very new. On entering a location a smaller facsimile of the larger picture is very quickly drawn up on the top left portion before expanding to cover the entire width of the screen. The eventual full-size picture appears to be derived from the smaller by an enlargement brought about chiefly by widening the compact version. It would seem this process aids picture design and implementation though I am not totally sure in what way this is achieved.

Familiar features are the type-ahead, which allows commands to be entered while the program is busy drawing pictures, the A(GAIN) command which repeats the last entry, and the use of IT taken as the previous specified object eg, LIGHT LAMP, then EXAMINE IT. One aspect of the game can slow you up should you be a shade clever with the type-ahead. Although the type-ahead can store tens of moves entered quickly and display their affects as you sit back and watch, the need to press SHIFT whenever a location requires more space for the location description rather negates this. So a modifier is to say you can sit back and watch with your finger on the SHIFT key. All the same, this remains a very impressive feature.

The Emerald Isle is not across the sea from Liverpool (if I were writing for a slick, topicality obsessed magazine I could have contrived something about writing this on St. Patrick’s Day — but it isn’t, quite). No, this isle is set in that peculiar isosceles, the Bermuda Triangle, a land of mysterious fogs, treacherous waters and lots of angles that never quite add up to one hundred and eighty. Now that I’ve mentioned the word peculiar, it must have some peculiar significance as it is used to describe just about everything on the cover. ‘Explore peculiar towns, meet peculiar people, learn the peculiar purpose of the "letters" and travel on a railway which is simplicity itself when compared to BR’s peculiar fare system.’ Peculiar indeed, but what are these ‘letters'? Well, as you go about your travels you bump into the occasional vowel or consonant simply left lying around in your path. A ‘W’ is discovered cut into a lawn while an ‘A’ is found hanging in mid-air. Curious, but what we might come to expect from a software team quickly developing an in-house sense of humour nurtured in Return to Eden. Anyway, enough of this Salinger-like rambling and back to the plot.




You play the part of an aircraft pilot employed to ferry urgent documents around the Carribbean. Fierce winds seize the plane over the infamous triangle and you escape with your life at the last moment. As you parachute down to the island below you recognise the coastline of the Emerald Isle from an old map. It is a lonely atoll rarely visited and from which none have returned. It is said only one person may leave and that is the ruler of the land. Success can promote an explorer to King or Queen but failure is suitably unrewarding.

You start off with your parachute snagged on a branch of