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The player's character is "an aspiring member of the infamous Guild of Thieves" and is to steal all the valuables that can be found in and around an island castle. The game features "extremely atmospheric" descriptions and 30 artistic renditions of key locations. Included in the game package are a faux newsletter of the Guild of Thieves titled What Burglar providing instructions and hints for the game, a Bank of Kerovnia Trading Account Card, a guild contract detailing the arrangement between the player's character and the Guild of Thieves and small dice.

The game was re-released in 1992 as part of the Magnetic Scrolls Collection. The new version had an updated UI and came with an art poster depicting the island.

Dragon complimented the game, calling it an "exciting sequel," citing its "witty dialogue, outstanding graphics, wry humor, and challenging puzzles". The game was voted Best Adventure Game Of The Year at the Golden Joystick Awards. Computer Gaming World in 1988 approved of the game's sophisticated parser, British humor, and high-quality graphics. It concluded, "the game must be highly recommended and it is tough ... it compares well with the best of Infocom". The magazine in 1992 called its puzzles "pretty good, requiring a certain amount of ingenuity ... None are particularly memorable, though. The game is good, but lacks the sparks of innovation that would elevate it above the level of dozens of similar games". Antic reviewer John Manor stated "The outstanding graphics of The Pawn are matched by those in Guild of Thieves. High-resolution pictures transport you into a medieval world of thieves, castles and treasure. The only complaint I have about the Atari XE/XL version is that most of the detailed graphics had only shades of one or two colors."

Rainbird/Magnetic Scrolls, £15.95 disk only

When The Guild of Thieves was voted Game of the Year, Spectrum owners went quietly green with envy. Now at last the game has been released for the +3 and all over the country adventurers are opening their shiny blue boxes with bated breath.

Inside is a game more than likely to live up to everyone's expectations. As a burglar, complete with stripy sweat shirt and swag bag, you have applied for membership of the Kerovnian Guild of Thieves. To prove your criminal eligibility to join, the Master Thief has devised a test: explore an island and thoroughly sack it of all available treasure before returning.

The adventure begins in the Master Thief's boat. You jump confidently to the jetty and begin a survey of the expansive countryside. The numerous locations range from castle to cave and from scrub to snow-capped peak. The descriptions, even without the graphics much-praised on other formats, are extremely atmospheric; even the most commonplace objects have their own characteristics. Exploration has some very realistic qualities: as you wander through the castle you can run your fingers casually along the piano keys or try your skill at potting the billiard balls.

The treasures are often quite easy to locate but difficult to collect. A jewel hanging from the ceiling of a cave is about to drop into a bubbling pool of quicksand; a silver chalice is inconveniently placed in the cage of a savage bear. Reckless burglars quickly come to grief!

The puzzles are often tough but at least have the virtue of being logical. The adventure is certainly more accessible than The Pawn which was occasionally open to charges of excessive obscurity. In The Guild it's sometimes the very obviousness of the solution which makes a problem difficult.

The parser is up to Magnetic Scrolls' usually high standards: as well as complex sentences it accepts FIND and SEARCH FOR commands to locate objects you may have forgotten or misplaced. The GO TO command lets you move from one location to another without typing in all the directions in between. In practice this can be quite dangerous as you can't stop the command once entered and the program marches you straight into whatever obstacles (for example a closed drawbridge) there may be in the way.

A small quibble is the absence of a RAMSAVE command. Constantly saving to disc gets a little tedious, especially in an adventure in which sudden death in the most innocent of locations is a constant possibility.

The Rainbird packaging comes with, among other goodies, a Contract of Service with the Guild of Thieves and a playing guide cleverly disguised as 'What Burglar' magazine. This last item also acts as combined hint sheet and program protection: several problems are listed and a series of codes printed underneath. Enter these codes and a cryptic hint (but not one that gives the whole game away) is be displayed.

The Guild of Thieves easily lives up to its reputation: a well-crafted scenario, immediately accessible puzzles, and a flexible parser make this a must for the compulsive adventurer. Even at the comparatively high price, it's a steal.

Overall 90%