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Has any member of your family ever been snatched by a 30-metre dragon and carried off to a wizard’s lair? Well, it is the kind of thing that used to happen all the time in the Dark Ages, or so Incentive would have us believe in this all-singing, all-dancing, cheese-eating, Freescape spectacular.
Freescape pioneered 3D adventuring way back in 1988, when Driller utilised solid geometric blocks to create an arena you could walk on, crawl under and touch. It was inevitable that Incentive would eventually turn to the usual adventure fare of castles, wizards and ghosts.
Legend (and the title sequence) has it that your twin has been nabbed by the aforementioned dragon and stashed in Castle Eternity. So you set out to conquer the fortress armed with your wits, courage and a handful of rocks with which to ‘kill’ any ghosts you meet on the way. This may not be the world’s most desirable arsenal but it will do.

The castle comprises four towers, each with three levels. Throw in a catacomb maze and a gate-house or two as well as sundry other essentials like a chapel and you have hours of frustrating entertainment guaranteed.
The first priority is staying alive – not as simple as it sounds. There are three things that any sussed knight should know. Eating plenty of cheese – huge wedges of Cheddar are everywhere – keeps you strong, falling in or off things is fatal and when you bump in the night the ghoulies drain your strength quick.

The game is controlled either from the keyboard, or by mouse or joystick. Two sets of cursors (direction and aim) appear on screen together, which means your first few steps are faltering. The icon controls are fine for rapid strides or swings in one direction, but they lack the response for fine movement, so keys are the only option for close control. And you will need to walk tightrope like catwalks – one slip and you are gone.

Naturally, it is not feasible to burst in, grab your bro’s or sis’ and bug out – that would be too easy. First you have to find the right keys to open the right doors. A monumental task in itself, because the darned thigns are not labelled. And there are more mysteries to solve en route, too, if your quest is to end in a reunion and not in a morgue. Strange ‘pentacles’ have to be collected, while literally littering the place are unmarked potions that do everything from restoring strength to granting you the nifty ability of ‘stone travel’.

To find the treasure, pentacles and keys means you have to look at, in and under everything – try performing a James Heriot on the back end of the horse and all you manage is to get an "aaaaeeugghh! " message.
Trenton Webb

Amiga Format, Issue 11, June 1990, p.72
GRAPHICS AND SOUND
The Freescape is better than ever, with fast movement in a clear, sharp landscape: yet it is no stunner. To keep the Castle motif alive grey and blue dominate the colour scheme. The result is markedly less spectacular than the golds seen in Total Eclipse. There is a sense of ‘been there, done that’, because solid 3D ain’t the technical marvel it once was, and all the cheese in the world cannot change the fact.
LASTING INTEREST
Castle Master will quite simply have you running around for months. Castle Eternity is huge and crammed with enough apparently inaccessible rooms to provide a challenge to any true gamesplayer. The ability to play broher or sister adds longevity, as each character has different ablities: there are places she can squeeze through, but he has to crawl or take a different route. Luckily a save game option minimises the intense hair-tearing associated with sudden death.

JUDGEMENT
Castle Master deftly overcomes two major stumbling blocks. Firstly Incentive have managed to produce a new game and not settled for Total Eclipse in grey. Secondly, they have survived the transition to the rather run-of-the-mill realm of dragons and dungeons by adding humour, riddles intricate conundrums.

A huge, interlinked puzzle, Castle Master demands mental dexterity, lateral thinking, mapping abilities and fast reactions to survive. The game does not exactly sprint ablong, but so what? The slower pace offsets the lack of instant amazement with a lasting intrigue and a real hook.