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Billed as the first multi-player adventure for the C64, Causes Of Chaos sees you trying to recover the six pieces of the crown jewels that have been stolen from King Arnid of Ix by the evil Count Vladimir.

You can play the adventure singly in which case it is just a straightforward text adventure or you can play with up to five other people. You are asked how many moves each player can make (up to nine) before his turn ends. A player does not have to use all of his moves, but can wait instead which has the effect of increasing his stamina.

One annoying feature is that incorrect inputs, misspelt words or using words not understood by the computer counts as one of your turns.

You can attack other players if you want to. Combat is resolved by waiting for a "Strike now" message to appear on the screen and then pressing a designated key before your opponents hits his. This continues until one character is dead or withdraws.

The atmosphere created by the game is minimal. In the multi-player game, extra exits from locations appear which is totally illogical. You can get hints but these tend to be of the "Don't swim in the lake" (which is full of piranha fish!) variety. The parser only checks the first three letters of a word and so the vocabulary is quite limited.

The game will stand and fall on whether or not the multiplayer aspect appeals. Personally, I find it awful. The idea of being sent out of the room whilst five other people make nine moves each holds little attraction. Sorry CRL, I didn't like this one at all.