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Sorcery deservedly sold on its graphics - the concept being a rework of previous ideas - and I hope Dragons is as successful. It may be ladders and levels but...

The screen is strewn with platforms in the shape of 3-D clouds interconnected by vines of delicately drawn flowers, all in Mode O's full colour. You control an equally well-conceived man who's task it is to collect all the jewels. You must also bump off the dragons - story book creatures of different colours, shaded to give a 3-D effect- but not with anything so crude as a sword!

Across the top of the screen the white Queen Dragon majestically, and smoothly, flies laying 3-D eggs which come to rest on various clouds. Guide your man to them, then gently push them off onto the nearest dragon. But don't get caught yourself, or you'll lose a life. Kill the dragons and you're off to the next of 20 screens, though the colour choice for screen 2, which is as far as I went, could have been much better. The different colours of dragons possess different attacking capabilities, so the game isn't easy, and they often change colour in response to your play.

What made this memorable for me, and for my resident team of testers, were the genuinely charming graphics, the very hummable stereo tunes, and the sound effects. For us, the best ladders and levels graphics yet seen on the Amstrad.

D.M.