ST Format


The Magnetic Scrolls Collection
By Virgin Games
Atari ST

 
Published in ST Format #31

The Magnetic Scrolls Collection

When decent computers became available to the public, adventure games suddenly became playable. Magnetic Scrolls have now collected three of their best in one four-disk box.

Fish!

Yes, you're a goldfish. You start the game in a bowl on the sideboard, with only some gravel and a tacky castle for company. YOu can go into the castle, though, which is bigger than it appears.

Although you're a mere aquatic creature, you still enter a world of adventure, doing everything humans can do in other adventures. You collect things, holding them in your mouth, and can operate fundamental devices.

The Magnetic Scrolls Collection

The call-up graphics in Fish! are great, with some nice distorted fish-eye views of the world. Fish! was a new idea in adventures, and is done well.

Corruption

From fish to businessman. You now enter the world of finance, extortion and wheeler-dealing. You must travel around the world in your car and on foot, stealing things from safes and accumulating damning information on your colleagues. Corruption has a tense, chain-smoking sort of atmosphere, with plenty of sleazy private investigation-type antics. You've got to ask the right questions, sift through mounds of irrelevant paperwork and tease out the vital evidence.

There's a lot to do and not much time, so order a pot of coffee and a dozen memo pads, and get the hell out of the office before they arrive.

The Guild Of Thieves

The Magnetic Scrolls Collection

As a member of the Guild of Thieves, you've got to set off to a castle and nick stuff. Sounds like every adventure you've ever played? Well, maybe, but nicking stuff from this castle is tough. There are lots of guards wandering around, for a start.

It's a survive-on-your-wits type of game, done with plenty of pretty fantasy graphics and lavish descriptions of your environment. As with the other two games, you can't afford to make too many mistakes, so keep your wits about you as you battle, struggle with and run from the police (or whatever).

Verdict

Smooth, pretty fast and with an excellent windows game-style, these three adventures are going to delight fans of the genre. There's lots of great graphics and high-class programming, too. But get yourself a hard drive because there's an awful lot of disk swapping.

In Brief

  1. Runs in 1MByte on double-sided disks
  2. Three big and absorbing adventures in one box.
  3. Much disk swapping, but can be installed on hard drive.

James Leach

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