Game Review: Spellbound (ZX Spectrum 128K, MAD)

Background to The Magic Knight Series

In case you aren’t aware of the Magic Knight series of four games, Spellbound is the sequel to Finders Keepers.  Once you play the game, Magic Knight is holding an Advert and upon reading it, this is advertising that Finders Keepers is available also available to purchase!  A bit of a plug there and why not?  If you’ve got it, flaunt it as they say!

Opening Menu

Once Spellbound has loaded you’re presented with a menu upon where you can choose from a selection of joysticks or keyboard.  In addition to this, there is an option to read the instructions.  Although the inlay card gives you the background to the story about Gimbal The Wizard casting incorrectly translated old spells, it is worth reading these from the menu.

It mentions the other characters who are now also trapped with you in the Castle of Karn.  These are Gimbal The Wizard, Thor, Florin The Dwarf, Orik The Cleric, Samsun The Strong, Elrand Halfelven, Lady Rosmar and The Banshee.

Presentation

The loading screen is one to be admired with Magic Knight at the front and a fantastic drawn ghoul in the background.  These characters of large so it looks good.  It is very colourful with a too with good use of brightness in some areas too.  Spellbound is written across the top.

Printed on one side of the cassette tape is the MAD logo and a man with a speech bubble saying: “Ok Kid – You’ve Bought The Game Now PLAY IT!”  In the bottom right in a rectangle it reads 128 ONLY.

Music and Sound Effects

From the moment the game has loaded, there is a soundtrack playing and you’ll see from the main menu screen that the layout looks slightly different to the 48K version.  I also noticed that this version has 1986 on it (rather than 1985 on the 48K version).

Enhancements

Most of the screens are named which I like giving the game that bit of extra depth and sense of progress.  The top level is all called The Roof Garden once you leave The Lift.  With this version, there are 57 rooms (the extra 7 are along the basement level) and additional objects to collect.  The 48K version had 50 rooms and less objects.

Compared to the 48K version, quite a few of the screens have much more detail.  A couple of examples are along The Roof Garden where you will see extra details like a yellow wooden doorway between trees and a white colonnade.

You also get the option to re-define keys on the keyboard.

Graphics

The games characters and background details are far bigger than its predecessor, Finders Keepers.  The objects scattered around the castle are now visual objects, so for example, you can clearly tell it’s a red herring rather than having to examine it.

There is plenty of colour and the flickering candle flames do look rather good.  Simple but very effective!

The other characters you come across are all static and aren’t animated in anyway.  It’s a shame these haven’t been enhanced.

Playability

Magic Knight moves slower than in the 48K version.  Ironically, this is better as the jumps are much smoother.  The downside being that it does take a bit longer to get from one screen to another (especially when walking).

Being that this is an arcade adventure style game, there are a lot of objects around the castle which will help you solve the clues.  This is unfortunately where the game gets a bit rather tedious as once you press the fire button, you start seeing window driven menus appearing over most of the screen.  Within each window, you move your hand up (or press the relevant key) to select what you want to do.  Options can include (but not limited to) picking up, dropping and examining items as well as casting a spell or calling the lift.  Magic Knight can also command the other characters do things such as fall asleep, eat and drink, be happy or wake up.

The most useful area of the game was in the lift room and putting the teleport pad there was the handiest thing to do, saving going through lots of screens to get back there.

Make Mine a Double, No Hang-On – A Treble!!!

Spellbound is also available in a 48K version too.  The 48K and 128K versions aren’t on opposite sides of the same tape so if you want to play the 48K version, you’ll need to buy the other tape.  That one is catalogue as MAD 2 on the spine of the cassette.

Additionally, Spectrum +3 users could also buy the game as part of the Magic Knight Trilogy on disk (of which Spellbound can be found on side A).  The other two games included within The Trilogy are Finders Keepers and Knight Tyme.

Other 8-Bit Systems

As well as the two Spectrum versions, Spellbound was also released for the Commodore 64, Amstrad CPC and Atari XL/XE.

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