Game Review: Wizard’s Warrior (ZX Spectrum, Mastertronic)

Your mission is to defeat the wicked wizard of Cinslair (see what they did there with a simple anagram!) and do battle in the crypts against his minions.

When the game loads, you are asked if you want to read the instructions.  Pressing Y then gives you 4 pages of what to expect in the crypts and how the scoring works.

It also explains that when you shoot a warrior, you may not always kill them.  Shooting their backpack or rifle can prevent them from dying.  Firing at a bullet can cancel it out.  It’s worth knowing this as otherwise you would possibly think that even with a good shot, if you don’t kill them, it might be dodgy collision detection (but that’s not the case).

In the earlier crypts, they have plenty of hiding spaces and as you advance further into the game, each new crypt has fewer hideouts.  Later, watch out for the Coliseum and the Abyss!!!  They become more open-plan meaning a stray shot can have consequences and no real hiding place.  Spoiler alert, The Abyss has no corridors and is fully open with no walls (apart from an opening and closing passage to go from one side of the screen to the other.)

The Ultimate Warriors

There are three types of warriors, each having their own characteristics.  The blue ones are always visible on the screen and never vanish (until you kill them!).  There are also the yellow and white ones who are mostly immaterial and can disappear and reappear back on the screen.

In crypt one, once you have killed the six blue ones, you then must kill the yellow one and white one.  They can increase up-to six when in crypt number 6.

Now That’s Magic!

There is also the Magic Eagle and if you shoot it, doubles your score on the next level.  If you miss it, you will be told that it has escaped.

The wicked wizard can sometimes make an appearance too and teleports after a few seconds hurling bolts at you too.  Quite a tricky customer, as they say.

I’ll Keep That on My Radar

Placed at the bottom-middle of the screen, there is a rectangle with dots moving around inside.

In true Defender fashion, this is a radar where you see where all the enemies are.  This is very useful because even if any of the warrior minions disappear of the screen for a few seconds, they will always be displayed as a dot so you can tell where they are even when invisible in the main playing area.

The one thing that the radar doesn’t show you though is where the walls are, which is smart or else the game would probably be too easy, keeping the difficulty level just right.

Graphics

To begin with, there is an excellent loading screen.  The only slightly misleading part is that your warrior on there is firing diagonally which can’t be done whilst playing the game.  Never mind, it is there for imagination too and that is a plus.

The characters on screen are clear and obvious (please don’t mention VAR!)

The colour coding of the enemy, you can tell what you are shooting at.  There is some colour-clash when you or the enemy are against the walls but its not flickery at all and therefore totally acceptable.

After each level, you will also see a well-drawn screen with The Wizard’s Warrior appear.  Whoever drew that, well hats off to them, as it looks fantastic.

Sound

Whilst playing the game, there is sound.  It can be described as a beeped alarmed siren raising up and down in tone on repeat.  This plays at different speeds on different levels.  It only stops when you fire or get shot at.  Then, you’ll then hear an increasing pitched note whilst the bullet travels along the screen.  When it disappears, the siren noise continues again over again.  The joys of one channel sound, eh?

An exception to the siren is when the Magic Eagle appears and new type of alert noise repeats whilst on the screen.  Fair to miss it by the way and the word Escaped appears!

Playability

You start the game with 5 lives and the ones you have remaining are clearly shown on the right-hand side of the screen.  Bonus lives can be got after completing some levels.

Your warrior can move in horizontal and vertical directions (so not diagonally).  Pressing fire shoots your laser rifle, and the bullet will keep moving across the screen until it either hits an enemy or wall.  You can only fire one shot at a time, so accuracy is important.  If you miss, then relying on manoeuvring your way out of trouble for a few seconds until you can re-fire again.

Just like in Pacman, there are side escape passages, allowing you go through them and re-appear on the other side of the screen.  The difference here though in Wizards Warrior is that they aren’t always open and close from time to time.

All warriors walk and turn at 90-degree angles and each has two frames of animation.  The enemy are quite intelligent as they don’t just wander aimlessly in a zombie state.  It can take a good shot to hit one of them accurately and kill them.  You may be waiting for one of them to walk along to pick off but they will just sometimes wander up and around a different part of the maze, so they’re not just sitting ducks.

The controls are ok, although and it is a matter of lining yourself up perfectly to get through a passageway (not ideal for dodging bullets).  To be fair though, this is what you’d encounter in many other games of this kind.

Just to add here, you can’t fire from inside the boxed area where you start on each level (nor can be shot by the enemy either).  Move outside of it and its game on, fire away and dodge away!

Font of All Knowledge

Why have I mentioned the font in a review?  Well at the very beginning, the text is in the standard Sinclair font.

When it comes to selecting either a joystick (AGF or Kempston) or the keyboard controls, a new clear font changes, looking impressive.  It just made me wonder why it wasn’t used on the opening instructions pages as well.  It’s just an observation really (so therefore I don’t have all the knowledge here!)

Final Thoughts

The best way to describe this game is as a pre-Gauntlet era, Pacman and shoot ‘em up type of maze game that I really wish I’d played this back in 1984.  it’s a very good and shows that a cheap budget title didn’t mean cheap and nasty.

Each time you play the game, the crypts have a different layout.  This means that you never really play the same game twice, which is a good addictive feature to enjoy.

With increasing levels of difficulty, to keep you hooked, it really is an early Mastertronic gem.  It was also released on the War on Want charity label too.

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