Having had moderate success with Battlecars and Rebelstar Raiders in 1985, Julian Gollop subsequently unleashed what many consider his masterpiece, at least on the ZX Spectrum computer. Don’t let those unassuming graphics fool you – Chaos (sometimes known as Chaos: The Battle Of Wizards) is a game of unprecedented depth that remains a firm favourite for fans and remakes almost 40 years later.
Drawing on its coder’s experience of board games, Chaos presents a blank black screen populated by between two and eight wizards battling to the death for victory. Each wizard has a selection of spells allocated at the beginning of the game. A menu appears at the start of each round, and this presents four options: Examine Spells, Select Spell, Examine Board and Continue With The Game. Under the first option, the wizard can consult their grimoire and study the various effects of each spell. Most spells have a range, indicating how far from the wizard it can be cast. All spells have a casting percentage, ranging from 10% for the heftier conjurations to a guaranteed 100% for certain easy spells. There are defensive and offensive spells for the wizards themselves – Magic Armour, Swords, Bolts and so on – and enchanted castles for the caster to hole up in should things get a little too hot. In addition to these, each wizard can summon creatures to the Plane to help them defeat their opponents, and this is the core of Chaos’ gameplay.
This story is from the Issue 248 edition of Retro Gamer.
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This story is from the Issue 248 edition of Retro Gamer.
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