One aspect of the game you'll notice right from the start is the font. It’s freakishly big and, if that wasn’t bad enough, not very easy to read. The letters often seem to flow into one another; a nice thing to see in handwriting but not on a computer screen. As such, a lot of the text is difficult to read and sometimes I found myself having to reread the same bit of text a couple of times before I could understand what it said. As this is a game written for the ZX Spectrum, the font is unadjustable and therefore one of those things you have to put up with.

But on with game itself…

“Tower of Despair” is generic fantasy handled well. The part of the warrior-mage, however, is not as developed as it could have been. Indeed, considering that you are a warrior it seems a little strange that you begin the game without a single hand-to-hand weapon to your name. As for the mage side of things, you have a staff which can emit a bolt of lightning and nothing else. No spells are available to you no matter which path through the game you take. Memory restrictions were probably the cause of this as “Tower of Despair” first appeared for the ZX Spectrum with its maximum memory of 48KB. So in the interests of providing a fairly large game and a sizeable amount of depth, certain aspects had to be sacrificed. The magic system, alas, was one of them.

The original game came with a detailed booklet which gave a recent history of the land in which “Tower of Despair” takes place as well as a Guide Book that contains illustrations for various locations. But the Guide Book was more than just mere eye candy as it often revealed things that were missing from the room description and could not be discovered in the game at all without prior notice of the Guide Book. I can think of several reasons for doing this – it means the game doesn’t require graphics, however basic (and when you're restricted to 48KB of memory you need to cut as many corners as you can); lengthy descriptions can be left out because the player will be able to *see* what is in the location without reading through a few dozen lines of text; also it cuts down on game piracy as the pirates would have to copy the Guide Book as well as the game – hardly an issue these days with thousands of old games being readily available for free on the internet but a major issue back when this game was first released.

The obvious problems arise when trying to play “Tower of Despair” without the Guide Book. Head into a tavern about midway through the first part of the game. It looks a fairly average place. Examine a few things. That’s it. There's nothing else to do or see. Or is there? Look at the drawing for the tavern in the Guide Book and you notice several barrels stacked near the back of the room. Moving these leads to a secret passage which you need to progress along in order to avoid getting killed by an enemy. Playing the game with the Guide Book in your lap, it’s easy to see the barrels and guess they might need moving. Play it without and you're well and truly stuck. Unfortunately while the game has survived the years pretty much intact – or as intact as any 80’s text adventure can be in the world of today – the Guide Book has not, leaving anyone lacking prior knowledge of the game with a great struggle to get anywhere.

In a couple of other instances the Guide Book is necessary to make any progress. In one you find yourself facing several doors which are unmarked in the game yet given descriptions in the Guide Book – the descriptions are the key to figuring your way past them and you are never likely to guess them without it. In another location quite a bit further on in the game, you find four rooms which bear illustrations in the Guide Book yet nothing in the game itself. Lacking knowledge of these illustrations means the game cannot be finished, although I guess it’s altogether possible, though highly unlikely, that you could stumble on the solution through sheer persistence.

While this idea is certainly an interesting one, and even a very good one provided you can find an artist to illustrate a booklet for your games, it makes “Tower of Despair” a frustrating game to play without the booklet. If the in-game text gave indications as to what was there this might not be a problem. But it doesn’t. When you’ve torn your hair out in frustration over trying to figure out just what the game writers were thinking at such-and-such a time, you'll really wish at least of the descriptive text had made its way into the game, even if this was at the expense of extra locations and gameplay.

The land of Aleandor, the main setting for “Tower of Despair”, is a vividly written set of locations. Most are empty of little more than a few lines of text, but as these are often immensely detailed they give you a definite feeling for them all the same. Puzzles are exceptionally difficult at times and it would be true to say that most of them will require a *lot* of thought to get anywhere with, although in hindsight you might find that you kick yourself in frustration for not figuring them out sooner. Communicating with your manservant is a good example of a puzzle that seems obvious once you figure it out, but which took me several hours to solve. And most of that time was probably spent in typing one command after another on the off chance I hit upon the correct one.

Only one part of the game has ever really annoyed me and this involves the Angel of Death, a demonic assassin you encounter at the end of the first part of this two part game. I'm sure there's a bug regarding the timing of the Angel’s appearance as sometimes he seems to show up when you reach the ruined town whereas other times he shows up quite a bit earlier. The problem with this is that nothing you have with you is effective against him and if you fail to reach a certain point in the game before encountering him you have no way of surviving in one piece. This wouldn’t be as much of a problem if the Angel only showed up after you had reached the town but he has a nasty habit of showing up earlier. Sometimes a lot earlier. A couple of times he showed up before I had even left the starting locations at Castle Argent which meant killing him was impossible, yet other times I could leave Castle Argent and wander around the game to my heart’s content before I caught sight of him. As there's no way of predicting just when the Angel will show up and no way of avoiding him once he’s there, and the timing of his appearance is purely random, this is one aspect of the game that could really have done with some tweaking. As the game moves straight into part two as soon as the Angel is defeated, this requires you to complete everything in part one that needs completing before you encounter him. While this is by no means impossible (provided the Angel doesn’t show up too easily), it’s frustratingly hard to say the least. A single mis-typed command can ruin everything for you and as “Tower of Despair” counts mis-typed commands as actual turns each one used is one wasted. Hit the wrong key enough time and the game will be over before you know it.

Part two of the game is just a continuation of the first part. In a way I preferred the first part more. It seemed to have more depth and while the encounter with Angel of Death was an unfair one, it was considerably more evocative than anything in part two (although the fight with Malnor’s henchman at the bridge is a memorable one).

Alas the climax of the game is disappointing and confusing with little explained and even less understood. Maybe the writers ran out of game memory and just had to leave the ending in the rushed state it is in but it’s a real pity such a good game had to end in such a poor way.

Rating: 8 out of 10