Chaos Strikes Back

Chaos Strikes Back was the sequel to Dungeon Master. I immensely enjoyed playing both of these games on my Atari ST as a kid. The PC version of Chaos Strikes Back is almost identical to these and has lost none of its addictive charm.
You control a group of four heroes which you select from a hall of mirrors, each containing a different soul, a bit like an underground spirit supermarket at the start, just like in the original. You guide them, first person view, real-time, through a three dimensional tunnel network, or dungeon, and gather treasure, kill monsters, gain experience, spells, magic items and level up.

You also need to watch your food and water levels, drinking from fountains you find along the way and feasting on the corpses of your enemies, which present themselves as handy (cooked) morsels of food. All the standard good stuff you’d expect from any RPG. There’s much fun to be had discovering new monsters, which do get even cooler the deeper in to the dungeon you get, then slaying them with your shiny new magic sword. There are some wicked suits of cool special armour hidden in bits around the place which are difficult to find but make your party look really cool. There are some even cooler spells if you can find the correct order to cast the runes in.
The main attraction with this game is the puzzle element, just like DM, Chaos has some really nice touches that make it a lot more than just ploughing through the maze to get to the end. It’s enough to make you think without letting you get stuck for too long. Although I did get stuck at the corbum bomb pillar at the end and couldn’t complete this which left me completely unsatisfied in the same kind of way that a good Chinese take away does. Conversely, completing Dungeon Master had left me sated. I think it’s totally cool and easily one of the best games of it’s time, and just as good now. Also, Chaos DM spawned other clones. One notable one being Captive. A trippier romp through a space station with robots, trying to figure out what to do. You’re trapped inside it somewhere with a laptop using it to guide these robots to find you. Unlike Chaos this is a bit more over the top and not as elegant of a game. Worth a look if you like the genre and totally love Chaos. You do get guns which is nice. If you like this you’ll definitely love Dungeon Master.