THE SPECTRUM GAME DATABASE DRUID PUBLISHER Firebird AUTHOR YEAR 1986 CATEGORY Arcade Adventure DESCRIPTION Druid is a Gauntlet clone with slightly more depth. CONTROLS Keyboard, Kempston, Cursor KEYS : Left - Z Right - X Up - K Down - M Fire - SPACE Toggle Water/Fire - P Electricity spells Cast Key - 1 Cast Invisibility - 2 Cast Golem - 3 Cast Chaos - 4 Control Golem (keys) - A Control Golem (joystick) - A + H Note: Joystick controls for 2-player game only! INSTRUCTIONS Four skulls of immense evil power have been brought together by the Princes of Darkness and placed in a tower. The skulls are now spreading misery and decay throughout the land and you, as an aging Druid, must destroy the evil skulls and thwart the Princes. Like Gauntlet but with certain subtle differences. For example, you can cast various types of spells. Offensive spells available are based on Water, Fire and Electricity while other rarer but more powerful spells include Key (opens doors), Invisibility, Golem (creates magical assistant - of which more later) and Chaos (smart bomb). Each time a spell is cast your capacity for casting that particular spell decreases, and the counter under the respective icon at the top of the screen will show this. Around the castle are many demons of different types which will attack you on sight (as you might expect). Each type of demon requires a different type of spell to kill it - a Fire spell would not kill a fire-resistant demon, for example. If they contact you they will drain your energy. This can however be ragained by standing on one of the Pentacles of Life that are scattered around the tower. Chests are another source of useful power, but careful thought is needed before selecting an item from a chest; they are magically trapped and taking one item will destroy all the others in the chest. Hint: a map might be useful... If things are getting a bit too hectic, casting the Golem spell creates a magical servant who can be controlled by separate keyboard commands or a second player. The golem can be given three commands: send, follow and wait and has its own energy bar which is drained in the same way as yours. However, its touch is instantly fatal to demons! SCORES RECEIVED Crash "A compelling demon-bashing game." RATING : 90% (CRASH #35, December 1986) NOTES Druid was one of quite a few Gauntlet clones that appeared around 1987, including Ranarama, The Dandy, Into the Eagles Nest and Storm.