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Based on the spy novel by Frederick Forsyth, this adventure puts you in the shoes of British agent John Preston (thrilling name) with a mission to prevent those eternal blighters, the Ruskies, from letting off a nuclear bomb in Britain. There are three stages to the game: Nato Documents, The Bomb and The SAS Assault. You'll find plenty of reports to gather, codes to decipher and plots to foil and it's all run from a natty icon-driven interface. Some might say that this is more of a strategy than an adventure, but there are enough riddles to solve to class it as the latter. A crisply presented and extremely playable spy romp.

THE FOURTH PROTOCOL
Hutchinson Computer Publishing, £12.95

If the last book you read was the Beano annual 1978 then you may not be aware of the standing of The Fourth Protocol (the book) in the literary world - where it was received to great popular acclaim. Much of the panache of that Frederick Forsyth novel dealing with the murky depths of counterespionage is retained in this computer game. It boasts a development team of games designers, graphic artists and programmers, and on loading you can well believe it. The game's concept has been very well implemented and the graphics are attractive and impressive.

The plot goes like this: in a remote cottage just outside Moscow a Soviet General Secretary and the British traitor Kim Philby plot the most audacious offensive of the cold war, codenamed Plan Aurora. The plan is to destabilize Britain and force the disintegration of NATO. With the NATO pact out of the way Soviet forces would then be free to overthrow Western Europe. The idea is to renege on the Fourth Protocol, a part of the Non-Proliferation Treaty signed by the 1968 nuclear powers of Britain, USA and Russia. This involves the smuggling of a nuclear device into the UK and exploding it there just before the 1987 General Election. A KGB disinformation program will ensure the nuclear disaster is blamed on an American military installation. The election of a hard left government committed to withdrawal from NATO will lead to a totalitarian state in Britain. Your role is to play John Preston, M15 investigator, who must uncover Plan Aurora and ensure that its insidious results are never realized.

Even as you take up your post as head of CI(A) a burglary is taking place somewhere in England. The burglar steals the Glen Diamonds but, more important, disturbs some secret NATO documents. The MOD mandarins receive these files and immediately get the Paragon Committee, whose sole concern is the source of the lost documents, onto the case. Your task is to find who is leaking the secrets, to whom they are being leaked, and why. Meantime, however, you must run a busy secret service department from your Cencom control network, maintaining as low a public profile as possible.

Nato Documents is the first of three parts on the tape and is an adventure/strategy game which uses an icon driven control system, i.e. you point to what you want and then press ENTER to reveal further options. The heart of the game is the Cencom display which allows access to news reports, sitreps (situation reports), files, telephone calls (both in and out), surveillance of suspects, and self-assessment to see how you are getting on in your role as head of CI(A). By way of this series of menus and sub-menus the player can effectively control the whole organisation: all its in- and outgoings of both personnel and messages. A file can be read into your Cencom system's memory over the telephone from Blenheim, a building which contains the vast archives of M15. As you might expect, however, codes must be deciphered and entered correctly.

Playing, the first thing you might like to do is to track down your personal list of telephone numbers as there is some important information available to you at Blenheim. You will need your one-time decoding sheets in order to enter the code of the week (which, strangely enough, lasted well over a month when I played it). This allows you to download into your Cenco console valuable lists of Cabinet and Foreign Office staff who had access to the stolen documents. Those staff with access to photocopying facilities are shown - which may be significant, as the stolen documents were photocopies. All the while you must concern yourself with the running of a busy secret service department and this can even go as far as probing the private lives of the workers in your office. Miss Abbs has a fling with a foreign diplomat and you must decide what you are going to do about it, if anything. More important is finding out who leaked the NEC privatization documents to the national press and dealing with the culprit.

An im

WARNING - possible breach of the Fourth Protocol ...

As John Preston, and newly appointed head of C1(A) it is your job to look after military security and, ultimately, uncover a British traitor and a plan to destabilise a nation of the Western Alliance.

The game comprises three sections, called The NATO Documents, The Bomb and The SAS Assault. In order to get into the last two you must use a code which is given to you in the previous section.

You begin in your office, reading memos sent by your superiors, using the phone, despatching watchers to tail suspects and receiving reports on the movements of potential traitors.

The game is controlled using a series of innovative and visually attractive icon screens. All input is made by moving a pointing finger to one of the icons and pressing ENTER.


Three terminals at the bottom of the screen provide contact with the outside world. The one on the left is used to read reports from watchers, the middle one gives you access to your reports and the one on the right allows you to read your memos.

File access is gained through the CenCom computer located in the basement of your office building. You can put your own files on the system or run checks and voiceprints on characters.

Files not held on CenCom can be accessed by ringing Blenheim and entering the correct code.

Once you have the file code the second section of the game can be loaded. The Bomb covers a trip around the building picking up useful objects for your search across Britain to find the nuclear device.

The building has four floors, connected by lifts. Although icon-driven, the options are flexible enough to allow characters to talk to you and for you to move easily and quickly.


Once you have located the bomb you can access the third and undoubtedly the weakest part of the game, The SAS Assault. You must arm your squad and place them around the building using a schematic plan. In this sequence you use simple verb/noun sentences with a list of words available on request.

Hav

WARNING - possible breach of the Fourth Protocol ...

As John Preston, and newly appointed head of C1(A) it is your job to look after military security and, ultimately, uncover a British traitor and a plan to destabilise a nation of the Western Alliance.

The game comprises three sections, called The NATO Documents, The Bomb and The SAS Assault. In order to get into the last two you must use a code which is given to you in the previous section.

You begin in your office, reading memos sent by your superiors, using the phone, despatching watchers to tail suspects and receiving reports on the movements of potential traitors.

The game is controlled using a series of innovative and visually attractive icon screens. All input is made by moving a pointing finger to one of the icons and pressing ENTER.


Three terminals at the bottom of the screen provide contact with the outside world. The one on the left is used to read reports from watchers, the middle one gives you access to your reports and the one on the right allows you to read your memos.

File access is gained through the CenCom computer located in the basement of your office building. You can put your own files on the system or run checks and voiceprints on characters.

Files not held on CenCom can be accessed by ringing Blenheim and entering the correct code.

Once you have the file code the second section of the game can be loaded. The Bomb covers a trip around the building picking up useful objects for your search across Britain to find the nuclear device.

The building has four floors, connected by lifts. Although icon-driven, the options are flexible enough to allow characters to talk to you and for you to move easily and quickly.


Once you have located the bomb you can access the third and undoubtedly the weakest part of the game, The SAS Assault. You must arm your squad and place them around the building using a schematic plan. In this sequence you use simple verb/noun sentences with a list of words available on request.

Hav