Ok, stop me if you’ve heard this before – there is evil at loose in the world and you, and your band of adventurers, must stop it.

Yes, Wizards & Warriors, from Activision, offers nothing new in the way of plot line. But wait until you see this program. It is a tale of two worlds – the one in town and the one on the road to adventure.

In an enchanted medieval realm known as the Gael Serran, an evil power has overcome a curse and is threatening to return to wreak horrible havoc (is there any other kind). Only one thing can put an end to this curse, the legendary Mavin Sword. Oops, it was lost and must be found again. That’s where you come in. You must assemble a band of heroes to take on the hordes of foulness that roam the free world, recover the sword and destroy the foul Pharaoh.

Yep, sounds rather mundane. But D.W. Bradley, the lead architect of this world, has fashioned a program that is visually appealing – once you leave town – and quite challenging.

A black crow sits on a tombstone …

Sounds like a line out of “Twin Peaks,” but it truly is part of the initial quest you are set upon. You must venture to the graveyard and to a crypt to recover the Mavin Sword, if it is there. Along the way, you will encounter trolls that roll toward you and your party in a sea of blood-lusting fury, or skeletons that rise from the ground to challenge you. As one alone on the trail, you are vastly outnumbered. Hit and run is a great recourse. As a party, you are trapped in the adaptive time-phasing features of the program. While a product like Icewind Dale will enable the player to pause and set an attack strategy, Wizards & Warriors takes into account each character's abilities and reactive time and phases them into the battle. You may target an enemy, but you really don’t know who will attack or who will take the punishment the foe deals out.

Of course, you can put it into real time, but that is a horribly fast-paced battle that renders the outcome all-but-decided in favor of the enemy.

Wizards & Warriors is a tale of two graphical elements – in town, and on the road. In town is two-dimensional, flat and not very inviting. The adventure part is spellbinding – three-dimensional with hills and dales, trees that must be ducked under and a game board that is expansive and open to exploring. You can get lost out there (there is an automap to help guide you), but half the joy of the game is fighting your way out of danger.

The controls for this program are anything but intuitive and friendly. It takes a while to learn to use the mouse the way it was intended, and to incorporate the keyboard functions with the mouse. And there are icons that must be activated to move from phase to phase, particularly in town. This is a bit of overkill.

But in spite of that, this game provides unique characters for the adventuring party. There is the standard variety of humans, elves, gnomes, pixies and dwarves, plus Lizzords, Ratlings, Oomphaz (elephant-type creatures), Whiskas (cat people) and Ratlings (you guessed it – rats). Male and female genders have a bearing on abilities, and you can train your cast in four basic roles – warrior, wizard, priest and rogue. The trick is to find the right combination, equip them on a pittance and send them forth to quest and conquer.

The game stumbles in the controls and audio departments. Controls – we’ve already discussed that; the audio fluctuates between vocal and text for the NPCs (non-playing characters, or computer-generated characters). And there is a dearth of repetition in phraseology in-town. You can’t go to the bank without being treated to the same lines over and over.

The options on this program are quite strong. You can adjust spawn rate and attack the program from several difficulty levels. Be forewarned, even the easiest level is quite challenging.

Wizards & Warriors does have some drawbacks, but overlook them and you will be treated to a program that is visually compelling and quite challenging – especially away from town. The 360-degree world is wonderful to look at, and just as must fun to explore. Just make sure you learn to control the game – you must be quick on the controls, or your party is dead.

This program is rated Mature for animated blood and animated violence.

Install: Hard. The maximum install is 1.4 gigabytes while the minimum is 740 megs. This translates into a long and uneventful installation.

Gameplay: 7.5. The game board is huge and fun, but the town landscapes are relatively unexciting and less challenging. You can’t explore them, but rather must scroll left or right through them and then click on two-dimensional buildings if you wish to visit them.

Graphics: 7.5. Again, the in-town portions of this program are not entreating, but the overall score is brought up because of the ‘on the road’ part of this program. The three-dimensional graphics are dynamic and quite fun.

Sound: 7. This program features a mix of spoken and text characterizations, which is frustrating.

Difficulty: 8. Even at the easiest difficulty levels, this program still presents a challenge while asking for a little cerebral play on the part of the gamer.

Concept: 6.5. Seen it, done it. The plot line offers little that is fresh. What is refreshing is the new characters that you can use as part of the troop of heroes.

Overall: 7.5. Wizards & Warriors has many of the elements that epitomize the best of role-playing games. However, the gamer interface is awkward and does not allow for, initially, a quick grasp of the program. Sure, you don’t want a program that is like every other game out there, but if the controls vary greatly from what you are used to, it takes time to get used to those controls. And once used to the controls of this game, they do seem relatively simple to use. After all, most of the controls are a combination of mouse and keyboard. Wizards & Warriors may not be a Diablo II, or Icewind Dale, but it is a nice RPG rife with challenges and solid graphics.