Page "Pool of Radiance" Paragraph 20

In their March 1989 " The Role of Computers " column in Dragon magazine # 143, Hartley, Patricia, and Kirk Lesser ( often called " The Lessers ") gave Pool of Radiance a three-page review.

The reviewers praised Pool of Radiance as " the first offering that truly follows AD & D game rules ", calling it a " great fantasy role-playing game " that " falls into the must-buy category for avid AD & D game players ".

The reviewers advised readers to " rush out to your local dealer and buy Pool Of Radiance ".

They considered it SSI's flagship product, speculating that it would " undoubtedly bring thousands of computer enthusiasts into the adventure-filled worlds of TSR ".

The Dragon reviewers criticized the " notoriously slow " technology of the C64 / 128 system but added that the C64 / 128 version would become nearly unplayable without a software-based fastloader utility which Strategic Simulations integrated into the game.

Conversely, the reviewers felt that the MS-DOS version was extremely fast, so much so that they had to slow the game operation down in order to read all the on-screen messages.

They found that the MS-DOS version played at twice the speed of the C64 / 128 version when using the Enhanced Graphics Adapter ( EGA ) graphics mode.