casino, playing a game similar to blackjack. A stint at a casino can be followed by a celebration (or players can drown their sorrow over a loss) at a tavern where various drinks are available and the bartender provides advice—for a price. When ready, a party can venture into a dungeon to explore, fight monsters, and gain the experience needed to advance levels and become powerful enough to complete their quest. After a return to town, parties may need to make a trip to a temple where characters can be healed, restoring hit points, levels, life force, youth, flesh (for characters turned to stone), or life itself. Roscoe's Energy Emporium is another useful stop, where spell casters can pay an exorbitant fee to have spell units restored. And when ready, characters can visit the Review Board to advance levels and magic users can change character class. Reception The Bard's Tale II entered the gaming field strongly, winning the Origins Award for Best Fantasy or Science Fiction Computer Game of 1986. Later observations of the game were more mixed. For example, Scorpia of Computer Gaming World gave the game a mixed review. She noted several improvements over the original, such as an easier start and more easily recognizable buildings. However, the snares were considered excessively tedious, and the gameplay skewed heavily in favor of mages. Scorpia later called the game "without a doubt, the worst of the series", but the magazine's Charles Ardai called it "a fine sequel to Bard's Tale". RUN magazine reviewer Bob Guerra praised the game's new enemies and their corresponding animations and stated the game "offers an irresistible challenge to all fans of role-playing fantasies." Compute! stated that Bard's Tale II "lives up to its predecessor's excellent reputation". The magazine described the game as one "for the true adventure gamer. It is a very difficult and challenging game, and it requires great intestinal fortitude", and suggested that beginning adventurers avoid it. The game was reviewed in 1987 in Dragon #120 by Hartley and Patricia Lesser in "The Role of Computers" column. The reviewers suggested that "If The Bard's Tale was to your liking, then you're going to absolutely go crazy for The Bard's Tale II: The Destiny Knight." Michael Bagnall also stated in 1987 that due to the number of new features, "It is its own game, whose design is familiar enough that veterans can leap right