Cavesweeper

If a Hall of Fame is ever founded for Windows games that eat away hours of workers' time, Minesweeper would probably clock in just after Solitaire (and all its variations).

The hunt-and-click guessing game is simple to learn and boasts even simpler graphics, but offers an element of danger that compels you to keep playing.

Cavesweeper by Quikding is a variation on Minesweeper. It successfully retains the addictive simplicity of its inspiration, but adds a touch of depth through exploration and monster-slaying. The final product is very digestible and likeable.

Cavesweeper doesn't waste much time on story. You're a mage / adventurer seeking fame and fortune in the depths of a cave. Within a few steps, you meet your first enemy, whereupon it's time to beat up some wolves, spiders, and beetles.

Battles in Cavesweeper don't occur directly. Instead, you do damage to your foes by uncovering coloured gems on a 5x5 grid. If one or more similarly coloured gems are adjacent to the uncovered one, a number alerts you as to how many you can expect to find.

If you correctly guess the positions of the gems, you do damage to the enemy. If you guess wrong, you lose energy. When you begin playing Cavesweeper, you only have access to red and green gems. More colours are introduced as you delve further into the cave, making it easier to screw up - and take damage.

There's plenty of help on-hand, though. You meet blacksmiths that upgrade your pick, letting you do more damage to enemies and restore more of your health when you land successful attacks. There are also merchants that sell health potions, and even gamblers that let you flip coins for stashes of gold.

In many ways, Cavesweeper is much more accessible than the traditional Minesweeper. In Minesweeper, one mistake means the end of the game, since you're presumably blown to smithereens. There's a lot more room for error in Cavesweeper.

While a few good enemy hits will incapacitate you, you can make a comeback by siphoning health from your enemies. And if things get seriously hairy, you can always use one of your (admittedly rare) health potions.

Despite this forgivingness, Cavesweeper isn't exactly a pushover. It still manages to offer up a decent challenge - particularly when more than two kinds of gems are thrown into the fray.

If nothing else, Cavesweeper should bring a smile to the faces of nostalgia fiends. The pixellated graphics are reminiscent of a 386 game from the early '90s, to say nothing of the gameplay.

After all, how many of us turned to Minesweeper when we couldn't get Doom to run properly on our machines for whatever reason? This cave is definitely worth spelunking through.