These battles do bring some great elements into play, though. For example, if you have a soldier hidden behind a house, an archer from the opposite side may not be able to hit him or notice him before it's too late. This gets quite interesting when sorcerers and other magic users come into the fray. Casting a fire spell might burn down a village, a life spell may cause your units to rejuvenate and an air spell might cause a bolt of lightening to strike down a physically strong opponent.

It's at points like these that the game inherits some elements from the likes of Everquest and the Ultima series, summoning demons or annihilating armies with a wave of the hand.

Overall, the single-player game deserves classic status, but there's one element that relights the multiplayer facility of Age Of Wonders - a great map editor.

When you first start up the map editor, you may be quite surprised not to find a random map generator with the vast array of elements that are included on each layout. Yes, you've definitely got your work cut out for you if you'd bargained on a quick, random scenario. However, the editor itself is remarkable, including every element from the game itself, allowing you to insert independent raiders and wanderers and even scatter heroes throughout the map. You can add castle ruins and, best of all, you can even edit the underground levels.

Each map has up to three levels - two underground and a surface level on which you can move your units - and this brings another element into the already booming fray: ambushes. If you've got a city that has an ominous-looking cave nearby, you're going to need to set-up some kind of defence strategy, as all kinds of beasts and monsters can travel through the underground - a bit like London, so it would seem...