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Postern's 3-Deep Space for the BBC B is the first 'stereoscopic' 3D game I've ever seen on a popular micro. It is supplied on tape in two parts, the first in Basic to set up the 3D background, and the second in machine code to actually get all the objects moving at a reasonable speed.

It loaded first time with no errors, the landscape generator loading up first giving your eyes a chance to adjust to the effect. Well, on my monitor at least, it worked up to a point. Something wasn't quite right because when I moved my head, the object furthest away moved fastest!

The point where a brief message ("S to Start") appeared was where the game began to fall apart. The instructions had neglected to mention which keys to use, but I eventually found them by trying all the possible contenders.

The game itself consists of nasties, who move in one of eight 'depths', coming towards you from the right-hand side of the screen, moving up and down (but not in and out) at regular intervals. You must sit on the left-hand side of the screen, moving in and out, firing a 'bolt' at the nasties.

If a nasty hits you when you are both at the same depth, you lose. Predictably, this gets a little boring after a while, as the marauding aliens take no more exotic shape than simple diamonds. I guess the author (Mike Singleton) used so much memory getting the effect right that he ran out of space for such desirable amenities as complicated aliens.

The aliens do change shape at a set score, however, so all is not lost - but you only get one 'life', there's no high score sheet, and I thought he really missed an opportunity for a Defender-style explosion in 3D.

The gameplay seems to have taken second place to the gimmick, but nevertheless this program is still worth looking at. Literally.