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Motor racing has become more and more competitive with time. Not only do we have bigger, better engines and flashier, faster cars, machine guns and rocket launchers are as vital to the success of the driver as a full tank of petrol.

Badlands is the futuristic follow up to Super Sprint, Atari's addictive multi-player racing game that stormed the arcades a few years ago. The difference is added violence. Missiles sit alongside the turbo-acceleration power-ups. Apart from that, little has changed. Three cars sit on the starting grid. And one or two of them can be human-controlled, opening up the way for a little comradely killing of your friends.

The courses are all continuous circuits, set in different environments, such as a junk yard, a military base, or a prison. The surroundings don't really make an awful lot of difference to the game, though features like opening and closing doors in the prison do add a bit of variety. A number of laps need to be completed, and getting to the line first makes you the winner. Winning is good for two reasons. One, it means you stay in the race (you must beat the computer at any rate). Two, you get a bonus spanner for your efforts.

This spanner business is the way to earn power-ups for your car. Spanners can be spent on such things as engine improvements (so you can go faster, accelerate better etc) and, of course, those missiles! Shields are also available to protect you against any rocket attacks that may be directed at you). Spanners often appear on the race track, and you can collect them by driving over them. Sometimes you find yourself going the wrong way just so you can top up your spanner collection.

As well as the usual steer left/right, and accelerate, you have the all-important trigger too. Normally bullets spew forth from your gun barrel. These don't actually do any damage to the target vehicle, but have the effect of slowing it down. Thus, if you're lagging behind, it's a neat way of making up ground. Equip yourself with missiles, and a heat-seeking rocket is launched following a stab of the Fire button. This will usually hit the closest car in front of you, and is even capable of manoeuvering around corners as it pursues it. On contact with a car, the missile explodes and the unfortunate victim has to wait a few seconds while a helicopter deposits a brand new motor on the track.

Shields, however, protect you against missiles. Now the computer controlled cars aren't vindictive enough to even consider launching a missile at anyone else, so single player games are quite boring. If you are behind (unlikely - the computer cars have the pace of an arthritic tortoise) simply let loose a missile, zip past the wreckage, and drive on happy in the knowledge that you can live without fear of retaliation.

Things are slightly more exciting in two-player mode - but only slightly. There is a certain amount to be said for taking on a non-silicon opponent - the racing becomes a lot more competitive and it's no longer important that you win the race, just as long as your friend doesn't. The problem is that while both of you amass huge stockpiles of missiles, you also amass equally large amounts of protective shields, and the whole exercise become futile. In fact it's preferable to have no missiles at all, because they don't do any damage to a well-shielded car, whereas at least the bullets slow them down.

One thing that you can't fail to to notice about this game is the 'Spec-factor'. Little or no effort has been made in trying to make the game look even half-decent. The colours are blocky, the cars and backgrounds are not at all well drawn. It looks like something you might have seen on a Spectrum eight years ago. Amstrad owners have every right to expect better - much better - than this.

So Badlands looks dreadful. It plays OK, but not great, and may give a limited amount of two-player fun. The missiles don't add that much at all really - a pity, since they sound like such a good idea. The computer opposition is not tough enough, and doesn't fight back. If it were really playable, that may be enough to forgive the bad graphics, but it's not, and any merits the game may have are lost. You'd be well advised to steer clear of this one.

Win on all eight circuits.

Badlands is one bizarre game. The graphics are incredibly basic for a CPC game of this day and age. Is there some mistake? Apparently not. And the game doesn't even play well!

The worst thing of all is when you compare it to Iron Man - the games are very similar but graphically the Virgin game is about a thousand years ahead of Domark's outing. Oh dear...

Graphics 23%
N. Shameful Speccy sprites.
N. Backgrounds are almost non-existent.

Sonics 48%
N. The noise annoys.

Grab Factor 45%
N. Simple car control.
N. The graphics put you right off.

Staying Power 38%
N. Unchallenging and uninteresting.
N. There's nothing to keep you coming back.

Overall 40%
N. Not the best of the genre!