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With a name like Blood 'N Guts, you'd expect this game to be really nasty - lots of dripping gore and stuff like that. But no. The violence is all a bit jokey in this barbarian equivalent of Summer Games.

There are ten "events" in the ancient decathlon. You can play the computer or a friend. Take on the character of a muscle-bound barbarian with a daft name. Names like Nop, Knorr - as in the soup - Hawk and Dog.

The option screen which displays these characters also includes their ages for some strange reason.

The events are, in order, Tug of War, Tower Jump, Rock Roller, Beer Drinking, Human Hit, Pole Fight, Cat Throwing (!), Mountain Walk, Axe Throwing and Arm Wrestling. All the events require a certain amount of Decathlon-style joystick wiggling.

Tug Of War is self-explanatory, wiggle the stick and pull the opponent into the water. In Tower Jump, you have to leap from the top of - yes, you guessed it! - a tower and jump as far as possible. The bad news is that to get a rating from the judges you have to land on your head! One for Status Quo fans, this.

In Rock Roller you have to roll a rock up a slope - racing against your opponent. Waggle the stick to take steps up the slope. Like the Tower Jump, this is a "best of three" event.

Beer Drinking is fun! You have to help your barbarian drain his tankard before the other guy.

Next up is the Human Hit in which you have to hit coloured targets on a poor chap locked into a stocks in the questest time possible. A simple line up the sight and fire game.

Pole Fight sees your barbarian sitting ona log suspended over a chasm. You have to fight with a club and knock your opponent off the log. Another pretty simple game, this - except the two figures are a bit small.

Cat Throwing is a tasteless addition to the game. It's a discus-style event in which you have to get your barbarian spinning and hit the fire button to throw the "cat" as far as possible.

Mountain Walk is a tricky tightrope-walking game. You have to "walk" your barbarian over the rope using left/right movements on the stock to keep him upright.

Axe Throwing is what it says it is. You and your opponent take turns at throwing axes at each other. The loser is the one who gets a sharp pain in the head! You can jump and duck to avoid the axes which come at you low or high - nothing in-between. It's only a matter of time before someone gets the chop.

Arm Wrestling is a computer version of that old macho pub pastime. Except here it's difficult to tell what's going on as the action is viewed from above. More stick-wiggling is required to move the arm. Lose, and a bird flies over and "marks" as the instructions quaintly point out.

The game is multi-load from tape or disc and our review copy worked perfectly with minimal delays between loading events.

Blood 'N Guts looks good, is well presented - but the barbarians lack that all-important grip factor to make you want to play.