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I approached this program with some trepidation, being interested in the traditional card-game version already. Personally I couldn't see how this two-player game of moderate skill and tactics could be successfully transferred to the Spectrum.

No instruction manual was provided with the game; however, full on-screen instructions are supplied on loading the tape. These take you through the basic rules of the game: play, scoring, winning conditions, etc.

As I expected, you are only able to play against the computer itself, which handles all the dealing and scoring chores. Unfortunately here, this proves to be the main flaw in the game. Half the fun of the card version is in the dealing and calculating how many points you make, by yourself.

With this element removed, each deal becomes extremely quick and, as no levels of play are involved, I could easily imagine becoming rapidly bored with the game. Possibly there is too much 'luck of the deal' involved and too little thought required, making it hardly a challenge at all. The only 'skill' is in the experience required to discard the right cards.

On the positive side, the graphical display of the board is excellent and the computer does give full details of how the points are being scored at each stage. A few hours with this tape would be a good way to learn how to play the game, so I suppose it can be recommended on that level.

A human player, however, remains a far more interesting opponent than the computer. At least as far as cribbage is concerned.