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Roll up, roll up! It's flick screen budget platform game time! Run around the alien battlestar. Shoot the aliens. Run around the battlestar a bit more. Prime a number of bombs. Make an origami paper hat (eh???).

The blurb says: "As the last star-warrior, you must complete the mission and uphold the honour of your fallen comrades." If this was a crappy game, I could have been incredibly waggish and said 'I'd rather have played one of the fallen comrades" Unfortunately the game isn't crappy, so I can't.

Deviants is pretty easy to describe, in fact I've already described it; you shoot aliens and prime bombs. This bomb-priming bit is quite tricky (or it is if you're as mind numbingly thick as I am), because you have to complete a little logic 'prob' within a time limit. Fail and you die. I just kept dying; my highest priming rate was a pitiful two bombs, and that was blind luck (literally - I had my eyes shut). Anyway, onto the 'look' of the game.

Question: What separates a good platform game from a dud platform game?

Answer. Crikey, I wouldn't send you out to buy a pound of sausages. (Whoops, wrong answer).

Proper Answer: Quite simple really; graphics, animation, colour, sound, playability and price. (Same as any other type of game. Haw Haw.)

Deviants scores well. It gets a tick for each of the above (quite a big one, actually). Nicely coloured bold sprites move smoothly over an attractive playing area with absolutely no attribute clash (a bit Dan-Dareish actually). There's yer extra bullets and yer extra energy to pick up and also a 128K tune (on the menu screen, anyway). All in all the game is very... erm, what's the word? Slick!! Yes, that'll do - it's very Slick. There's another word for it as well. Uuum - aah yes: Cheap! Deviants is Slick and also Cheap. And well worth the spondies, too. Boing!!

Top-notch cheapie platformer from the author of Joe Blade. It's positively deviant (fniar)!