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Vooosh! Rat-a-tat-a-tat! Screaming through the skies in an incredible piece of aerial weaponry... the F1 Tornado. Bandits at three o'clock. Line them up in your sights and let loose a barrage of hot lead and high tech missiles.

The title screen proclaims this game to be a simulator, but once it's loaded you are presented with a small window of horizontally scrolling shoot-em-up antics. The only concession to simulation is a poor representation of a cockpit display.

The game looks and plays very much like the Capcom coin-op UN Squadron, i.e. bog standard scrolling shoot-em up. This doesn't mean it's bad, however, in fact quite the opposite.

Aircraft appear in droves, swooping and diving at you as they release their deadly payload of missiles. The attack waves are quite impressive - difficult enough to keep you on your toes, but possible to avoid. Extra weapons can be picked up - these include double firepower, speed-up and reverse fire. The options are cycled through on the cockpit display.

The graphics are nice. Sprites are fast, colourful and well-animated. The scrolling, too, is OK. Sound? Not much to speak of, but the spot effects do the business.

Overall 78%
Decent rendition of a much tried formula and very good value.