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The Game Boy has quite literally come on in leaps and bounds since its first black and white incarnation some ten years ago. Now, in this era of full colour and sensational development houses lavishing us with quality software, we expect to see some huge licences making their gradual transition to our favourite pocket toy. F1 is one of those utterly monstrous licences, having been liberally splattered on nearly every console in the last ten years and in doing so, raking in a fortune.

The reason F1 is appearing on the Game Boy Color might have its roots firmly in the idea of making money, not to continue the trend of producing high quality gameplay. The problem is a simple one, and something we'll get to later, but first, the F1 experience!

Rather than simply racing around tracks, F1 has matured into an extravaganza of options, a bevy of baffling stats and more choice than a giant box of Milk Tray. From the outset, you are bamboozled by the number of options open for experimentation. Adjusting steering, tyre pressure, gear box ratio and downforce all help to capture the feel of what it must be like to sit in an F1 pit stop as do the team stats.

Gathering up as much information you can on the teams you are allowed a sneak peek into their history, current positions, drivers and even what engines they prefer. Again, this sort of depth only goes further to add that professional touch to the package. The courses (all mapped out as precisely as they could be on a couple of inches of screen!) are accurate enough for F1 aficionados to recognise them by shape alone but they lack incredible amounts of attention. This is where F1 World Grand Prix starts to crumble slightly.

Monte Carlo, notorious for its tight, urban corners and winding waterside roadways bears no resemblance to the real thing whatsoever. A smudge of grey (to symbolise the urban environment surely) and a backdrop of shoddy grey rectangles (urban housing estates) are all that identify Monte Carlo for what it is. The rural race courses are even worse because the difference between them becomes so thin you could call it Paul Daniels' hair.

Unfortunately the cars are no great masterpieces of individuality either. The Jordan car is a lump of yellow. Bennetton - cyan, Ferrari - red, they share everything from handling to management and are inseparable apart from their colour.

The intensity of the race is also lost. Partly because the action could never hope to be captured in full on such a small playing area but partly due to the sheer lack of love that has gone into production. The cars have three frames of movement (point left, point right, head in a straight line) and the screen so obviously comes down to meet them rather than the player feeling as if he is accelerating to the horizon. To make this even more blatant, horrid stripes of green (or grey depending if you are in Monte Carlo or Japan) descend the screen hypnotically sending you deep within some freakish handheld trance. Bizarre is not the word!

F1 World Grand Prix will soon have you wondering why you parted with your money. Stat shuffling, team politics and off-road rivalry should have been confined to the likes of the big boys, PlayStation and Nintendo. Maybe the lesson will be learned when the huge F1 licence grinds on and we find ourselves with another F1 sequel.

Talk about all show and no go - while F1 is a joy to behold, they seem to have forgotten something. All the drivers are here and it's bang up to date in terms of who races for which team.

The number of options are immense with some well thought-out qualifying ideas and excellent challenge section. But the game... well, it sucks to the tune of an 80's Game Boy title called, unsurprisingly, F1.

Why doesn't anyone realise racing games don't work on the Game Boy? Please, take it away...!

Graphics 40%
Didn't we see these years ago?

Sound 40%
The constant rasp of engines.

Playability 60%
Nothing out of the ordinary.

Lastability 60%
Plenty of tracks to tackle.

Overall 51%
Certainly not a "Pole Position" game!