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As you can tell if you cast an eye over my scores. I really enjoyed this game. It marks the welcome return to the gaming world of the near legendary Orlando who, for those BBC gamers who've been living under stones, was responsible for those all-time classics Arcadians, Frak! and Zalaga.

Generally held to be a technical wizard, Orlando has produced a classic shoot-'em-up which incorporates all the tricks and a few more.

Leaving aside the legend of Firetrack - those inlay card background stories bore me rigid - the game explores several worlds and requires you to shoot the hell out of everything in sight! A vertically scrolling screen - perfect scrolling incidentally, all over the screen - reveals the planets laid out before you, your ship at the bottom of the screen. As you progress up the screen, shooting planet-based objects for points, wave after wave of highly detailed alien planes swoop, swirl and descend down towards you.

Patterns change, speeds change, nothing is certain. Well, okay, I'm exaggerating, some things are certain, but there is a fair amount of pattern learning to do and you'll be amazed at the detail and range of objects on screen, and it will take you some time to take it all in.

The secret is not to look at the screen but to feel it. Without getting mystical, the game does demand a certain Zen-like attitude to gaming: coaxing the ship into patterns of its own and looking ahead of what you are currently doing. It's not hard. The game is generous enough to let you progress quite far and, nice touch this, you can re-try a level with your score intact if your previous attempt was not good enough.

None of this is really important, however. What counts is the fact that its compulsive and very playable. The attention to detail is staggering - not just the finely detailed planet surfaces but also little things like an automatically firing plane.

I think this game will become an instant classic. The gameplay is just right - there are static objects to be destroyed, movable objects to shoot or avoid, as they move over the screen, and the final part of each level involves a bonus shoot-out.

Orlando, of course, is an enigma. Hiding behind a pseudonym - not for any suspicious reason, but just because "programming isn't all I do" - here is a young man who has coaxed the BBC into entering new areas. His previous games have all met with acclaim and Firetrack has been in development for eighteen months or so. What has caused the delay?

Firstly, there were university exams, and secondly, time wasted trying to convince Atarisoft that Orlando's Aardvark software house should release Delos D. Harrimans exceptional micro conversion of the arcade classic Joust, since released independently after negotiations collapsed.

What of the future? Orlando mentions completing some unfinished games, starting new ones using a few little techniques he's worked out since Firetrack and a BBC book.

I for one am pleased to see him back. This new game shows the scoffers just what a good games machine the BBC can be when programmed by an expert.

Computer Gamer readers interested in Orlando, what he's been up to, his credits, his unfinished games and much more besides might like to track down a copy of our companion magazine, A&B Computing, in which all is revealed this month.