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I'm no prude. I don't mind a bit of senseless violence from time to time and I wouldn't mind the tacky, tasteless advertising for Friday The 13th if the game itself had a few redeeming features.

But it doesn't.

The plot of the game is, of course, based on the Friday the 13th films in which a psycho named Jason hacks his way through a group of young people staying at a summer camp. Having worked on an American summer camp I can sympathise with Jason's feelings, though the game based on his exploits doesn't have a fraction of the excitement that the films generated in their own gory little way.

When first loading, the intro screen is accompanied by a gargled scream that sounds just like Snoopy in the Charlie Brown cartoon series. The instructions tell you that you have to warn all the kids on the camp and lead them to safety before Jason creeps up on them, but that's all they tell you. There doesn't seem to be a way or warning them or of getting them to follow you at all. They all just wander around, apparently at random and there's no way of affecting them - I even tried shoving a chainsaw into a few people's earholes just to see if it would have any effect, but it didn't.

One of these wandering teenagers is actually Jason and every now and then he'll bump off one of the others, but as he looks just like the rest of them you won't be able to locate him unless he attacks you or he attacks someone else while you're nearby, but that hasn't happened while I've been playing and I've only ever spotted Jason as he kills me (end of game). And, as it sometimes takes quite a while for Jason to reveal himself, you can be faced with long spells of wandering from screen to screen only to die suddenly when Jason cuts off your head.

The graphics are very poor - your little stick man seems able to walk through tables, he becomes invisible when walking near certain objects but is unable to get close to fences for some reason.

This game has attracted a lot of attention due to the criticism that the advertising has attracted. I just hope that that hasn't led anyone to go out and buy it.