Judge Dredd, the computer game. Coming soon from Melbourne House. Does it do any sort of justice? You play Dredd, as impersonated by a fairly convincing sprite.

The game plot isn't at all bad. Thankfully Melbourne hasn't tried to invent some sort of ridiculous special plot that enables them to include fifty different bouncing aliens.

The game is all about crime. Your task is to stop it - to stop every sort of crime from littering, to comic dealing (kids get addicted to them), to murder. Crime is a constant feature of Megacity One.

In Stage 1 of the game you have a map, a plan view of Megacity with icons representing the various kings of crime scattered about as they happen. And you must use your judgement to decide what crime to go for first and what sequence of crime fighting will be most economical of time.

Time is of the essence because crime is breaking out all over the place and if more than eight misdemeanours are happening simultaneously you get fired. For a Judge that's a fate worse than death.

Having selected a crime, the scene changes to a Dan Dare-esque representation of City Blocks, Megacity One and the Under City.

Most crimes occur high in the blocks but you'll need to cross the Megacity walkways and may sometimes be forced to venture down into the Under City where danger lurks in every crumbling corner. Dredd has to run around leaping between the walkways or leaping into lifts seeking out the crime and arresting or wasting the participants.

The representation of Megacity is reasonable but definitely less shabby than the real thing - it all looks so clean. I like the views of distant grim tower blocks though...

Dredd may have to deal with other problems on his way to a crime. These are in keeping with the comic so full marks for authenticity. There are the Garbage Crinders into which it is a bad idea to fall. Sudden patches of ice send Dredd into an uncontrollable skid. Conveyor belts convey him - usually into something bad...

In other places parts of the platforms and walkways between the city blocks may collapse and then there are the patches of alien seed that will grab hold of your boots and slow you up.

More animated obstacles include Maintenance Robots which get in the way. Satellats and Robo Hounds which will take pot shots at you if they can. Under City dwellers and Perps are also out for blood but are marginally (maybe) less dangerous. The remaining problem is passers by - innocent bystanders get in the way a lot and basically it's not a good idea to kill them although you don't lose serious points for it and actually it's quite a lot of fun blasting them.

Which brings us to Dredd's own special ways of dispensing justice.

You have three attack options. You can elect to fire a warning shot - a speech bubble saying either 'Halt' or 'Blam' will appear. 'Halt' is OK but 'Blam' is not a very Dreddish word. If Dredd is close to another person the Fire button press is interpreted as a punch - it does as much damage as firing but looks funnier. The battle between Dredd and an escaping Perp is sometimes highly fraught - each successful hit only reduces the Perps stamina level - some Perps have a stamina level greater than yours - and they will certainly fire back. This is one of the really good things about Dredd - the fights are genuine fights.

Graphically I rate the game (a pre-production version I should stress) as pretty close to Dan Dare in style.

As a recreation of the style of the comic book it's really not bad at all though - in the end it comes down to a lot of continuous tension and gung-ho shoot-'em-outs (not ups).

It's retained a certain portion of the black humour to be found in the original comic book and for that let's give thanks. We haven't stuck any sort of rating on it because the Spectrum version wasn't close enough to completion... but it's looking very promising.