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Looking into the future, Virgin Games have produced a training simulation for shuttle pilots and indeed anyone interested in a career in space. The game brings realism into what is for most of use still a fantasy world.

The screen layout and colour is very good. You are sitting at the controls of a shuttle or similar ship and all the information about your descent is displayed on the panels in front of you. There is also a monitor which shows how your craft is aligning itself.

It is essential to keep on course and to correct any sideways drift with the altitude jets which are controlled with the cursor keys. Rate of descent is determined by the choice of thrustor power (function keys 0 to 9) and a nice touch is the way the ship revs up through the thrusters until it reaches your choice.

The descent needs very careful handling indeed, finely balancing velocity, altitude, thrust and fuel in order not to overheat. Overheating is well worth seeing however as everything gets out of control and your cabin becomes white hot.

The program certainly doesn't pull its punches when you actually avoid overheating and merely crash. It gleefully tells you how many kilometers off target you were on impact. One slight disappointment when the crash came was the way in which the monitor seemed to crack like a piece of glass and that was all. However, the game as a whole is great fun, and offers something we all like - a challenge.