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Third time round at producing a MASK game, and Gremlin has more or less junked all the distinctive paraphenalia of the licence, and served us up with what amounts to little more than a bogstandard shoot-'em-up. No more flying cars, armoured trucks or choice of MASK agents; now we get to play only the boss man itself, Matt Tracker in a fetching red jump suit, and quite frankly, he could be anybody.

Similarly, gone is the exhausting James Bond-like scenario, replaced with a simple one line set up - "rescue your son". All of which would seem to add up to the worst game of the trio. Not so.

For all their admirable efforts to be true to the spirit of the toys, neither MASK nor MASK II were particularly impressive games. Average graphics and decidedly slothlike playability do not a hit game make, and it is in these precise areas that Venom Strikes Back scores. It is nice to see programmers realise that it is how well a game plays that should always be the bottom line, even if it is only on the third attempt.

Apparently, none of the MASK vehicles will operate in space, so you as Matt (good name for a hero, that) have to steal a Venom craft in order to reach the moon where your son in held. What this means is that you must bounce your way through a number of levels picking up different Masks that add to your arsenal of weapons. Venom, of course, are well aware of your rescue bid and send a vast array of rockets, missiles, bombs and other nasty things at you. A pretty tough old geezer is old Matt though, because you soon realise he can take a massive number of hits before breaking up into five or six pieces and bouncing along the ground. In fact, you can pretty well ignore the majority of Venom weapons - apart from the big ones that come a couple of times on each level - because you are far more likely to die by timing your jump wrong and landing in the water. Oh yes, I forgot to explain that the Venom base looks for all the world like the Lake District or something, with blue skies, piers and grassy bits. Quite why they want to bother with a moonbase or kidnapping people is beyond me, when they could be spending their time water skiing or lying in the sun.

Yep, that old jumping is quite a tricky one, and takes some learning. Seems the basic idea is to leave it as late as possible each time, in fact on some obstacles to stand in what amounts to thin air, since the backgrounds don't always correspond too well with where ol' Matt can stand, and where he can't. You also get some very short levels that take place in a high tech tunnel system, which aren't a quarter as hard as the outside bits, since there aren't any tricky hops to perform. The only problem here is to get through the missiles quickly, or else you'll miss the Mask that waits at the end and gives you extra weapons. It doesn't hang around for too long!

One of the most useful weapons to grasp is the ability to fly, which you will need to take out of the big homing missile which stands between you and your ride to the moon. Get there, and it's more of the same with a lunar backdrop, though to do so on the pitifully few lives you are given is rather hard. At least there is none of that tedious waiting around through title screens before you can try again, which ruins so many games.

All of the above refers to the Commodore 64 version, which for all its faults and there are plenty, like the over-jolly sound effects, remains one of the most addictive games I've seen on the C64 for quite a while. It's a pity the same does not hold true of the Amstrad, which boasts graphics so different (and inferior) that it could be another game entirely, and which is totally devoid of thrill power.

One to be avoided, I'm afraid, though the Commodore remains superior to many much hyped shoot-'em-ups, and is worth nine ninety nine of anybody's money.

The little monotone sprites seem to be given precious little to do as the number of weapons launched at him seems pitifully small, and the jumping sections, which were what made the game for me on the Commodore are conspicuous by their absence. The Spectrum suffers, though more for the poorer quality of the graphics than in that it is much less playable or anything. There are no plans yet to go 16-bit, and quite right too: it really isn't enough of a game to carry any overblown treatment easily, just a bit of fun on the C64.