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Ever fancied causing death and destruction across the world? Think you could antagonise global leaders to such an extent that nuclear war would be the only way of saving face? Reckon you could wipe out the enemy before he gets you? Wait a minute though, after all the damage caused to the planet by exploding megaton warheads, even if you win you lose. Ah, who cares? Blast 'em anyway!

After choosing four adversaries from a selection of ten Global Leaders, you each take turns carrying out certain actions in a bid to be the survivor of nuclear war. The limited actions available include building weapons, defending your country, conducting propaganda campaigns on enemy countries to increase your population and dispatching missiles or bombers to destroy enemies (this takes two turns). When all participants have completed their actions, the results are shown in an almost humorous, animated, graphical display.

All countries are made up of cities, their population size indicated by an icon: a tent is a small city, a high-rise block is large. The larger a country's population, the faster it can build weapons and the more attacks it can take.

Enemies' attitudes toward you change depending on your actions - they don't usually take kindly to having their cities razed to the ground - and how you feel towards them. Trying to keep them tolerant of you is a good way of not being blasted from all sides before you can build up a decent arsenal.

Once all cities in a country have been destroyed, that country makes a final all-out assault on its enemies until its weapons are spent. Should you be the first country to fall, the remaining four go through their actions at an incredible speed until only one remains. The game-end screen is a very nice graphic of a desolate area with the victorious leader jumping up and dwn shouting "I won, I won!"

Nuclear War is easy to get into and warrants a few attempts at becoming leader of a dead world, but its simple gameplay, limited strategies and unimpressive (though nearly humorous) graphics render it poor value for money.