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This is the cartridge-based pyramid hopping game that has built up a large following. As with Frogger, the game is superbly packaged. There are no coloured screenshots in the manual, but you can read the instructions in six different European languages. including English.

Q*bert is a game that I find impossible to play, though adepts seem to have no difficulty. The aim is to bounce Q*Bert, your engaging hero, down the 3D pyramid of cubes, colouring each cube as Q*Bert hits them.

This would be difficult enough in its own right since Q*Bert can be made to leap off the sides or bottom of the pyramid very easily. Jumping off into space is, of course, fatal.

The problem is that joystick control is a little sticky. It is all too easy to leap diagonally left when you meant to leap diagonally right, or down, or up or whatever.

To make a difficult task impossible, there are a number of bouncing 'things' which bound about the pyramid, threatening to snuff out Q*Bert. These include the red and purple balls Coily and Ugg.

A pair of flying discs, one at either side of the screen, will carry Q*Bert back to the top of the pyramid and out of the way of the villains. Leaping onto a disk is the only way to get rid of Cody, since he follows and falls to his doom. A nice touch, if a bit repetitive, is the cartoon voice bubble that Q*Bert gives off whenever he is caught.