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A perilous voyage down the River of No Return awaits you in this testing game converted from the VCS system.

You don't go in a boat. Oh no. You have a powerful jet-fighter blasting just about everything in your path, which, as we all know, can be a very enjoyable pastime.

The game is in effect a 3D shoot-'em-up with vertical scrolling of great smoothness and has certain affinities with Scramble. But your view is from above and the skill lies in lateral rather than vertical movement.

At the beginning of the game hazards encountered on the river itself include battleships, helicopters and balloons, all moving from side to side. You can either destroy them with a burst of missile fire or avoid them by banking left or right - a very realistic game-feature.

Naturally, you must also refuel. This is accomplished by passing over the fuel depots scattered along the river. The slower you move over them, the more fuel you take on board.

After you've blasted your way through a few bridges, the going gets pretty tough: enemy fighters foul up your flight path, everything moves much more quickly and the river becomes fiendishly narrow.

River Raid's graphics are colourful and exceptionally smooth making a shoot-'em-up of superior quality. It'll take a good few missions before you'll get through to bridge 50.