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Five levels of blasting action await the budding pilot in Scramble Spirits, where the task is to remove the threat posed by enemy squadrons by, well, blowing them up.

Starting with only a measly gatling gun and unlimited bombs, drone planes can be collected along the vertically scrolling route which attach themselves to your aircraft and can be used either as extra firepower or smart bombs.

If you manage to reach the end of a stage, a large battle station lies in wait (sometimes guarded by heavy shielding which your fighter first has to disarm). Destroying this craft allows the pilot to land, refuel, resupply and carry on to the next level. After every other stage (there are five in all) is a bouns level; here, you have to fly up the screen and blow up the enemy craft which are displayed as expanded sprites. Killing them all earns a hefty points bonus, while being show down gives you nowt.

The Scramble Spirits coin-op isn't the best shoot-'em-up in the world, so it's no surprise to find that the computer conversion isn't exactly a rip-roarin' bundle of fun either.

The presentation is fine, although I thought the blown-up sprites on the bonus stage were sloppy. The music is tuneful, but doesn't fit the game - how would you like to be flying into almost certain destruction with a tune similar to the theme from the "Love Boat" (a crappy 70s American TV show) blasting into your ears?

Then there's the game itself. Not only has it all been seen before, it isn't particularly brilliant either. I just sat there, mindlessly blasting away, and by the time I came out of a daydream I found that I'd reached the end of level three!

If you want a good vertical scroller with loadsa killing to be done, check out Xenon II instead.

Apart from a drop in sound quality, there are no differences between this and the Amiga version. The same bland, tiresome game rears its unattractive head.

A simple game which works best on this machine, but even so there are much better scrolling shooters available.