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All over the globe, factories are falling into ruin, economies have fallen apart, interest rates are rising, the TV companies are out of business and (worst of all) milk production has come to a standstill. No more Shredded Wheat for you, mate.

So what's behind all this? A band of deadly, virus-like aliens which have infected every part of the planet with their horrible disease, that's what. Pretty nasty, huh? So absolutely, horrendously nasty, in fact, that the combined efforts of the army, the navy, the air force, the fire service, the police, Machoman *and* Postman Pat have been totally liquidised in their attempts to stop it.

Just when you thought that the end of the world was nigh, when everybody thought it was OK to eat lots of cream cakes 'coz they were gonna die tomorrow anyway, a llittle speck became visible in the sky.

Was it a bird? Was it a helicopter? Was it a speck of chocolate on your glasses? Nope, da da daaaaaa - it was Space Harrier. Yeaaah!

With nothing but a laser and a jetpack to his name, he battles through waves of ugly-looking aliens, dodges dangerous missiles, survives end-of-level tussles with great, big, enormous fire-breathing dragons, tries to stop himself from splatting, slap bang into the nearest obstacles, gets his eyebrows singed and still survives.

Some selfless guy, huh?

Not really. He just couldn't face another day without three Shredded Wheat.

I'm not on a diet for nothing you know. If I keep off the doughnuts for long enough, I might actually manage to squeeze my porky loins into one of those snazzy arcade style hydraulic chairs.

Then again, maybe I'll stick to the doughnuts and keep on playing the Amiga version because it's just as good. I'm really impressed at the way they haven't compromised on the full-screen scrolling and the breakneck speed of the 3D action.

If you want a really fast-moving arcade conversion, get your grubby hands on this - it's a lot more fun than a poke in the eye with a pointed stick.

Well, this is a lot better than shoving 50p into a hyraulic machine gadgi and then dying three times before you've even had a chance to stick your bum on the chair.

I reckon, if you're the sort of person who can't even stand losing 2p in the bubble gum machine, this is the conversion for you.

Not only do you get all the entertainment value o brilliantly smooth full-screen scrolling, incredibly breathtaking and mega-fast action, you also get it for the price of 40 goes one of those fancy metal machines you have to wait ages to get a shot at. Bargain or what?

Presentation 52%
Nothing special - title screen with digitised speech and high score table. See The Word for details of a possible hyraulic chair add-on.

Graphics 84%
Fast-moving 3D backgrounds with smooth and clearly defined sprites.

Sound 54%
Warbling in-game tune but very rough speech (nothing like the coin-op).

Hookability 90%
So like the arcade game, it's got instant grab.

Lastability 81%
A pretty simple concept behind all that 3D, so your initial interest might wane.

Overall 85%
A pretty hot conversion of an even hotter arcade machine.