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If you read the American computer magazines, the name of Stellar 7 may well be familiar to you. Until recently it's been advertised by the Software Entertainment Company, but now it's been released as part of the Penguin catalogue.

In fact, the box says that the game is copyrighted by the Software Entertainment Company, but the manual says that it is copyrighted to "dynamix". Fortunately you don't have to be a copyright lawyer to play the game.

Arcade fans might recognise the basic formula as deriving from Battlezone, but instead of a tank you are now commanding Earth's most sophisticated fighting machine, The Raven, and must battle through seven star systems to reach your ultimate goal.

Yes, once again it's time to blast everything in sight as you carve your name into the history books, or at least the high-score table. Only the names have been changed to confuse the innocent. The Raven has a few things which the arcade tank didn't have. For example, an invisi-cloak lets you hide from the Arcturan hordes and protonic shields protect you from enemy fire.

Unfortunately, your biphasal thunder cannon only fires two shots per round before it needs reloading. You'd think a civilisation capable of producing the technological wonders of the invisi-cloak could manage better than two shorts per round, wouldn't you?

You also have a gravitic scope (That's it - the square box in the top right hand corner of the screen) to locate your enemies, complete with a zoom lens facility. The two indicators down the right hand side show the shield strength and the energy reserve. Each time you are hit, the shield loses some energy. When the shield is all gone, so are you!

The energy "cistern" doesn't hold much energy but can be replenished at a fuelbay, assuming you can find one. I wonder if the cistern has a plasma ball-cock.

The other word which amuses me in the manual is the "warplink". The idea is that once you've killed enough people in the star system a warplink appears and flying into it causes you to re-materialise in the next system. To put it another way, it's a way of progressing from one level to the next.

I wish they'd hyphenated the word after the first four letters though. I once read it was "war plink" and now I can't see it differently!

If my comments seem a little jaded I'm probably not being entirely fair to Stellar 7. It's as good an example of the genre as I've seen, with excellent 3D wireframe graphics, smooth animation, sound toggle, pause facility and self-destruct mechanism.

Actually, the self-destruct is a little unnecessary with so many different varieties of Arcturan mega menace out to get you. If you've got a friend with a Commodore 64, you can buy a copy of Stellar 7 to share between you. The disc has the Apple version on the back and the Commodore version on the front.

Despite the familiarity of the formula, Stellar 7 is difficult enough to be engrossing. If you're a true arcade fan it doesn't matter whether it's Gir Draxon or Wellington Womble's flagship you have to destroy.