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It would be so good to say something nice about a Quicksilva game for a change. So I will. The music on both versions of this new multi-game game is great. David Whittaker has done a masterly job.

As for the game itself - well, I'm afraid that it wouldn't keep your interest very long even on a rainy Sunday afternoon. Let's take a look at the scenario.

Your objective is to survive a journey through the alien scrap collection system known as The Tube. In order to do this you must plunder the energy from those ships less fortunate than yourself which are stored in the Capture Area ready for the next alien dust cart to collect them. Energy is essential, although your shield will give your ship reasonable protection, energy will be drained whenever shields are used or a collision occurs.

Shields consume energy at an increased rate, so should be used sparingly, until you enter the Capture Area where their activation is automatic.

If, whilst you are in or when you try to enter the Capture Area, your energy levels become insufficient to operate your shields the mission will be instantly terminated.

The Tube comprises eight segments each consisting of three zones, the Transfer Zone, the DMT (Defence Mechanism Tunnel) and the Capture Area, designed to trap even the most skillful of pilots.

The first area is the Transfer Zone, which is designed to capture space vessels, sustain and draw them into the main body of The Tube.

The Transfer Zone is basically a duck shoot game - a cursor type sight has to be lined up on targets. The Commodore version has an interesting "moving window" effect not found on the Speccy game.

This part rapidly gets boring after a couple of games as you always survive it and you begin to wish you could skip directly to the next part of the game, the DMT.

This is an easy Scramble-type game with some distinctly slow scrolling. At the start of each DMT level the shuttle streaks along out of control towards a couple of hazards allowing you to take control just in time to avoid them - then the shuttle waits for the scrolling to catch up!

Next up is the capture area which features a top view Slap Fight type screen. You have to drive your shuttle about in search of other ships to gain energy.

The graphics on the C64 and Spectrum versions strangely don't look very different and some play is similar in both versions.

Overall, The Tube is a mishmash of ideas taken from other games - which is no bad thing if they come together well. In this case I have to say they don't.