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New Sega Megadrive releases have been thin on the ground since it was launched in Japan just before Christmas - but if this new shoot-'em-up is any indication of the quality of software to come, it looks as though the machine has a very bright future ahead of it.

Thunder Force is a techno-blast with five scrolling levels. The twist is that there are three eight-way scrolling bomb-the-base sorties which alternate with two horizontally-scrolling megablast missions.

There are the usual truckload of aliens buzzing about the place, as well as the usual truckload of weapons to shoot them with. Not yer standard power-ups these, though. Exotic armaments such as wave beams, hunter missiles, megaflash or five way shots are what you want, because they kill lots of baddies (and make some rather nice noises too!) Very handy for those b-i-i-i-g end-of-level nasties, particularly that mean mutha of a tank in mission four.

The alien backgrounds and sprites are very well drawn and animated and there's even a bit of parallax scrolling in there. The use of sound is outstanding though, and it's really worth plugging your headphones in for the funky music and raucous spot effects.

In spite of all this, I wasn't completely bowled over by Thunder Force, simply because there isn't quite enough to it. Although it's pretty tough at first, a few days of practice and a bit of jammy flying is all it takes to get through the game. If it had eight levels I'd rave. As it is, I'll coolly say, "Check it out".

A great shoot-'em-up. It's tough, but the appeal is a bit short-lived due to the lack of levels. Expect even better things of the Megadrive very soon.