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Xcel was originally released as a full price game about a year ago and it didn't exactly set the world alight. However, as a budget title, it's worth a look if you're into shoot-'em-ups. The game has a few bells and whistles attached in the form of some icons, but these don't really shift the emphasis of the game from much other than straightforward alien blasting.

The action takes place on a group of planets which are controlled by Sentinel computers and it's up to you to fly from planet to planet bombing everything in sight in order to return control to the human population. You fly over the scrolling surface of the planets, avoiding trees and other objects in order to blast the computer's control centres, and after each bombing run there's a Galaxians style wave of attacking aliens.

The action isn't as fast and furious as some other shoot-'em-ups, and at times the game looks a little dated, but there are about 300 planetary locations to blast your way through, so at least there's a fair bit of variety in the game. Mind you, I did find it a bit irritating that each time you get killed you have to go right back to the start of a particular sequence (rather than carrying on from where you got killed), which means that you can find yourself going over the same screens over and over again.

Still, the game is nicely presented and at £1.99 is much better value than when it was first released.