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When there's death dealing action on the cards and it involves hi-tech super-death mobiles, there's only one man for the job: Andy Hutchinson - mercenary, plankton specialist and devil's tool

Dear, dear me. If you can believe all these sooth-saying games designers, the future isn't going to be a very nice place to life. According to the crystal ball gazers down at Psygnosis there's going to be a nuclear war in which the vast majority of us are bound to die - but hey, anybody could have predicted that one.

However, things get worse. All the politicians and rich people who sat out the nuclear winter in their sterile little environments have no intention of letting the little people on the outside share in a bit of warmth and synthetic food. So, as you might expect, the little people build a laser cannon.

Your mission in all this? Well, see, you work for the fat cats and must find five pieces to a neutron bomb scattered throughout the nuclear landscape before the little people unleash a large beam of light on your prefabricated hideout. Only problem with this of course is that, in real life, we're all far more likely to be the outsiders yearning for a bit of shelter. Still, on with the game.

Armour Geddon is very much like a futuristic Carrier Command. You control the headquarters of the Sheltered Ones - you know, the rich people. At your command are four departments: Research and development, Intelligence, Equipment and the Stores.

The R&D department enables you to develop and build weapons and vehicles for use in the field. A set number of scientists and engineers can be placed on certain projects, so for instance you've always got a steady supply of rockets and fighters (the two most useful items in the arsenal).

The intelligence section enables you to view a map of the game area and set up waypoint beacons to guide vehicles. This way you can drive a vehicle straight to a particular location without second-guessing from the landscape.

Equipment is one of the most often used sections of HQ. Here vehicles are kitted out with the appropriate technology and then shoved into the lift to be piloted about the landscape. The stores screen in simply a record of what is available for use in the field.

The game comes complete with four saved game positions. This enables you to play the game after the discovery of sections of the bomb. Alternatively you can play from the very beginning, train or set up a two-player modem game.

Up to six vehicles can be under your control at any one time. These are: light tank, heavy tank, hovercraft, helicopter, stealth fighter and stealth bomber. Most useful vehicles are the hovercraft and the stealth fighter because they are both fast, manoeuvrable craft.

Six different kinds of weapon are also available: shells (primarily for the tanks), free-fall bombs (primarily for the bomber), "retarded bomb" rockets, missiles and an all-purpose laser beam. Additionally, beacons, night-sights, flares, drop tanks, cloaking devices, telepods and fuelpods are also available, depending upon the nature of a particular mission.

Each vehicle emerges from the HQ's lift and is then under your control. If you're in an aircraft then you need to taxi to a runway for takeoff; other vehicles can just yomp across country. None of these vehicles is easy to pilot - they all need considerable practice before you're proficient at picking off the enemy.

In combat, the best weapon to have is a missile. This automatically tracks possible targets; keep them in sight for long enough and the missile locks on ready for firing. A successful hit is accompanied by the plane or vehicle blowing up with suitable plumes of smoke.

The enemy's progress can be closely watched from the main 3D map in HQ. Here you can monitor the progress and condition of all of your craft as well as any possible threat from the enemy. In addition, reports on whether or not these craft are being fired upon appear in a messages window.

Psygnosis have a reputation for producing graphically superior games; Armour-Geddon is no exception. As usual, a cinematic opening sequence portrays a portion of the plot of the game, and then you drop into an excellent title screen.

The game-world scrolls about smoothly, even if it is a rather simplistic one. Each vehicle can be viewed from outside at any viewpoint or angle - even from a tower or satellite.

The aircraft are realistic filled vector graphics which move pretty smoothly. The head-up display of each craft is attractive, if crowded. Because of the wealth of information you need to be aware of ay any one time, it can become a bit confusing seeing (for instance) exactly how much fuel you've got.

The headquarters screens where your army of vehicles is managed are pleasing to the eye and functional. The graphics mean that it's easy to allocate resources and kit out your craft.

Sound consists entirely of semi-realistic soundchip noises attempting to sound vaguely helicopter or laser-beamish. Still, with this much graphical data in memory what could you hope for?

After the superlative intro sequence, you almost expect to be let down by the gameplay in Armour-Geddon. You're not. The game has a wonderfully tense feel to it - you know that you're up against it and simply letting loose a silo of missiles isn't going to save the day.

Each craft has a completely different control feel to it. The aircraft particularly aren't easy to fly; drop out of the sky too quickly or overload one and you soon find your bum skidding across the floor with a blazing canopy about your ears.

If you enjoyed Carrier Command, then you'll love this game. There's an ultimate objective to be reached, and lashings and lashings of gameplay to make you want to do it. Armour-geddon a lot of fun out of this game!