Quite a while ago I bought Boulder Crash from Blaby Computer Games and soon afterwards won a copy of Stone Raider 2 in a competition. These turned out to be virtually the same game, although myself and my two sons preferred the Blaby version. For those of you who do not know these games, the idea is to collect diamonds from around the screen of which you can only see a small part at any one time. When you have collected a set number you can then go through the Exit to the next screen. Boulders fall when you remove the earth under them, and these can crush you if you are not careful. On some screens you need to drop the boulders onto the Flappers who chase you to turn them into diamonds, although this does not work with the Ghosties. Beware also of the Slime which grows and tries to engulf you. Power is also available at certain places, and this can be fired at pursuing creatures.

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Boulder Crash 2 is a screen editor for the Original so you will need both programs before you can start designing your own screens. The instructions tell you to CLOADM the the 'kit' program from Side B and that this will then copy and compile the original taking about 15 minutes, but this is a 'once only' task. I cannot comment on the ease of the compiling as this review copy was already done for me. When the revised program is loaded, there are two extra options from the main menu. Pressing E takes you to the Screen Editor and X allows you to select infinite lives or any number from 1 to 100. Extra screens can also be loaded from Paul 'stapes, and I will comment on these later.

When I first saw the Editing screen, I nearly gave up as the graphics are abysmal but forget about that, as once you go back to playing mode everything appears exactly the same as in Boulder Crash. I have tried several of these 'edit your own screen' ideas and I must admit that this is about the best I have seen, although it is not really my cup of tea. The instruction sheet that I received as very comprehensive, and it is possible to design your own screen and play on it within a very few minutes, but do not press reset if you are trapped somewhere, as you will lose everything, as I soon found out (I promise to read the instructions next time!)

Back to the extra screen provided with the program. On the whole they are very good, although several times my young seven-year-old has trapped himself between two walls and two boulders, and we have had to wait for the time to run out before we could start again due to not being able to reset. Still, I must admit that Paul Burgin's screens are certainly better than mine, which are either too easy or just plain impossible. Any screen you devise yourself can be saved out to tape so that you can play again whenever you wish, and there is also a built-in verify facility to ensure that they have been saved properly. The keys used in the edit mode are very logical. For instance, D is for diamond, W is for wall and SPACE is for a space.

To sum up, if you liked Boulder Crash and would like more screens or would like to design your own then I can recommend it. If you have not seen the original then contact R. & A. J. Preston and you could very soon be buying this one as well. If the price were under £3.50 I would give it four dragons, but as Boulder Crash is not new I will give it three.