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Why do I get all the puzzle games? This latest effort involves less mental dexterity and strategic thinking than most, and is in fact little more than a particularly nasty kind of memory tester. A pattern of various shapes appears on a 5 x 5 grid for sixty seconds, and you have to memorise it before it disappears. Random shapes then fall from the sky, and you and your opponent (computer or human) have to run around madly in a battle to grab the pieces and slot them into the correct positions on their respective grids. Various embellishments (training mode, placing bets on the outcome, assorted special blocks and so on) have been added in a rather desperate attempt to give proceedings a touch of added depth, but the basic nature of the gameplay is still extremely simple.

When you actually get down to playing, however, matters are complicated by the fact that many of the blocks are very similar in shape and colouring, and by the uncomfortable balance between ridiculously easy levels and stupidly complex ones that you average human being will get hopelessly lost in (especially in two-player mode - at least against the computer you can watch your opponent and copy him if you're stuck). When confronted with such a screen, my guess is that most people's reaction is likely to be "Oh God, I just can't be bothered with this."

Making things horribly difficult is all very well, but if you don't also make them reasonably entertaining, there's no incentive for anyone to carry on torturing themselves for no reward. Brain Blasters more or less completely fails to provide any such entertainment value, so all you're left with is an unpleasant and depressing way in which to waste a few empty hours of your presumably valuable time. The metallic graphics are too clever for their own good, and don't help any (in a game like this, it's primary colours or nothing as far as I'm concerned), and generally the whole thing is a dull and pointless waste of time and money.

Try memorising the phone book instead of buying this. You'll get much the same experience for far less money.