A rather disappointing collection of arcade favourites including ThunderBlade and OutRun.

One thing that is correct about this compilation is the misleading packaging. US Gold boldly claim that Coin-Op Hits is "a collection of five of the best selling arcade games of all time". That in itself is quite fair. OutRun, Spy Hunter, Thunder Blade, Road Blasters and Bionic Commando all have achieved great arcade success.

Unfortunately, converting them onto the CPC in the way US Gold has done is a mistake. The CPC conversions are either years old or have just been badly programmed... or both.

I remember seeing these games a few years ago and thinking that there was no way they could ever be released as budget games or as part of a compilation. Sadly US Gold has chosen to release a compilation of some of the worst coin-op conversions ever produced for the CPC.

OutRun has you situated in a Ferrari Testarossa. Unfortunately as you start your driving there isn't much to do, the game plays slowly and the backdrops look very basic and rather dull. Spy Hunter is a car shoot-'em-up with you in a car scrolling upwards avoiding various obstacles and shooting anything that moves. Way back in 1985 this was just about alright, but today it looks less than impressive and the graphics are not even properly defined. ThunderBlade gives you the chance to fly a helicopter and blast to death everything and anything that moves. If it moves, shoot it. Unfortunately for ThunderBlade freaks, there was no way to move the helicopter forwards, at least not in the version I played. All you could do was go left and right and up and down.

Well, for about three or four minutes this might be fun, but after a while it does get a trifle boring.

Road Blasters looks and plays fairly well. It is OutRun with lots more violence thrown in. Knocking people off the road or shooting them is the aim of the game. This sustained my interest for quite a while, combining fast actions with some nice backdrops.

The final game on the compilation is Bionic Commando. Here you can leap, run, jump and, of course, shoot things to pieces. Again, this was just about acceptable and did sustain some interest but after a while there is only so much leaping around and killing a person can do before they get rather bored of the whole affair.

Coin-Op Hits is boring, the games represent nothing new or exciting, I had no urge to play them beyond bedtime. I am surprised that US Gold should have lowered themselves to bring out this compilation. It is fair to assume that on most compilations you get one or two duff titles, but when it is five bad titles out of five then there must be something seriously wrong.

Compilation games normally represent some form of value for money, but when they consist of generally appalling games which have no lasting interest then they are of no value whatsoever.

Maybe if Coin-Op Hits cost a couple of pounds, then US Gold could justify it as a release. Maybe.