Continental Circus (Virgin/Mastertronic, £19.99)

Way back in the dim and distant recesses of time, there was a game called Pole Position. It was a racing car game with two gears, a wheel to steer with, and an accelerator pedal. Many racing games in the same vein have appeared since, including the infamous OutRun. Continental Circus is the latest addition.

There are eight courses of increasing difficulty to race around: Brazil, America, France, Monaco, Germany, Spain, Mexico and Japan. Around each there are checkpoints to be reached within a time limit. Fail, and the game ends; succeed and it's on to the next stage of the race. Reach the finishing line and you can continue to the next race track.

Colliding with cars is obviously unhealthy, but you only start smoking (a disgusting habit!) when you collide. A visit to the pits gets your car fixed, but a second impact reduces you to ashes and loses you valuable time.

You have five credits to work your way through the courses, with one lost whenever you run out of time. Losing that final credit brings your game to an end.

Sound effects are good and the music is even better with some short but pleasant tunes. The race course moves towards you at a rapid pace and both scenery and cars are extremely colourful. There are a few nice digi-pics too and each track is shown in detail before the race commences.

One complaint. When your car has exploded after a second collision, you're repositioned in the centre of the track and have to accelerate from zero. Unfortunately, there are still other cars whizzing around the track, and since you can't see what's heading for your rear until a tenth of a second before impact you've got a granny's chance on the M25 of getting out of the way.

Other than that, there are no problems with this fast-and-furious game. Once you've completed every course, you'll probably only play it occasionally, but it's gonna take a long time before you master them all.

Gary Barrett

Continental Circus (Virgin/Mastertronic, £19.99)