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Oscar Wilde called fox hunting "the unspeakable in pursuit of the uneatable" and if, like me, you agree then Foxx Fights Back might gladden you a little. It's a game that should appeal to all those people who would like to give clubs to seals and peopleskin coats to mink and leopards. It's also a lot of fun.

In Foxx Fights Back, we follow the routine life of Mr. Foxx, a member of the vulpine race who has to take all kinds of stick above ground from the local wildlife and below ground from his demanding vixstress. Foxx Fights Back gains full marks for animal rights cred but falls down a little on its sexism. No matter for Mr. Foxx has had just about enough. His four-legged spouse sends him out for some food and he's attacked by bomb-throwing squirrels, beagles on bikes (shouldn't they be smoking cigarettes somewhere?) and rock-throwing badgers (who should know better). So ignoring the firearms amnesty, he turns the tables on the whole miserable lot by blowing away anything that hinders his foraging.

That I suppose boils it down to a collectable shoot-'em-up, but Mediagenic can relax because it looks nothing like R-Type. The screen scrolls left and right and Mr. Foxx can jump and run through its various stages looking for tasty bunnies below ground or chickens sitting waiting to be eaten in their coop. There are collectable items in the shape of apples, pies and sausages which you take back to the wife. Both kinds restore stamina to a flagging fox.

Weapons can be picked up in the shape of shotguns and grenades to make fighting off the malicious wildlife a bit easier and an extra life can be obtained by finding a huntsman's horn. Dying sends you back to the beginning of that particular section of what is a pretty large playing area.

Foxx Fights Back is fun to play and pretty good to look at too. It's a Denton Designs game, surprisingly, and although it doesn't have the kind of depth of many of their previous efforts, it's by no means a bimbo program. The graphics are colourful but cute, whilst Mr. Foxx leaps and bounds in smoothly executed animation. Sound too is excellent with some good effects and some jolly classical renditions.

All in all, it's a polished game but it just lacks that certain something to warm the heart of a real hunt saboteur.