BBC Games are increasingly available for the Electron. Bob Chappell peruses a few of the best

Conflict among the stars is the theme of this impressive perspective space battle. From the cockpit of your interceptor, you have a wide-angled view of the galaxy. Slap in the middle of the star-spangled sky is your yellow cross-sight with which you take a bead on the attacking aliens that scud around this part of the galaxy.

Though you don't travel forward to meet the enemy, your view of the action can be shifted by turning your craft to the left or right, and by climbing up or down. The heavens shift swiftly and silkily around in response to the controls. Somewhere out there is a yellow mother ship - line up your sights on it (but don't shoot!) and it appears to move rapidly towards you for docking and vital refuelling. But you're wide open to attack from the enemy.

To help you track down the four different types of alien craft, a radar device at the top of the screen displays all movement in the near vicinity. When in view, your antagonists hurtle towards you, launching chunky rockets as they loom even larger. When you receive a direct hit, electronic explosions rend the air and the screen turns red and shakes alarmingly. You can strike back with twin lasers that head unerringly for the spot where your cross-sight was when you pushed the button.

Beautifully smooth action, good perspective views and zappy space sounds result in an excellent game of galactic dogfighting.

And now for something far more relaxing - unless, that is, one-armed bandits have a worse effect on your adrenalin flow than cosmic guerrillas.

Here you play an addictive fruit machine with neither the discomfort of a noisy, crowded arcade nor the pain of losing real, live money. On the other hand, since you can't win real live money, your heart doesn't exactly do a triple somersault when you hit the jackpot.

Nevertheless, this is a very good simulation. It is a three-barrelled machine, with three pictures displayed per reel at any one time. The line on which winnings are paid out is the bottom one, rather than the more traditional middle row. The pictures include attractively drawn fruit (cherries, plums, melons and so on) along with bells and the trade logos of the BBC and Superior Software.

There are a few simple sound effects, and playing features include hold, gamble and nudge, the latter requiring a pretty nifty bit of keying if you're to hit the big time. You start with 20 credits - if that runs out, game over and you start afresh.

A superior gambling simulation and a painless way to learn that the machine always wins in the end.

Back to pitting your many wits against something that is after more than your money. To lull you into a peaceful frame of mind before proceeding to hammer the living daylights out of you, this game plays classical music while it loads into the main program.

Set in a haunted house, this is a sort of Manic Miner with ghosts. A series of platforms must be scaled by a little yellow dumpling on legs. Right at the top is a box of jewels which you must reach before you can progress. Along the platforms are various edible yellow dots to boost your score while deadly spikes, moving ghouls and bouncing spiders boost your blood pressure.

Gobbling up the single stray Power Jewel sends the ghouls off for tea for about 15 seconds. Other difficulties include gaps in the platforms (you turn into custard if you fall), contracting floorboards, moving platforms, and giant springs. There are four different screens - Spectre's Lair, Horrid Hall, Spider's Parlour and Death Tower.

Your little character moves fast, running and jumping left and right. Controlling him via the keyboard requires skill - there's no joystick option.

The game has some superb sound effects - delightfully ghoulish - with good graphics and fast and varied play. It provides a real challenge and is likely to maintain its lasting appeal.

More soothing, but no less challenging, is this test of your knowledge of familiar or obscure world capitals.

You may elect to name capital cities with an option, for those who really know their stuff, to say how big each country's population is - are you that clever?

Filling most of the screen is a neatly drawn, simplified map of the world which stays on screen all the time. The questions and answers are dealt with in the lower part of the screen. When a question is put, a flashing blob illuminates the position on the map. There are eight categories of difficulty, the questions ranging from 'What is the capital of France?' to 'What is the capital of Tuvalu?' (the answer is Funafuti - as Michael Caine might say, not many people know that). Capital entertainment.