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Microbe is an excellent, and fast, game. It is the first game from Virgin that I've been really impressed by, and I'm still spending far too much time playing it.

You have managed to find your way inside a huge alien. You are the microbe of the title. Your aim is to destroy the alien from the inside. This is of course impossible as the defences of the alien's inner reaches and its various parasites are intent on destroying you, but I am addicted to trying...

Playing the game depends to a certain extent on how fast you can keep pressing the spacebar. That's what you use for firing, and firing is the only way to stay alive.

The microbe appears as a large and brightly coloured hornet type figure. Not that I've ever seen a micro-organism this shape, but if it's fun - who cares? It is attacked by antibodies, red blood cells, amino acids and spores, and you control the microbe across the bottom of the screen with keyboard or joystick.

You do have the option of rising up into the middle of the screen, but it seems like suicide, since you can only fire forwards.

Although it's just another variant on the old space-invaders theme, it really did get me going. It's possibly partly to do with the speed of the game. The microbe fires as often as you press the spacebar, and there doesn't seem to be any limit to the game's speed.

One small criticism is that once you've got to about the 10,000 point mark (and that's not easy) the game just starts repeating. Even so it's never very long before you've been hit. And it certainly gets the adrenalin racing, and the wrist and fingers aching too. It strikes me that if the game was played too much then it might damage the keyboard, although I never had the opportunity to find out what it might do to a joystick.

The usual impeccable Virgin instructions, and an interesting biographical note on the programmer, accompany the program and the usual "Join the Virgin Games Gang" offer.

Microbe is wonderful. Apart from some initial loading difficulties (in the end I succeeded with the B side where I'd failed with the A), the game is a great example of what can be done on the BBC. I'm addicted.