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Three-dimensional games just don't seem to have caught on as well as some others. Most people apparently prefer to see their targets moving down or across the screen, rather than hurtling towards them in increasing size as they do in Star Jammer, a new battle game from Salamander.

The aim of the game is to stop the alien ships from a distant galaxy reaching the colonised planets of your own federation... or to put it another way, zapping and high-scoring.

Star Jammer is the name of your ship. The game itself comes in Salamander's usual sturdy plastic wallet, complete with instruction leaflet, though this is scarcely needed as the proverbial log. My copy loaded first time every time.

Your sights are fixed in the centre of the high-resolution screen. Stars and space debris float towards and around you. From time to time you'll see a green or purple object in the distance. By using the joystick you must steer this into your sights and blast it with your cannon ('the very latest type', it says, so Salamander obviously spares no expense.)

As the alien ships approach, they turn into one of several varieties, from the common 50-point 'H'-wing to the infrequent 1,000-point Commander, but they all have to suffer the same fate as you head for the targets of 10,000 and 50,000 points and your reward of an extra life. I'll have to take that on trust, I'm afraid, as my entries in the high-score top ten at the end are strictly between me and my Dragon.

Occasionally you'll approach a Stargate, and be drawn through the whirlpool-like phenomenon into the next quadrant of the galaxy, while having your energy replenished at the same time.

You have three lives, and if the enemy ship gets close enough to fill the screen you're going to lose one of them. Sound was a little disappointing, with unexciting little shrills and bleeps, and only a siren when your ship is wiped out.

The game is pleasing on the eye in colour, but it is set against a pale rather than the usual black background, so I wouldn't recommend it to those with just a black-and-white set. They'd find it tricky to pick out the aliens.

This isn't a game to set the world alight, and it lacks the simple "Clear the screen" challenge of most games, but Star Jammer is reasonably fast for Basic, and requires a fair amount of dexterity with the joystick. It shouldn't disappoint buyers.