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Perhaps you can remember It's A Knockout. It's A Knockout, or Jeux Sans Frontieres, was a medium popular TV programme in the mid-70s, where various teams from various European countries took part in farcical competitions. A bit like the Eurovision Song Contest, but intentionally funny.

There were all manner of ribtickling races. In general everyone competed at once on each, but the marathon was just one team at a time. GB used to have a private competition with the Belgians as to who would come last most times - we even lost that one.

If it was ont' telly today it would be a natural for a computer game, Ocean must have thought. Ah well, if they can have WWII simulators then we can have It's A Knockout. And here it jolly well is, in the style of Dirty Tonsils Supertaste and other fine Oceanic offerings.

Take your joysticks for the first merry jape. The Flying Flans is born from the best slapstick tradition. Two guys on the other side of a wall take turns in throwing flans at you using a mallet and a seesaw.

You're carrying a tray on which to catch the catapulted custard and once the quiche is quaught you have to dump it to one side. If you miss any- and you will - the floor underfoot becomes awash with albumen. Ever tried running on flans?

Once you've wiped down your messy metatarsals after that little delight, have a go at Harlem Hoppers. Spherical objects are rolled down a camel's back towards you, and they have to be caught.

Just in case that's too simple, you're attached at the waist to a large elastic band which pulls you backwards. And once again, the floor is slippery. Something to do with the camel perhaps.

And then, appropriately for Ocean, there's the Titanic Drop (take it as you will, guys ...) . This exciting compo involves sliding down a rope from the ill-starred liner into one of four lifebelts. They're colour-coded as to their pointworthiness.

Feeling chicken yet? Good. Now try the Diet of Worms. No longer the funniest date in history, you guide a fowl around a field. On this lie a number of worms and you have to get as many as possible into a tray at the bottom of the screen.

Penultimately (Penoceanicly?) there's the Obstacle Race. A firm favourite with It's A Knockout of old, you race down a track attempting to miss various obstacles. You mean you guessed from the title? The computer races an opponent against you - keep up with him to keep in the points.

The Marathon is the Bronte Bash. This scales the wuthering heights of freaky funambulation. Armed with a crane, your mission is to drop a heavy weight on to the bonce# of various dinosaurs that pop out of holes in front of you. No wonder they became extinct - there wasn't any paracetemol in those days.

Up to six players can battle it out at once - any unfilled places are taken by the computer, which merely announces the scores. After each race, the contestants are awarded from one to six points according to where they came in the grander scheme of things.

Does Britain still come last? Is it still a tossup between the deft Dutch and the grim Germans for first place. Only you can tell...

It's A Cop Out is an attempt to take a bunch of very naff games which would get laughed out of the worst budget range and compile them with a famous name. Once you've got a name the buyers in the big stores look no further. Boy are they fickle.

The Mode 0 graphics are the worst I've seen in quite a while with no attempt at shading. The animation is average and the games all boring. I've seen it all before and didn't enjoy it then.

Hehehe, haw, haw, haw, This heeeeeeeeeee, game fro... hohoho from oooh, Ocean is as irksome as the commentary in the real thing. It thinks it is funny and is similarly wrong.

If you think that a girl from Huddersfield dressed up as a rubber penguin with six foot, flippers is amusing then you might also think that waggling a joystick a million times while trying to avoid chunky beachball sprites is a seventh heaven. I don't.

Here's a blast from the past. Continental cavortings, yet. I played it through once, and I don't think I'll do it again.

But it could be one of that rare breed, the computer party game. The animations are OK (how many times have I said that...), and the humour excites a few titters, but the novelty soon wears off, Most of the games go on far too long, and in the obstacle race I put the joystick down in ennui well before the denouement.

Perhaps it needs more players, but the computer printing up the scores at the end of each bout is done with all the panache of a fishmonger filleting his fiftieth flounder on a Friday. Now what it needs is a digitised Eddie Waring going over the top.