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When university student Colin Chapman built the first Lotus in 1947, using a rickety 1937 Austin, I wonder if he could have foreseen his future sports cars appearing on the Amiga. A stirring thought perhaps, but just how good is the new generation Lotus from Gremlin?

Lotus III, like its predecessors, presents the action from a second-person 3D perspective. Getting started is based around an easy-to-use menu with which otus I and II fans will also be familiar. With a choice of one or two players, and the four-player link option (two machines must be connected) it's definitely a multi-player game, and on the surface it does look to offer all the scope and playability of its forebears.

A first spin also reveals a familiar control system. It follows the straightforward Lotus formula, allowing manual or automatic gears, with fire button or joystick-operated acceleration.

As far as game structure is concerned you must choose whether to race against time or race for position against other cars. Next choose your difficulty setting, from the three provided.

It's then time to get stuck into the track editor, to plan a course of your own. Here you can decide the overall level of difficulty, and the degree of curves, hills, steepness or obstacles on your course. All are measured as a perentage. Simply select the feature (course detail, for instance), then decrease or increase the perentage using the joystick. Now go to the icons at the bottom of the course editor screen.

These enable you to select the course type, including all the styles from Lotus II plus several new ones, including windy, future world and mountain tricks.

Lotus III brings your vehicle variety too, with a choice of the new M200, the Esprit Turbo SE or the Elan SE. After choosing a race car, select an audio track from the CD screen. There are six different tacky tunes, but to be honest you're better off sticking to sound effects.

So how does Lotus III handle - does it pass the Amiga Power speed test? As a fan of Lotus I, I feel that something is definitely missing. Lotus III just doesn't have the sheer hellbound speed of its parent game. It's even slower than Lotus II - there's no longer that feeling of being on the edge, so perfectly captured by Lotus I. Controllability just isn't as smooth as in the first Lotus game. It doesn't feel or handle as smoothly, and its stop-start tendencies can be more than just frustrating, especially on the two-player game where things get distinctly jerky.

In a world of ever-increasing standards, it's not surprising that someone else did take the Lotus I formula one step further. Crazy Cars 3 creams Lotus for sheer speed, handling, thrills and excitement. In fact, after the bellowing of Crazy Cars 3's throaty engine, Lotus III no only sounds but feels like a vacuum cleaner. AS you accelerate into a race, this sluggishness soon becomes apparent. The other cars are clearly not there to race you, but get in your way. When you attempt to overtake, they block your path. Your car responds by decelerating, allowing your opponents to accelerate away while others overtake you. Your car must now go through all the gears again to regain race pace - this is frustrating when you've worked your way up into the top five positions. In Lotus I your car only slows down if you actually crash.

Unfortunately, Lotus III follows Lotus II along the no-crash philosophy. Although a crash meant it did take time to get going again, I'd rather see the crashes and speed of Lotus I. So, yes, at first glance Lotus III does look slick, but after 10 minutes play, slick is exactly what it isn't.

The course editor is an innovative addition to the Lotus package (in fact, it's the crucial one as far as this product is concerned - Gremlin wouldn't sell many copies if this was just a rewrite of Lotus II with a few extra tracks) and would seem to make up some of the flaws in the actual game. That is, until you decide to put this new addition to the text. While it initially appears that the system gives access to an almost infinite number of tracks, it soon becomes apparent that it's impossible truly to tailor a track to your requirements. After all, mucking about with percentages isn't going to enable you to fine tune that bend, or add that steep hill at a certain position.

The course designer doesn't so much give you an opportunity to design your own courses, as have a vague hand in the random creation of a course. I know Gremlin have pointed out that their 'RECS' thing is fast and easy, with the advantage of codes for each track, but what's the point in having a track designer if it doesn't allow you design?

As far as climatic effects and terrain variety are concerned, Lotus III is still top of the class. The graphically gorgeous animation of snow, thunder storm and log conditions are still there from Lotus II, and Lotus groupies will recognise other elements such as the desert and motorway - its juggernauts and the chance to play chicken on the opposite carriageway are still there.

The roadworks section has been improved, but opponents smash through barriers, their speed unaffected, while you lose big chunks of speed if there's so much as one scrape on a 'keep right' sign.

There's no getting away from the gorgeous backgrounds and graphic brilliance, but then who would invest in a Lotus for the scenic route to anywhere? Not me, that's for sure - speed is the name of my game, judging by the amount of tickets littering my passenger seat. I want thrills, I want a sensation of speed. Lotus III fails to give you that. And if you can't go like a bat out of hell on your Amiga, where can you do it? It's no disgrace, but the time of Lotus has passed.

Uppers: The graphics are gorgeous, highlighted by beautifully crafted climate/terrain effects, with plenty of scope and variety in the multi-player facility and track editor.

Downers: Gone are the smoothness, speed and excitement of Lotus I, and what use is a track editor in a race game with no speed?

Lotus III turned up showing all the potential of a speed animal, but when I put my foot down it felt more like the engine of a Skoda. The track designer makes it worthwhile, but really, Lotus has been surpassed by the likes of Crazy Cars 3, and no amount of extra features will change that.