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Hold on to your hat, honey, Clur's going to take you for a buzz around the block to see what's new in the realm of the bumble bee. Watch out, you might get stung!

Talk about environmentally unfriendly! This game is more damaging to our natural wildlife than a nuclear power station! More insects hit the dust in one minute than in two hours of Reservoir Dogs, it's a massacre of the most macabre proportions! [We get it, Clur, Bee 52 has an awful lot of killing in it - Ed]. Yep... an awful lot of killing. And although it sounds as if it should be a flight sim, Bee 52 is actually a horizontally scrolling shoot-'em-and-collect-'em-up about a bee with a serious attitude.

The bees run their own honey making business from the security of their hive; a line of work that keeps them quite nicely thank you. The problem is that nearly all of the honey bees have been incapacitated and the only one around to keep the pollen coming in is Bee 52; so our hero has to face the terrors of the outside world on his tod. Luckily, he has the power of killer spit to blast baddies out of the sky. Unfortunately most of the evil gits that are shooting at him have evolved a slight immunity to bee spit, so it takes a good many shots to knock 'em out of the sky. But I digress; killing the enemies isn't the point at all; collecting pollen to make the honey is and don't you forget it. But hey, if a rogue insect gets in your way, what's a bee supposed to do apart from shoot at it?

You'll find pollen tucked away in the depths of the open flowers that are liberally festooned all over the landscape. Each flower only yields a third of a teaspoonful of pollen (that's 1.666ml recurring to all the mathematicians out there), and once it's given that up it closes its petals round its stamen to stop you from getting any more. All of which means that you need to visit another flower to get more pollen. Then, when you've visited three flowers you'll have to head back to the hive to empty your spoon. Every spoonful of pollen you take back to the hive is turning into honey to fill the jar at the bottom right of the screen. When the honey jar is full, the level is finished; it's as simple as that.

Well, it would be simple if it wasn't for all the little buzzin' critters that have made it their mission to get in your way, in fact all the insects that you come across will try to debug you. Some of the insects though, as well as killing you with one touch are bonus bugs; shoot these and all sorts of goodies appear . Look out for smart bombs that act as an enormous squirt of insecticide, destroying all the baddies in sight and keep your eyes peeled for a rapid fire pick-up that gives your trigger-finger a rest for a while. But the best goodie of all to find is the super-stinger; never before has a bee's bottom been listed as a deadly weapon.

The first of the five levels starts off simply enough, with big arrows telling you where to go and with very few baddies shooting at you. But the second level starts with a vengeance, as soon as you come out of your hive there's a big blue nasty waiting for you in the first flower. You need to blast him to get in for the nectar. Beware, though, because another will be back before long to take his place so you'd better get out of there quick.

While you're loading up with pollen and for a few seconds afterwards you're invincible, watch out though because in common with those cheapo bin-liner coats that you buy at Alton Towers when it's raining, it won't last you very long.

The thing about bees and flowers is that they're naturally very bright and colourful, 5o it's not too hard to get a good looking game from the flora and fauna concept. The only problem I had with the graphics was that I couldn't work out what some of the baddies were supposed to be, the brown blobs that zoom up and down the screen occasionally had me completely stumped. But eventually I came to the decision that it was much more fun to blast their brains out without worrying about what genus of insect they were. Shooting them out of the skies is a much more satisfying pursuit. [We're going to get tons of mail from hives of irate insect fans now. That'll certainly keep us buzzy. Thanks, Clur! - Ed]

Not so satisfying is getting through a level, these look so alike that you don't get a feeling of progression. You just meet more baddies on your way through the garden, it might have been better if you could have found yourself in a different scenario. A pantry, buzzing around a country kitchen, or inside the hive?

There are some great intro screens and an adorable animation between levels that would make even the toughest of hard nuts go "ahhh, isn't that sweeeet!" [I'll bet you twenty quid that I would not do anything of the sort! - Ed]. Huh, ignore him. Anyway, there just isn't enough to give Bee 52 the edge, a bit more gameplay is what's needed. Come on lads, just a little bit more effort and you could have had a real flower-power corker.

Graphics 80%
You can't help but be bright with a bee as a star.

Sound 57%
No music and an annoying buzzing noise interspersed with bleeps.

Playability 78%
It looks great and the first level's a piece of cake.

Lastability 57%
There's nothing there to keep you coming back.

Overall 81%