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Psygnosis asks the games-buying public to get on their bike. David Upchurch, who fancies something big throbbing between his legs, duly complies...

You can't deny that there's something very glamorous about a motorbike. Imagine it: burning down the desolate highway on your black and chrome missile, wind tussling through your slicked-back hair, leather jacket and sunshades glinting in the desert sunlight and, natch, a gorgeous blonde babe riding pillion.

Sexy, eh? Trouble is, while the image is appealing the reality is not. Decent bikes are so expensive - chances are I'd end up with one of those laughable little putt-putt machines so beloved of the fifty-year-old blokes who wear those white helmets that make their heads look like giant lightbulbs. And with my shaky road-manoeuvring prowess I'd probably end up skidding along the M1 at eighty miles per hour on my face before you could say "skin graft".

Which is why I'm always pleased when a game like Red Zone comes along. It allows me to indulge in my most adrenalin-pumping fantasies without leaving an unfortunate red smear on the tarmac or, at very least, a brown one in my underpants.

Red Zone is the latest game from Dan Gallagher, he of Ocean's Voyager and Psyggy's Infestation fame. It's a sort of Formula One Grand Prix on bikes. However, where the MicroProse game had huge depth and rigorous attention to detail, Psygnosis has an exhilarating turn of speed and super-responsive control. Those who like their racing games hard, fast and easy to get into need look no further.

It's usually the graphics that everybody notices first about a game but with Red Zone it's the sound - the bike's growling engine noise is just perfect. Which is not to say that the graphics are lacking at all. With all the detail turned on the ten international tracks look superb and the 3D update is still surprisingly swift.

However, there's little doubt that most players will soon sacrifice the game's aesthetic frills in the name of even more speed, reducing the courses to little more than a blur of crash barriers. And blur is the right word because Red Zone is fast, very fast. The good news here is that the player's sensitive-yet-not-too-much-so control over his bike allows him take full advantage of the game's wonderfully-exhilarating turn of speed, permitting much break-neck cornering and straights burning. Even changing gears is easy!

If I were a serious bike fanatic I could quibble over several aspects of the game, such as the fact that the ten courses are modelled on Grand Prix circults, that there's little authentic league structuring and that there's no opportunity for you to tune or refine your bike's performance, but I'm not so I won't.

Although seriously lacking depth, Red Zone is quite simply the most exciting bike-racing game yet. If you hunger for high-speed thrills then Red Zone is the game for you.