After seventeen years of presumably slow development or being shelved for a long time, Antonino Scala has released a simple-but-fun scrolling platform game for the Commodore 16 and Plus/4 called Galli. The object is to guide a feathered-like upright (which could be based on the 1986 movie Howard The Duck) around a almost Mario Bros-alike scrolling world to collect the coins, diamonds and other valuables.

There are no roamers to speak of, at least not in the way that they appear in the aforementioned revered Nintendo classic. However, two meanies patrol above you, which will deplete your energy on contact, with the object being to collect as much as you can in the time limit provided. This is a rather simple concept, but one that may be addictive, and a public release should appear soon (hopefully by the time you're reading this). To find out more, head over to plus4world.powweb.com/software/Galli.

There's a new version of Namco's hit game Pac-Man available for the Atari XE/XL. If you don't remember, Pac-Man was released into the arcades in 1980. The game stars an animated pizza base whose sole task it is to roam around a maze-like environment while consuming all the pills therein. Occasionally, fruit will appear at the starting point of the play area, which add bonus points, and there are four ghostly figures (that actually aren't scary), which will chase you down to entrap you in a corner or something equally as sinister. The only way to preserve your lives is to either skilfully avoid the said nasties, or to use the power pills, which turn all of the roamers blue, which then can be chomped, sending them back to their point of origin to regenerate.

This should all sound pretty familiar to you, and this new version, written by AtariAge (www.atartage.com) forumite Tep392 has used much of the Ms. Pac-Man code to create a framework on which to build. There are several tweaks to the game engine and program, but basically it's the same game that we all know, and that most of us love. For the full story, point your web browser at tinyurl.com/Pac-Man-XEXL, and if you want to follow this development and leave feedback, sign up to the AtariAge forums - they're a friendly bunch!

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The Spanish-based Sinclair ZX Spectrum development group The Mojon Twins has released a sly tribute to Atari Games' 1985 arcade classic Gauntlet in the form of Maritrini: Freelance Monster Slayer, for the 128K machines.

The game tells the story of a mid-30s blonde female, a once famous TV star who has fallen from fame, to setting up her own business and then into a temporary alcoholic slump. As it turns out, her main line of business, monster slaying, was actually in need when her former boss had his only daughter kidnapped by an evil organisation that performs evil experiments on humankind, turning its victims into genetically modified monsters.

Your task is to guide our armed heroine to the headquarters of the said malevolent group, taking out the mutated beings as you go, in the hopes of rescuing the recently kidnapped soles, freeing them from a dreadful fate in the process. To get this free download, head over to tinyurl.com/MonsterSlayerSpec

That's it for this week, see you next time.