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When Acornsoft offered me the chance to drive a modern Formula 3 racing car around the taxing Silverstone circuit I jumped at the chance. As you've guessed, it wasn't quite the real thing, but Acornsoft's latest super-game Revs.

This must be one of the most realistic simulations of a racing car yet devised for a home micro. The screen displays the view you would get sitting in the cockpit of the racing car, with steering wheel and rev-counter immediately in front of you, and the track curving away into the distance. Two keys control the movement of the steering wheel, left or right, two more keys move up or down the gears (Five gears plus reverse), and two more keys provide accelerator and brakes (a joystick can be used instead).

The controls took some getting use to, and I had completed, or attempted to complete, a good many practice laps before I even found fourth and fifth. It's a good job that practice sessions are available. Racing cars are very responsive to the controls and it is only too easy to spin the car off the track into the perimeter fence. Your lap time during practice is recorded and your best lap time displayed on the screen.

The track itself is an accurate representation of the Silverstone circuit and is complete with all the market signs indicating approaching bends, etc. A nice touch here is that if you spin and end up going the wrong way round the circuit, the signs are now all blank, since you're looking at the reverse side, but it does let you know which way you're going!

Once you feel you have mastered the car and familiarised yourself with the course, you can enter the Formula 3 World Championships against such inspiring drivers as Hugh Jengine and Miles Behind. There are three classes of race, from novice to professional, and you can select the duration of the race in laps.

A final practice session is allowed, which determines your position on the starting grid and then the race is away. From then on only your driving skill counts. Nineteen other cars take part and it can be most disconcerting to see faster cars approaching from behind in the wing mirrors and then zooming past and into the distance. With my lack of racing experience I often found it easier to follow another car round a bend to achieve the correct line.

Alas, in my first race I finished last of the twenty entrants, and that's despite taking many 'short cuts' across the corners. This is undoubtedly a classic game from Acornsoft, to follow Aviator and Elite, though whether it will capture the public's imagination we must wait and see. For me, it's back for some more practice before the next race.