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The hooded figure of Saboteur makes his entrance a little late in the day for a spy-style arcade adventure. The games-buying public are on the alert for poor imitation, prepared to catch out the fast buck makers.

They may not be quite quick enough to track down Saboteur. He's pretty slick for a Spectrum conversion. Large, well animated, plenty of flash moves and an atmospheric building to explore.

The task before him is pure hit and run. Infiltrate a high security building and steal a disk with details of rebel leaders contained on it before they are released to security stations. Then make your escape via helicopter.

The odds are stacked against you in the shape of guards and nasty alsatians who snap at your heels, draining your energy constantly.

Neither these or the guards ever kill you outright. They'll chase you relentlessly around, draining your energy. It's fairly easy to escape simply by dodging onto the next screen. If your energy is particularly low pausing will rebuild it to an acceptable level. Don't do this unless it's really necessary because there's a time limit.

In fact, the biggest single enemy is time, ticking away rapidly. You only have minutes to get the disk before the details get released and the rebel cause ends well and truly up against the wall.

As you move around the converted warehouse you'll find various items that can be used to your advantage. The guards for example have been very careless about leaving knives and shurikens lying around. One other item it's essential you find is the bomb which is down in the sewers. Once you're carrying this though you can't pick up any of the weapons.

Also useful are the computer terminals dotted around the place, which give you access through doors when activated.

The controls are easy to master and in fact the whole game is very comfortable to get along with. There's no fiddling around with obscure icons or attempts at needless complication. It's nice to be able to sit down and play a game after a cursory glance at the instructions. It also has a good degree of the atmosphere necessary to this kind of game. In fact, this has everything the likes of Max Headroom lacked.

My only real gripe is I'm not sure that there's quite enough to it. By that, I mean it's not very hard. Bar running out of time, there's no reason why your saboteur should come to a sticky end amongst the dogs and guards. Hence I can see that once you've solved the game you may well struggle to find any further challenge to bring you back to it.

Saboteur is not exactly a mammoth game. You only have to go up and across a few screens to reach the helicopter for example. The time limit is 99 seconds, and there's no reason why you shouldn't be able to do it in less. It's tight but definitely completable - especially if you take the easy option and go straight for the helicopter.

Some random element would have been a good idea to incorporate, I feel. As it stands it's more Possible Mission than anything else.

All said and done though, fair unpretentious entertainment. Nexus take note.