I, for one, have never really had much interest in show jumping, probably due to a blind fear of horses! However, that is not to say I do not know what it involves. I would be able to tell the difference quite easily between, for example, show-jumping and organised crime, or, to use a more appropriate example, show-jumping, and Computerware's Show-jump program.

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Years ago, in pubs, there was a neat little game called Stunt Biker. What you had to do was drive a cute little graphic Hell's Angel biker over ramps and jumps.

In this game, you control a cute little Princess Anne as she trois over various jumps. The ramps have gone, the game is now more complex: you have a jump button.

This game has been badly classified (and anyway the "horse" could just as easily be a stunt bike with the quality of definition!). That is not to say it's a bad game, it's just lost some of its prospective market; I mean surely something like Speedy Slum Man would sell more copes than Show-Jump. Thus endeth the first lesson in creative marketing.

I'd love to be able to go on to say that the game itself was a superbly addictive challenge. Oh well, another unrequired love!

Show-jump consists of a horse jumping fences of various length and height spaced over several lines on the screen (the horse goes left to right on the top line, then the second, and so on to the end of the event). The controls are accelerate/decelerate, and jump. Basically, you want a lot of speed for the long jumps and very little for the high ones. And that's it.

There are nine courses, which would be nice if there was any real variation between them other than slightfy taller and longer jumps, more frequently on the later courses.

The game has a "jump-off" option for two tying competitors which I was fortunate enough never to require. All in all it does seem to be a well written and thought out program.

It is sad that Show-jump is so... look out... ugly word alert... boring. It just doesn't make me want to load it. It is suffering from the length-grab problem.