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I ask you. If somebody told you that they had a game called Slap Fight, what would you think it would be. A previously undiscovered martial art perhaps. Chi'k to Chi'k, where two sweaty opponents prance about, trying to land an open-palmed stinger on a portion of the other's anatomy.

Ten points for a face, 20 for a thigh and a massive 50 for a pranged buttock. Could be quite a, er, hit with the right sound effects.

Would you think of it as another Lightforce? Slap Fight? It is, you know. Small spacecraft shooting up waves of invaders as they tumble down the screen. As each wave is eliminated the backdrop changes and the next lot come on in a meaner mood with more guns. As the Taito copyright message is displayed prominently, the thing has to be some arcade conversion, but the original hasn't been sighted around here. Perhaps Slap Fight is a misprint like Donkey Kong, That game should have been Monkey Kong, but a letter got mixed up.

Despite the hoary gameplay, there is a hint of innovation. Some aliens, when shot., turn into stars. These act very much as Green Shield Stamps. In case you're a stripling who has never heard of such things, let me elucidate.

GS Stamps were (maybe still are) given away by shops with sales. Collect a couple of hundred, and you could get a set of glasses, a couple of thousand and you picked up a TV. There was a top limit of some ridiculous number where the lucky saver could get a luxury yacht. The slight drawback that some 27,000 tons of processed peas had to be bought first was never mentioned.

No sale is needed with Slap Fight. One star entitles the owner to extra speed. Two adds a little something to the built in guns. Three causes deadly emissions to be radiated from the sides of the craft, and then come things like an industrial-strength laser, smart missiles and shields. Once you've spent your stars on a feature, you have to start again from scratch.

You get the desired extra by acquiring stars to the right number and pressing space. The new addition lasts for a variable time, but typically it works until you lose a life.

Enough of the InterStellar Discount Saving Scheme. The mechanics of the game are standard, except that on keyboard with extra speed the spaceship zips around at a phenomenal speed. You can outrace bullets with impunity, which is useful.

All the projectiles lobbed at you are carefully aimed. Aliens that you pass are quite capable of firing backwards with an accuracy that verges on the unfair. To the veteran space warrior, used to seeing the opposition shooting willy-nilly at nothing at particular, the sight of five or six missiles converging on the spot where he's sitting is educational. It also provokes joystick bending reactions.

It's an interesting game. But Slap Fight? There is mystery here. Probably a story too. Let me get my investigative boots on...

The space fight theme develops. A nice twist on a nice implementation makes the game worthwhile, even with as strange a moniker as this one. There were a few interesting abnormalities on the preproduction version I had.

Unusually, you could drive over an alien and you both survived unscathed, And the playing area didn't scroll down as smoothly as some I've seen, It's only half the screen as well, so there is room for improvement. Keep at it, Imagine (1984). One day you'll produce a real winner.

I played this in an arcade on holiday and loved it. but didn't notice the name, so I assumed that Slap Fight was an ice hockey game. Imagine my jubilation when I found that this was that game. The patterns are the same, the sideways fi ring weapons don't have quite enough poke.

Always go for the speed up first, then laser, then wings - which doubles your laser power and finally a shield. If you get every star you should have a shield for blasting at the big ship shown in the picture. Ace.

A straightforward, scrolly shooty game, in the same vein as Mission Genocide. The scroll is not as good but then this has to imitate the arcade machine, so there are other considerations.

Because this was not, a huge arcade hit I doubt that many people will buy it because they want the same game. They'd miss a good blast.