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You don't have to be short to be a great general, although it does seem to help. Short men tend to make far more ruthless generals - look at Napoleon, Alexander the Great and Genghis Khan, for example - all of them were under three foot tall.

Steel Empire gives you the chance to try a spot of annexing and subjugation even if you are only of a moderate height. Set in the year 2200 AD, it pits you against up to four human or ST-controlled contesting empires. Instead of the usual organic soldiers, you fight it all out using huge cyborgs - fusions of man and machine that are bristling with weaponry and optional extras. The game is split into two distinct sections - strategy and combat, so you can play either a pure strategy game or a straightforward cyborg-trashing exercise. You need to be packing 1MByte memory to go anywhere.

After you have given a name to your megalomaniac alter-ego and decided what style of game you want to play, it's time to go onto the theatre of war - the peaceful planet Orion. Well, you can soon put a stop to all that mellowness and do a pot of invading. First off, you need to create some cyborgs. To build cyborgs you need factories and to build factories you need money. To get money you need to invade countries, and to invade countries you need cyborgs. Get the picture? You start off with enough cash to get attempted world domination off the ground.

The strategy section is rather Risk-like and simple enough to get to grips with. Individual's turns - whether human or ST - don't take long and there aren't too many options to wrestle with. It's not as easy as it looks either - you need to use the old noggin and plan things if you want to avoid getting pasted. There are nine different cyborg designs to wreak havoc with, ranging from the lowly Mercury - fast but venerable 0 to the mighty Titan - 750 tons of trouble. Each has its own strengths and weakness and on each of the five various terrains you need different battle tactics. When the cyborgs finally meet, you go onto the arcade section. You can opt to hand over control to your ST to take command of one of your cyborgs. Everything is viewed from above and the joystick and a few keyboard commands are all your need. The battles are usually short and bloody with lasers and missiles flying in all directions. If you win, your empire expands, you get another capital, more money, factories and cyborgs. Just make sure you keep this up until you have exterminated the opposition - these empire builders are mean sods.

The graphics and sound effects are passable - they're nothing eye or ear-popping, but are up to the job. The strategy section is a pretty simple tactical manoeuvring job and the arcade a below-average blast.

The two hang together quite well to make a competent game. The gameplay is up to the job, although the artificial intelligence of your opposing cyborgs is a bit on the ropey side. It's particularly good fun with more than one human player, too. There are plenty of options to choose from to give you different styles of game.

It's not an adrenaline-producing effort, but it intermixes thoughtful strategy with arcade battles making an interesting game for those who - er, like this sort of intermix of strategy and arcade battles. Tuck one hand into your shirt and get dominating the world.

1. More strategy than Champion Of The Raj, more arcade than Samurai Warrior.
2. Not exactly state-of-the-art in any department, but a well integrated mix of styles.