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Destroying the tiles may look easy, but it ain't!

This is one puzzler that you're not going to be able to put own for a long, long time. Brilliantly devised, amazingly simple in its design, yet murder to get to grips with. Swap is all about using your cursor to change the position of brightly coloured tiles in the playing arena. Put two tiles of the same colour next to each other and they simply disappear. The aim of the game? To be left with as few tiles as possible on the screen, of course.

Naturally, things are not quite as simple as they seem. Indeed, if you want to proceed to the next level of the game, you don't necessarily have to destroy every tile on the screen, even if you could.

No, the idea is to destroy as many tiles in as few moves as possible, which is where the careful strategy comes in. A quick look at the playing area may make your eyes boggle to start with, but sitting quietly for a moment and studying the configurations of colours may help you to work out your best starting move.

If you can destroy five or six tiles at once, it has to be better than a simple twosome.

Indeed, each of your moves is monitored at all times by the intelligent programming in Swap, gauging your skills and working out whether you are good enough to proceed.

Play well enough and you may find yourself skipping levels to cater for your skills, although that won't happen too often. If you do happen to find yourself unexpectedly on level 90, then you'd better go and have a long drink and pat yourself on the back, you're a genius!

However, for us mere mortals, there are a few very useful options to make things slightly easier. Supplementary tiles are available on many levels, to help you finish off some of the tiles you missed out on the first time around. Be careful though, these are very limited.

Another neat option is the avalanche effect, which causes all tiles to fall to the bottom to fill available spaces. This is particularly useful towards the end of a level where you have left some tiles stranded.

These are the helpful bits. Now come the painful restrictions which will beset you on later levels. The time limit is one of the worst, which will cut down your playing time considerably, leaving you no time at all to decide on your best moves.

Another notable hindrance comes in the form of the Credit system. Reserved for more advanced levels, the credits appear as a stack of ingots at the bottom of the screen. Silver ingots are worth one credit, gold is worth ten credits and, for a diamond ingot, you'll get a whacking 100 credits.

Throughout this game, each move costs two credits, while destroying a tile will earn you one credit. Thus, a swap that destroyed two tiles will make you a net profit of zero.

Got the idea? Yes, you will need to think very carefully if you want to come out on top in these stages and, if you cannot afford to make a move, the computer will not let you. Be warned!

Supplementary tiles will cost you ten credits, while if you want to take advantage of the avalanche feature in these credit rounds, be prepared to fork out a massive 100 credits.

One other handy hint to remember is the Undo option. This enables you to go back one move in order to erase any howling mistakes you might have made. Extremely useful.

Quite simply, the gameplay of Swap is totally brilliant, but that is only the beginning. Taking a look at the superbly produced menu will show you the host of options available to you.

Clicking on the options icon will take you into the game variations menu, where you can change the shape, size and colour of the playing tiles. The practice icon is also invaluable, enabling you to select the number of colours you want, the shape and whether or not to include credits, time limits, avalanches and supplementary tiles.

Whether you are a genius or not, playing through the practice level is a must, giving a totally comprehensive run-down of everything you can expect to encounter throughout the challenge. You never know, by constructing your own devilishly hard game of Swap, you may even make the rest of the game a doddle for yourself, though I very much doubt it.

Utilising some exceptionally crisp graphics, Swap is an absolute joy to play. Like so many simple puzzle games, it is totally addictive and is guaranteed to have you gnashing your teeth furiously from the word go.

With the ability to save and load games freely, Swap really is an excellent all-round offering, a must for all serious puzzlers and well worth having a look at, even if you are a hardened shootie fan. You may well be dumfounded by the gameplay to start with but, after a few attempts, you should get the hang of affairs and find yourself performing well enough to start advancing.

If you don't, then get back to the practice mode and start again from scratch, you'll be doing yourself a favour.