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Poor old Charles Addams. First he's gratuitously abused by that noticeably chuckle-free '60s series which makes BBC2 think they're hideously trendy by repeating it, and then his creations appear in a hyped-up-t0-the-gills '90s film with about as much style as Batman. Finally, just to make him rotate in his grave, his name is forced to appear on this Ocean licence.

Anyway, we can ignore the TV series and the film, because they bear no relation to the game at all. The Addams Family is a purebred platform game which bears not a little resemblance to that of a certain blue hedgehog. Say no more.

The plot is something vaguely like this: Gomez, who's the nominal head of the family, has to rescue the other no-hopers from various locations around the Addams' house. Each of them then nips back to the music room and contributes a bit of a tune, which Lurch then plays on a piano. What a good laugh, eh?

The game's split into sections according to the division of the rooms. Each "room" - games room, portrait gallery, kitchen, and so on - actually comprises around 40 or 50 screens with a particular theme. There are some outside bits and pieces too, like a hollow tree and the conservatory. That you have to do is to bound around these screens, stomping on nasties' heads - the only way to kill them - and work your way through the labyrinth of screens to find the particular hidden family member.

This would be all very well, except that some bright spark decided it would be a good idea to make a press of the Fire button perform a jump. This can be very confusing when you're working on instinct and you push up rather than hit Fire.

Anyway, along the way you can collect extra lives and energy and groovy little bonuses like the flying fez - which enables you to fly, believe it or not - invincibility gizmos and magic trainers. Cash is also on offer - get enough and you get an extra life.

Viewed as a straightforward platform game, The Addams Family is quite a decent effort. It's slick, bland, well-programmed, large, not too difficult, and the graphics are excellent. The daft control system is a bit off-putting at first, but it's easy enough to learn to live with.

Viewed as anything remotely to do with The Addams Family, it's not much cop. The setting really doesn't matter at all - this could be any platform game, and the characters in it don't rely on any special addams characteristics at all, except for looking (vaguely) like them.

So it's a pleasant enough game, but why have Ocean bothered with the Addams licence? Why not do this as a standalone platformer and use the Addams name properly? It's the same old syndrome of a wasted licence. Buy it if you appreciate platform games, but not for any other reason.

1. A little bit like The Blues Brothers and Titus The Fox, only it's not about foxes o cult film heroes, so perhaps it's not like those games at all.