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Games which feature time travelling warriors are usually nothing more than lame excuses for chucking together a few totally dissimilar and threadbare arcade scenarios, like commando combat followed by jet-pack shoot-'em-up. The result is like a compilation of second-rate games which couldn't make it on their own.

CRL's Time Fighter is, thankfully, a cut above the rest, and though it grafts wild west gunfights and subway mugging, medieval archery and space-age lasers, it does it all with a certain amount of style, and - just about - gets away with it.

This has nothing to do with the preposterous drivel on the back of the package, which does its best to stop you from buying it, and everything to do with some crafty animated and challenging joystick control.

Your character is a diminutive athlete who actually moves like a human being rather than the ill-proportioned, jerky dwarves which inhabit most games software. He runs, leaps and climbs, throws stones and grenades, fires guns and arrows, and even dies with a fluid realism which is remarkable.

His movements and weapons alter for each new time period, and that means you have to develop new skills as you progress through the seven levels - another point in the game's favour.

So, in the prehistoric level one, survival comes down to killing stone-age men, pterodactyls and dinosaurs with some well-aimed rocks. But by the time you've got the hang of that, you've reached the middle ages and you have to master the bow and arrow. Not difficult, but not fast either, so you have to allow for the time it takes to draw your bow before you fire.

In the Wild West you're gunning down indians and bandits, and shinning up totem poles to avoid galloping wild horses, and then you're transported to prohibited Chicago. Things start getting sweaty now, as you dodge a hail of lead and attempt to pick off the gangsters at the windows, sidestepping the occasional police car. And you've still got WWII, the New York subways and an orbital space station to fight your way through - though the last is a bit of an anti-climax, being easily the most derivative of the bunch.

The animated action is, however, often let down by the background graphics. While some of the scenery is reasonably detailed, especially the indian camp and the castle battlements, at other times it's pretty ropey, and the prehistoric and trench sequences are exceptionally dull. Sound effects are limited to belches and farts which don't vary much from level to level, plus the odd special effect (horses, sirens, motorbikes).

It's a shame too that the other animated characters are all identical to your own, only in a different colour. It would have been a darn sight more atmospheric if the hordes of knights, indian soldiers and thugs had bothered to dress up for the party...

Still, these flaws don't detract overmuch, and the game is sufficiently challenging to compensate. For wimps, CRL has provided a practice/cheat mode (hit the space bar) which allows you to battle through all seven levels with infinite lives but no score.

Altogether Time Fighter is an interesting addition to a well-worn format. Rumour has it that the programming team has subsequently developed a system which doubles the size of the sprites without great memory loss. Perhaps next time they'll also come up with a more original format in which to place them.