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Water Polo is a waterlogged version of basketball. Instead of slam dunks you just get dunk dunks. The spectator element amounts to watching what look like a load of apples bobbing up and down in a bowl. The main attraction for the players is that they don't need to take a bath afterwards.

Despite this lack of sporting charisma Gremlin have chosen to simulate water polo in a computer game called Water Polo. The main similarity between Water Polo and water polo is that they are both pretty boring.

The rules of water polo, sorry Water Polo, go like this. Teams score goals by throwing the ball into their opponent's net. In the meantime, there's lost of general swimming around and water treading to do. That's got the rules out of the way.

Gremlin's game offers you a one-player game (you against the computer, a two-player option - by far the most satisfying) and a championship option that involves four teams in a play-off. Games involve four quarters of five minutes each, and you can vary the skill levels.

The game sticks to the well-worn tradition of allowing only one player per team to be under joystick control, always the two players nearest the ball. You can spot them because their shower caps miraculously change colour - must be something in the water.

The player without the ball can move in any of eight directions, whilst the player with the ball can both move and shoot. Direction, power and flight of the ball is also joystick controlled in more or less the usual way. But it's not as streamlined as in some of the Epyx sports sims.

As soon as your player has the ball, he holds it up above his head. Pressing the Fire button makes him wave it, ready for a pass to another player or a shot. Whilst holding the Fire button down, you push the joystick in the desired direction and quickly press the Fire button again. The player then executes a shot. You can produce fast and low shots, short but high ones, and spin the ball in either direction.

But don't think you can play patsy at the back. Your team must make a shot inside 35 seconds or the ball immediately goes over to the other side. There are strict rules about fouling too. You can grab the ball only from the front. Try it from behind and you commit a foul - three fouls and you're in the sin bid for 90 seconds or until the next goal is score. Unlike some sports there's no arguing with the referee. This would be difficult since he's on the poolside and you're in the water - he'd simply stamp on your head.

So that's Water Polo for you. The game may not be gripping, but some of the animation and graphics are pretty special. For a start, all the players are constantly bobbing up and down, and you see ripples in the water around them. They're pretty good at swimming too, gliding around the pool doing a crawl. The ball moves well too, bouncing and skidding off the surface of the water when you play a low shot.

Scrolling is smooth and the screen shows about two-thirds of the pool, with the referee pacing up and down the poolside, keeping up with play. Funnily enough, the spectators bob up and down just like the players - the mainstand must be flooded or something.

Sadly, sound is pretty naff and annoying at times. Apart from the reasonable title tune, all you get is an approximation of the sound of water. As you know, water makes no pretensions to brilliant sound, so Gremlin have gone for what sounds like a constantly flushing toilet, permeated by the occasional ear piercing referee's whistle - ouch.

Apart from the graphics, I didn't like Water Polo very much. The joystick movements never gave me the impression of being in control of my player and I never felt I could get more skilful at it by persevering. The two-player option is by far the most enjoyable (two-player games always are), play it by yourself and you'll find the whole thing pretty uninspired.