Producer: CCS
Memory Required: 48K
Retail Price: £8.95
Author: RT Smith

Oh no! I thought, when I got this one out of its jiffy bag. Can it possibly be true? Perhaps the lavish praise I've been heaping on CCS of late has gone to their heads! Maybe they have taken on a new marketing manager (horror of horrors) to actually start getting their stuff into shops and weird things like that. The reason I'm wondering about all this is because Arnhem, the latest from CCS, comes in a big box - in fact the same size vinyl pack as Alien by Argus (here's a possibility for you, boys) with a full-colour painted cover and a sixteen-page booklet with a fold-out map of the playing area.

The cover picture is a little bit dodgy, but the overall effect of the packaging is very impressive. No more inlay cards that fold out eighteen times! No more miniscule print! Eee, luxury.

The program is pretty good, too. You know how I was always moaning about coordinate-controlled movement? Well, they've finally got rid of it, and bought in cursor control. The game is very slick, as strategy games go; for example, as you finish doing what you want with one unit, you are moved on immediately to the next eligible unit. You don't actually have to do anything with the unit - if you don't want to, there's a 'pass' feature - but it's a nice touch, not having to do all the donkey work in between moves.

There are five scenarios, increasing in difficulty and length (in playing turns) from seven turns (which takes about an hour) to 26 turns (which apparently takes eight to ten hours)! The scenarios progress through the physical playing area, which is a long thin strip, roughly 30 x 100 units, with the first (easiest) being the approach to Eindhoven, the fourth being the assault on Nijonegen and Arnhem, and the fifth being all four previous scenarios rolled into one. The object of each scenario is quite specific; in the first you have to clear the main road to Eindhoven of Huns, and if you don't succeed in doing this you lose, even if you've wiped out the vast majority of the Krauts in trying. The other objectives tend to be fairly similar, capturing bridges and so on.

When you start playing the game you are presented with a fairly large (20 x 20) map window, an identification of which unit is to go, and a menu of options for that unit. The units are represented on the map as squares with symbols in them. Each unit initially covers an area 2 x 2, but it can be put into a component mode, which gives faster travelling, but makes the unit more vulnerable to attack. 'Compacted' units cover only one map square. The map graphics are remarkably clear and effective,and although there is no specific command to search the whole map area, it is possible to survey quite a bit of it by using the 'travel' command (a sort of automatic movement order - you can use it to set a piece moving in a given direction, and it'll carry on until you tell it to stop).

There are fifteen types of unit, ranging from tanks to gliders; depending on the type of unit, the menu of options available will change slightly - eg, artillery units can 'bombard' over a certain range, while all other units can only attack when adjacent to an enemy unit. Units can also 'dig in' which gives them a virtually impregnable defence position - a favourite trick of the Huns is to dig in on one side of a bridge, so you can't get across.

It is clear that a lot of thought has gone into programming the computer intelligence here, since I've not been able to even get to Eindhoven yet - perhaps it's just lack of thought gone into programming my intelligence! There are quite a few different terrain types, and the map presentation is very pleasing - especially the 'black and white' mode, which is handy because it means I can play it in bed (well, Radio Rentals finally sent the bailiffs round for the colour telly).

The game has a save facility, which is obviously vital if it takes eight hours to play - I mean, can you imagine it? it must be like reading the entire Mills & Boon library in one fell swoop! Not bein a gentleman of leisure (like Mr Brewster) I haven't had the time to get into the long game, but a friend of mine who has says it isn't worth it - he got snuffed at about seven and three quarter hours, after holding Arnhem bridge for a week. All in all, this is a very confident, competent and realistic historic simulation from CCS - Monty would be proud of them.

Dave: At last - a wargame that's both playable and makes full use of the Speccy's graphics. If I've been hard on this type of game in the past it's because none I've seen has yet come up to this standard.

First off, you're given the choice of four basic scenarios. If you're new to the game it's an idea to go for the easy option, a seven turn reccy round the battlefield. The next three cover specific operations that take more time but should turn you into a battle scarred veteran. Only when you've got ten hours to spare is there any point in tackling the final scenario that covers the complete Market Garden area. At the beginning it's sure to be a whole river full of bridges too far.

If you're on your tod, you'll control all the allied forces while the computer plays the Germans - with a friend, the allies split into Brits and Yanks and there's even a three player mode that offers a complete free choice.

Play is certainly fast but it's easy to follow so you shouldn't get hopelessly lost just as you thought you'd got 'em outflanked. Plus there are sound effects and on-screen flashes that show when a unit is under attack.

The scrolling screen covers the whole of the Arnhem area and there's also an accompanying map and booklet for budding battlers. In-door generals who'd probably find the real thing a touch too noisy could do worse than take a look. 4/5 MISS

Roger: Outside my usually cowardly tastes but good enough to make me take a general's job - leading from the rear ...4/5 HIT

Ross: Not my sort of software but I soldiered on - and then got beat! 3/5 HIT

Publishers: CCS
Price: £8.95
Memory: 48K

The race for the bridge at Arnhem was one of the more daring strategies of World War Two. General Montgomery conceived the plan of a rapid advance across Holland with paratroopers dropped behind the lines to capture the vital river bridges.

Forty years on CCS has conceived the not-so-daring plan of simulating the enterprise in a series of five scenarios culminating in the full-scale battle, Operation Market Garden.

Long-time specialists in wargames, many of which had little merit, CCS seems finally to have cracked it. Arnhem is one of the finest computer wargames we have seen, a blend of complex strategy, historical authenticity, and simple, swift operation which will have fans returning for more.

The playing area scrolls over a map of the roads and terrain towards the final bridge. Units are moved in turn, and have an abstract form. You can call up reports on their strengths and efficiency, and issue orders which will be continued on subsequent turns unless cancelled.

The attention given to realism includes the formation of individual units, which can travel fast in condensed form or slowly in open order. The condensed form equates to a column of tanks, for example, which can take advantage of a road for speed but is hampered in combat.

Provision is given for one, two or three players. With three players one player commands the Germans, one the Americans and one the British forces. An introductory scenario can be completed in an hour, and consists of capturing the first bridge at Eindhoven. A full map is provided with a comprehensive booklet.

At the end of the game an assessment is made of your success. If you have failed to advance swiftly you fail, but you may be granted victory anyway, as it is possible to do well enough to make the outcome inevitable.

Wargames of this sort are not for the impatient, nor for the complete novice at strategy. But for those who enjoy simulation wargaming, Arnhem is one of the best, and captures the problems of maintaining a swift advance along narrow country roads remarkably well.

Spectrum, £8.95cs
Amstrad, £9.95cs
C64/128, £9.95cs

This one, two or three player tactical wargame is based on the "Market Garden" operation of 1944. Montgomery's plan was to rid Holland of the Nazis and open the door to Berlin. Three allied airborne divisions were dropped behind enemy lines and attempted to capture a series of bridges for the advancing allies.

The game contains five separate scenarios, each lasting a fixed number of turns. Each day of the campaign is made up of three turns (morning, afternoon and night) and each turn is divided into three phases. The first is the mechanical phase in which motorised units can move and engage in combat. The second phase is when other units can move, and the third phase is another mechanical phase.

Despite it's age Arnhem is still one of the toughest, most atmospheric and involving wargames you could wish to own, and it set its author R.T. Smith on the road to fame and - who knows? - fortune.

Spectrum 48K
CCS
Wargame
£8.95

"I think you might be going a bridge too far" were the prophetic words of Eisenhower when General Montgomery revealed his audacious plan for a quick end to the war in 1944 by capturing three bridges over the last major river obstacles between his army and the heart of the German Reich.

Arnhem seeks to recreate this battle through five different scenarios. Some cover just a part of the battle,a nd once you've mastered these, you go on to the whole thing, fighting the whole battle. As this can take up to eight hours, you, and probably your Spectrum will be glad of the load/save option.

The level of simulation is brigade/batallion level and there are 13 different unit types, each with different strengths and weaknesses. The sideways scrolling map depicts the area from the XXX corps front line near Eindhoven to Arnhem.

The system used sets a new standard for realism in wargame simulations. Units can dig in, get in to column for road movement, they have morale as well as variable strength and effectiveness. It stimulates beautifully the difficulties both sides faced in trying to deploy their forces effectively in the difficult Dutch countryside.

The XXX corps advance had to be made up a single road, where even light resistance caused delay. Meanwhile the Germans were attempting to recapture the bridges from the lightly armed paratroopers before XXX corp arrived.

There are a few minor quibbles - supply was very important in this battle, both for the airborne and ground troops; no attempt is made to simulate this. Also the system only allows you to attack once per turn, bur in the other half of the turn you can move normally but not attack!

These minor points aside, this is probably the best wargame on the Spectrum to date.

GOING TO BATTLE

War simulations are becoming ever more popular Tom Courtenay examines some of the best.

War games have come a long way from the time H.G. Wells wrote Little Wars at the turn of the century. He wrote it as a result of trying to regulate the battles on the Kitchen table against his friends involving a handful of pained tin soldiers. These days, war-gamers revel in the complexity and realism of their simulations - ify ou call it playing soldiers they would be very upset. Any game worth its salt will involve tape measures, dice, sets of tables, vast numbers of troops, or even cardboard counters representing regiments or divisions.

So it is scarcely surprising that the home computer was welcomed by the war-gaming lobby with open arms. Two approaches were taken: either the computer could be used to referee a traditional war game fought on a table-top in traditional manner, or the whole thing could be transferred to the computer.

The pioneer of the latter approach was Lothlorien, which began to produce war games written in Basic on the Spectrum. Obviously they look primitive by today's standards but they attempted to be accurate representations of historical events. To the mainstream games enthusiast, they played slowly and you could not kill anything.

The first truly modern game was Nato Commander from Microprose. It takes place in northern Europe and features that almost constant American obsession, the Reds pouring over the border and trying to take over Europe. The game covers the most critical period, between the initial invasion and the U.S. getting huge reinforcements to the front. Thus, the Nato commander is severely outnumbered and is fighting a delaying action, trying to hold on to as much ground as possible, and possibly inflicting significant losses on the Soviets.

However distasteful you may find the scenario, it is a very good game. Success depends on falling back in stages, each rearguard action allowing time for the forces to the rear to dig in, then fall back, and so on. In that way, the steam is taken out of the Soviet advance. Any Soviet forces not in contact with friendly forces may disappear from the map, depending on how many aircraft are flying reconnaissance missions.

Aircraft can also run air superiority or ground attack missions. It is important to keep open supply lines and make the best possible use of terrain. The computer opponent is fairly intelligent, although by following particularly outrageous tactics it might be very confused.

Microprose recently followed this with Decision in the Desert and Crusade in Europe. They are a real tour de force. Covering two famous campaigns in WWII, they are about as near to a board game on a computer as you are likely to see. Almost everything is there, the different strengths and weaknesses of units, use of terrain, supply - in both strategic and tactical senses - fog of war, and a two-player option.

Again, the computer could be a little lacking in the old grey matter, especially when called on to defend, but the two-player option is what the game was about. Both games feature several different scenarios which portray different battles within the campaign. Although the games can be long, the speed of play can be varied to slow things when things become difficult. Orders are made in real time - the battle does not stop while you input orders. Tactics are very subtle. All-out effort rarely works; you will just run out of supplies and exhaust your troops. It is all about probing for weaknesses and then exploiting them quickly. The games are on C64, Atari and Apple.

Microprose recently capped even that success with its chart-topping Silent Service, in the same three formats, with ST, Amstrad and Spectrum versions promised. It is a superb simulation of submarine warfare in the Pacific. Almost without being aware of it, the player is subject to many rules about sighting, detection, firing and hidden movement. It knocks spots off all the board games devoted to the same subject - and you can shoot things.

You command one submarine on patrol in the Pacific. After a convoy is detected, a quick squint through the periscope to see whether its worth the risk - how heavy is the escort? Then check the time. Should you wait until dusk? Check the speed and course of the convoy. What is the best attack course to evade detection? A little on the slow side for the shoot-'em-up fraternity but a superb and exciting simulation which will take some beating.

That is not to say British programmers are not starting to get their acts together. Particularly Robert Smith, who has produced two fine simulations, Arnhem and Desert Rats, published by CCS on the Spectrum and Amstrad.

Another company specialising in this field is PSS. It has attempted to popularise the genre by including an arcade element in most of its games. Unfortunately that tends to mean the realism of the game suffers - precious memory and development time is lavished on a rather tedious shoot-'em-up.

Neither is the company a stranger to controversy. Its titles include Theatre Europe, all about the jolly little subject of a European war escalating into a thermonuclear holocaust. The scenario is much the same as Nato Commander but the addition of a complex air war, the arcade sequences and the thermonuclear option has left in its wake a rather dull land game.

The game falls between four stools. Falklands '82 was another landmark of good taste. It features the Argentinians and the British locked in a struggle to save their respective governments from the wrath of the electorates. The game stayed mainly with the land campaign, and it aroused much anger as it demonstrated the possibility of the British losing - something fairly obvious to anyone of even a semi-rational disposition.

Possibly the company's best game to date is Battle of Midway, about the decisive carrier battle in the central Pacific in the middle of 1942 which effectively ended Japanese chances of winning the war. The player controls the American task forces in an attempt to seek and destroy the Japanese aircraft carriers protecting an invasion of the American base at Midway island.

Although the tactics employed would make most military historians turn pale, it is not a bad game. The player has to find, identify and then shadow the enemy task force as, his strike aircraft close in from his carriers. Naturally, the enemy is trying to do the same, or even get to grips with his surface units. The player must plan his raids, try to evade the enemy, and control the strikes, making sure they find their targets and have sufficient fuel to return to their carriers.

The same system was developed further in the PSS Battle of Britain. It covers the Luftwaffe attempt to destroy the RAF in the summer of 1940. The main pre-occupation of the player is to preserve his fighters, taking on the Germans only if he can do so on favourable terms. There are problems; after each interception the fighters must land, re-fuel and re-arm. The nightmare is that a German raid will catch the fighters on the ground. The campaign is fought through several turns, with the British meeting raiders as their losses permit. It is a long game, of slightly dubious accuracy, but a fascinating struggle.

On the same subject, Their Finest Hour from Hutchinson is a flawed attempt to be a real simulation of the battle. Although highly-detailed, some of the mistakes are almost laughable. First, defensive flak can zip from target to target as if on wheels; ME109s have huge fuel tanks, along with the Spitfires which also have inexhaustible ammunition. Time and again, a squadron can shoot down 200 aircraft and usually the Luftwaffe is defeated on the first day. It is a pity, because it had the makings of a fine game.

The most recent PSS game returns to the Western Desert, Tobruk, on the Amstrad, features an exceptional network option where two Amstrads are connected using the joystick ports so that two players can battle with highly-realistic Fog of War. Neither can see each other's pieces. The game design is a little artificial, with the British having fixed supply dumps and the Germans being able to zip around at will but it is a fine game which is great fun to play.

Most of the games have been set in WWII. If you crave for the age of the horse and the cannon, there is a grave shortage of quality material from that era. The Lothlorien Waterloo and Austerlitz are not bad. Although they lack detail, the games go some way to recreating the Napoleonic era, but if you are looking for dramatic cavalry charges, forget it.

Possibly the best thing Lothlorian has done to date is Jonny Reb, a semi-abstract simulation of tactics in the American Civil War, seen in retrospect as the transition from the Napoleonic to the modern era. As firepower became more formidable, so the only way to stay alive was to take cover. The infantry charge became a rather rare commodity. That is dealt with very well in this game. The Confederate army's job is to try to take a bridge from a small force of troops before a large number of Union reinforcements can arrive.

The tactic is to move up men with covering fire from artillery, then open fire with the infantry. If that does not work, send in the cavalry as a last resort - demoralised troops will tend to run rather than face a cavalry charge. Endless variations of troops and terrain can be tried with a kind of battlefield designer.

The major criticism is that such a complex game has completely inadequate instructions. The terrain is placed there with little explanation of its effects. Despite that, and the usual monumentally thick computer opponent. It is a game which will reward plenty of experimentation.

Computer war games have progressed a long way from their humble origins but they still have some way to go before they reach the level of accuracy and subtlety of most board war games. Perhaps the new generation of 68000-'based machines might just fulfil that potential.

CHRIS BOURNE TAKES A NOSTALGIC TRIP THROUGH THE BATTLE-STREWN FIELDS OF LAST YEAR'S STRATEGY GAMES

Before programmers discovered sprites, 3D graphics and continuous fire buttons, strategy games were regarded as a sort of ideal computer entertainment. That was partly based on the idea that computers were essentially souped-up calculators and partly because mainframe computers were very good at games like chess.

If you were into computers when the Spectrum was launched, you'll remember titles like Football Manager, and Flight Simulation being held up as examples of the finest programs around. These days it's more likely to be Alien 8, Shadowfire or Dun Darach, and their reputation depends in great part on graphics programming.

One of the reasons for that is financial. In their wisdom, retailers and distributors tend to see strategy games as having a narrow appeal. They are the classic sleepers which sell steadily but slowly. The trade wants the money now and lots of it. That means quick-selling arcade games, preferably with some spin-off celebrity theme attached, which hits number one in the charts in a couple of weeks and stiffs out a month later.

Many of the fine strategy/simulation games, produced in 1985, saw little exposure in the shops - certainly not in the big high street chains. That does not mean they were no good. In fact, there has been something of an upsurge in the quality of strategy games recently, and most spectacularly in the field of wargames.

Wargames have as long a tradition as any sort of computer entertainment. If you've ever read the hefty instruction books for classic wargames of the past - Avalon Hill's Afrika Korps you'll understand why. Those rules tended to read like a computer program with complicated look-up tables for cross-referencing dice throws, gridded maps and strict sequences of actions within a given turn of play. They also took hours to play.

The computer is supposed to take all the argument of table-top gaming out of wargames. It quickly does all the adding up, it doesn't cheat, and it can handle secret moves easily.

Unfortunately, most wargames never turn out like that. Graphics tend to be based on unrealistic grids, the rules appear over-simple, and the computer generally takes a vast amount of time to think about the moves.

One such game, which in other respects might have deserved success, was ATRAM. The name stands for Advanced Tactical Reconnaissance and Attack Mission, which turns out to be a NATO exercise in which the RAF and USAF battle it out using Harrier jump jets. The idea neatly sidesteps the obvious problems involved in trying to flog a game based on bombing the daylights out of Port Stanley.

The game is a computer-moderated boardgame with a glossy magnetic board and stylized pieces that you slide about as if you were a real NATO general. Unfortunately, the computer part is less fun. The only excuse for the program is to handle the boring bits like keeping track of how much fuel each jet has consumed.

The author is clearly fixated on jargon, which makes the rules almost unreadable, and all moves are keyed-in in a jumble of letters and numbers. It is so easy to make a mistake that you'll never be entirely sure whether you're playing the game properly. Headbangers and retired Harrier pilots only.

A much better two-player wargame is Confrontation from Lothlorien. Confrontation is a wargame system which allows you to design your own maps and, within reason, choose the composition of your armies. That allows you to play at a tactical or strategic level. The flavour is essentially modern, with armour and mechanised infantry supported by footsloggers, artillery and air units.

To go with the system, Lothlorien has also released a set of four scenarios ranging from a fictional WWII invasion of Kent to guerilla warfare in Afghanistan and Angola. We found the Egypt-Israel scenario most interesting in that the open terrain left units extremely vulnerable without air support. The organisation of such support requires capturing and defending a chain of airstrips in order to reach Tel Aviv or Suez depending on which way you're going.

Nevertheless, Confrontation is still slow. The same cannot be said of Overlords, another two-player game from Lothlorien. Loosely based on an old boardgame favourite, Campaign, it is played across a large area of fairly basic terrain. The concept is abstract, involving footsoldiers, generals, and the Overlord. The objective is to capture strongpoints - ownership of which generates one piece per turn. The fighting is equally abstract, based on the number and strength of the pieces in contact with the enemy.

Both players play simultaneously, and the game is so fast that you'll almost certainly need joysticks - preferably one each. The pieces whizz about the screen and that leads to a magnificent confusion as both players simultaneously attempt to outflank their opponent.

By and large, it is the epic battles of WWII which command the keenest attention from programmers. Battle for Midway is a strange hybrid from PSS, and incorporates arcade sequences. The Battle of Midway was a crucial turning point in the war against Japan, when the US sent a force to smash the invasion fleet.

The PSS game falls into two parts. First, locate the course of the three arms of the Japanese forces. Having done that you must send out strike forces from your aircraft carriers to bomb them.

When battle is joined you get the chance to zap the Japs using a joystick, which rather spoils the point of a supposedly realistic wargame. The author claims it simulates the fog of war, or some such nonsense.

We found the game easy to beat - it's good to see the computer taking an active part in a solo game for once, but the graphics are primitive and not very clear. A year ago we might have had more praise, but there are better games around.

Much better, in fact, and the star of the bunch is undoubtedly Arnhem from CCS. CCS, like Lothlorien, specialises in strategy games. For years CCS games were worthy rather than exciting, and almost always written in super-slow Basic. With Arnhem the company has finally struck gold.

The game follows the thrust of the Allied armies across the Rhine against fierce German opposition. The main idea was simple enough. The British were supposed to hurtle down country roads to Arnhem while American paratroopers were dropped on the bridges ahead to hold them for the main advance.

Of course it wasn't as simple as that, and neither is the game. There are a number of levels at which you can play, until you get to the full battle. A time limit is set, and if you don't capture the bridges quickly enough you lose. The German task is therefore to hold up the advance.

The graphics are pleasant, and information about each unit's strength can be obtained by positioning the cursor. One of the best features is the movement system. You can choose to move in open or close order - open order means you are far less vulnerable to attack but cannot take proper advantage of the roads. The game can be played by up to three players - with three, one player gets the Germans and the other two play British and American forces.

The feel of the game is tremendously realistic, with the onus placed on keeping the British moving down the roads. Arnhem is absolutely recommended and will hopefully encourage other software houses to pull their socks up and match the standard.

Less attractive, but equally fast, is Lothlorien's The Bulge - the German counter-attack on Antwerp and Hitler's last great offensive in Western Europe. It was always doomed to failure, what with narrow country lanes and terrain choked in snow. The computer plays so quickly and viciously that you'll be hard put to survive.

Although The Bulge scores over Arnhem for speed, the graphics are less clear and the strategy less easy to fathom. Lothlorien has opted for simultaneous movement, and one is frequently reduced to hurling forces willy-nilly into the fray without much regard for tactics.

A pleasing feature of both Arnhem and The Bulge is that you can issue general orders to units which they will continue to obey until you change them. That is a sensible and much more realistic alternative and saves having to move fifty pieces every turn, slowing the whole flow of play.

Moving away from wargames, another category of great antiquity in computer circles is what is known as the land-management game. An early example of the genre was Hamurabi which puts you in charge of an ancient kingdom. You are head of a population, and there is corn in the treasury.

The idea is to manage the economy - based entirely on corn - so that everybody gets enough to eat. There is enough corn to sow for next year with some in reserve in case of natural disaster.

Of course, the way the game is set up at the beginning, there is never enough, so you get to make decisions about how many people to starve to death for the greater good of the rest, and so on.

Such games are very easy to construct on computers, and if you want to write your own strategy game we suggest you try something along those lines. The secret is to construct a set of formulae governing the relationship between various factors - for example, how much food do people need? How many people are needed to sow an acre of land? How much corn?

There are very few business-type activities that cannot be simulated in that sort of way. Two famous games of this type are Football Manager from Addictive Games and Mugsy from Melbourne House, in which you play a gangster trying to run rackets with the aid of a none too loyal gang.

Sadly, Kevin Toms - Mr Football Manager himself - has not managed to follow that enormous success.

Addictive has brought out a number of games along similar lines in 1985, but none of them match the old classic.

Software Superstar casts you as a producer of games. You have to allocate time and money each month to releasing games, programming, advertising and the like. Nice touches include the decision to hype games or be honest about them, but the overall impression is dull, and we found it easy to get a hit program and reach the targets set.

Grand Prix Manager from the same outfit was equally tedious, with poor graphics to boot. Luckily CRL brought out the infinitely more entertaining Formula One - a Sinclair User classic - which we found totally compulsive.

Formula One is a full simulation of a grand prix season. Start off by hiring drivers and building cars - you have a million quid or so but it goes very fast. When the race starts choose your tyres and then watch the cars whizz past in convincing graphics. Messages inform you of the state of the track and incidents involving other cars, while a leader board keeps you in touch with the race positions.

Best of all, you can call pit stops for tyre changes, and the correct choice of timing may win or lose a race. The pit stop sequence is arcade based, and you have to manoeuvre a mechanic around the four wheels to complete it. Purists may have their doubts, but the speed of movement is linked to the amount of money you invested in the crew, and does not therefore make a mockery of the strategic element.

Formula One is a good game against the computer, but becomes really exciting when played with friends.

Almost as enthralling, although less well presented and rather more anarchic in play is The Biz, a simulation of the record industry from Virgin Games. You begin by choosing your social class - from stinking rich to unemployed - and then form a band. Hire a manager, go on the pub or college circuit and send endless demo tapes to bored record companies. If you have the money, you can cut your own discs, but beware - without the clout of the big boys behind you it may all go to nothing. The ultimate goal is, of course, to get a number one, but the road is full of pitfalls.

The game is full of subtle humour - you may reckon a dry ice machine is just right for your tacky rock band, but watch your credibility plummet. You may even get a chance to sample drugs during the game. Try it and see where it gets you.

On then to simulation proper, by which is meant those worthy and sometimes addictive attempts to portray accurately a real-life experience. The original impetus comes from the flight simulators used by airlines to train pilots, and for some time software houses only seemed to be interested in mimicking those.

They all look more or less the same, with an array of instruments on the lower half of the screen and a view of the horizon with occasional crude landmarks. Some are better than others for speed and ease of use, and the best are still Psion's antique classic, Flight Simulation and Digital integration's Fighter Pilot, which is rather more difficult but does allow for aerial dogfights.

DACC specialises in those features, and recently brought out 747 Flight Simulator. We've taken a bit of stick at Sinclair User for giving it the thumbs down, but I still maintain it's an unexciting production, mainly because the Jumbo jet isn't a patch on a light aircraft for aerobatics.

Real enthusiasts will probably enjoy it, it is certainly a worthy and apparently highly accurate program. If you're looking for entertainment, though, try elsewhere.

You might try looking at Southern Belle from Hewson. The program simulates the old Pullman service from London to Brighton, and you have to handle the great steam engine all the way.

Initial levels involve handling only one or two controls while the computer does the rest, but you work up to a full schedule with stops, signals, hazards on the track, brakes and handling gradients, to name a few.

It is a surprisingly fulfilling program, and the wire-frame graphics of recognisable landmarks along the track are well executed. You are marked at the end according to your accuracy on the schedule and how economically you conserved fuel.

Another unusual simulation is Juggernaut from CRL, in which you have to drive a container truck around town picking up cargoes. The screen shows an overhead view of the lorry and road, with traffic lights, status, steering and gears. The movement is slow and there are no other vehicles around - presumably you're driving in the middle of the night, council bye-laws notwithstanding. The irrepressible John Gilbert reckons the lorry looks like a Gillette GII razor. He's quite right, and although Juggernaut isn't a bad idea, the end result is rather dull.

Finally, a look at a few odds and ends which don't really fit any categories. One such Minder, a much-hyped trading game based on the famous television series.

You play Arthur Daley, the dodgy entrepreneur, and the idea is to buy and sell an incredible range of weird goods such as gold acupuncture needles while steering clear of the law in the form of mean inspector Chisholm.

You do that by seeking out dealers and wide boys, either at their warehouses or in the Winchester Club. Terry, as ever, gets to do the fetching and carrying, and can also be hired to mind you - an important function when dealers discover goods are stolen.

In essence the game is simply trading, with a large text interpreter enabling you to bargain with characters in authentic Daley cockney - it understands words like bent, or pony. Once you get into it there's rather more strategy involved. You have to organise Terry's time so goods get collected and delivered on schedule, while you need sufficient cash to pay for the next lot.

Minder is a pleasant romp and deserved to do better in the charts than it did, but would have benefited from a greater variety of incidents. Memory taken up with slang during the bargaining is fun at first but since it is really only window dressing it leaves you with the feeling that the game lacks depth.

Alien on the other hand, from Argus, has plenty of depth but is difficult to get into. It follows the tense cult movie in which a devastating alien invades a spaceship and proceeds to exterminate the crew.

The game uses menus to pick characters, objects and locations in the spaceship Nostromo, while plans of the decks indicate your position. The idea is to destroy the alien either in a straight fight - fat chance - or by escaping from the ship and blowing it up by remote control.

You only see the alien when you are in control of a character in the same room. The rest of the time you can hear it as doors and ventilation grilles slide open, or your scanner picks up the presence of a living creature nearby. That makes for tremendous tension in the play, and the one drawback is the simplicity of the graphics which works against the otherwise strong illusion of involvement. Fans of the film will enjoy it. Others may find it tough going.

We have made no mention of some of the plethora of spin-off titles in the sports arena which might come under the umbrella of simulations. Those are generally disappointing, especially in comparison with the arcade based sports games. Two, which play quite well, are Steve Davis' Snooker and American Football from Argus - which has the added virtue of not involving a famous personality. Nick Faldo's Open is a lovingly programmed simulation of the course at Sandwhich which suffers from one horrible flaw. The closer your ball is to the flag on the green, the more difficult it is to judge the angle at which you should strike it. In fact, the reverse should happen.

It is heartening to see arcade games taking on more elements of strategy in their play. Arcade-adventures such as Knight Lore or Gyron - if you can categorise those masterpieces at all - have as much to do with logical thought and planning as they do with swift reactions. That argues a growing maturity, both among games publishers and also in public taste, as computer owners look for more than a quick joystick fix from their hobby.

Best of the year's wargames, Arnhem is a one, two or three player simulation of the famous battle for the Rhine bridges. Highly sophisticated movement systems - cursor controlled - lend realism and ease of play to the game. There's a choice of scenarios to suit all levels of play.

The spirit of the original campaign is well captured - American paratroopers hold the bridges while the British attempt to organise a swift advance down narrow roads. The German task is to prevent the yanks from holding the outposts and slow the main advance past the game's time limits.