Bond is back. Again. This, the fifth licence from Domark, follows the now standard format of game levels made out of various scenes from the film.

In Level One you drive the Lotus Esprit Bondmobile along a twisting course collecting things called Q-tokens - you will need them later - avoiding pedestrians, oil patches and the roadside scenery. Not too taxing if you take it slowly and keep an eye on your car's armour level.

Halfway through the level you reach a jetty where your Lotus is magically transformed into a motorboat. You spend the rest of the level slicing through the water, mangling careless swimmers and holding off marauding enemy boats. There are yet more of those Q-tokens to collect.

In Level Two you are back on the road again. Straight away, life is tougher as there are lots more enemies. In the midst of all this mayhem you have to attempt to drive up a set of ramps onto a moving Q-truck. This is where those Q-tokens come in handy. With them you can fix up your battered car as well as buy missiles, lasers, smoke canisters and all sorts of Bond-like goodies.

Level Three takes place in the giant cargo vessel Stromberg has used to capture the two missing subs. Bond slides precariously along the ceiling while baddies pop up out of the water and the scenery taking pot-shots at him. Bond's task is to top them in an Operation Wolf-style blast.

Somewhat of a puzzler is Level Four. Not too much at stake, though - only the total annihilation of the entire civilized world if you go wrong. You must reprogram Stromberg's missile targeting computer by matching the code symbols with those you find from tapping away on a keypad.

Then to Level Five: and by this time the action is hotting up. Bond leaps on to Q's specially-modified Wet Bike and takes off across the waves in an attempt to burst through the defences of the island Atlantis, Stromberg's HQ, before the whole place goes up. Pick up the packages Q has dropped along your route and you will be able to mash all corners.

Level Six (phew) and you are not far off now. It is another Operation Wolf-style shoot-em-up section, this time with enemies leaping out of doorways at you. At last you come face-to-face with that man with dentistry problems - Jaws...

GRAPHICS AND SOUND

The graphics are bright and clear with no real cause for complaint - except that your sprite does not turn all that convincingly. The animation on the driving and sailing levels, however, won't exactly set the world alight. The sound is good, consisting of a decent Bond-style soundtrack and some excellent effects - especially the 'thumping' sound of traffic cones being sent flying and the agonised shrieks of pedestrians flying over your bonnet.

LASTING INTEREST

The variety of levels gives The Spy Who Loved Me the edge over typical shoot-em-ups and the escalating difficulty as you advance through the levels is pitched just right. You would have to be a very handy joystick waggler indeed to beat it, but a complete novice not to be able to knock off the first level on your second or third attempt. All in all, there is enough difficulty and variety to keep you going for quite a time. Do not expect anything new, just good, solid fun.

JUDGEMENT

None of the Bond licences have been the sort of stuff to set the gaming world alight, but they are growing steadily more proficient and playable. As ever, the levels are only thinly related to the plot - change a few sprites and backgrounds and it could be any other action film - but the game works well for its own sake, never mind as a faithful rendition of the film. Not a gaming great, but not bad either!

The Spy Who Loved Me places you in the rather comfortable old English shoes of Roger Moore, as he returns once more to save the world, this time from the insane clutches of Karl Stromberg. Kaz, as he is known to his friends, has stolen two submarines, one Russian and one British, and intends to use them to take set the cold war superpowers at each others throats and so take over the planet. James Bond is back in action.

Set over six levels, The Spy Who Loved Me is not so much a consistent game, but more a compilation of classic game styles including Spy Hunter, Master Mind, Operation Wolf and Xenon 2. You begin the game in Bond's infamous submarine car - an adapted Lotus - and from here you have to race along, avoiding or destroying enemy cars and collecting bonus points by driving aboard the weapons trucks that sporadically appear.

The controls of the car are responsive, but you have to travel quite slowly to get a fair chance of avoiding oncoming obstacles. Halfway through level one, you drive off a jetty, get into a speedboat and race through a maze of docks, boardwalks and swimmers. Unfortunately, it is far too easy to take a wrong turning and find yourself in a dead end. You cannot reverse, so the only thing to do is lose a life. There is an on-screen map, but as it is less than a centimetre wide strip on the left hand side of the screen, it is far too small to be practically useful.

Provided you have bought submarine capability from the weapons truck, at the end of Level Two you transform the car into an underwater attack vehicle and play a rather limp version of Xenon 2. The enemies range from enemy divers that only swim and fire forward to large bubble-like machine that follow set patterns around the screen while firing a stream of bullets at high velocity.

Avoiding the bullets is nigh on impossible due to the sluggish response and movement of your car. Because of the large amount of enemy shrapnel flying around, you find yourself dying a fair bit.

Levels Three and Six are straight Operation Wolf shoot outs. Both follow the same lines - the enemies appear in half a dozen preset locations and you have to take them out before they shoot you. Ammunition is limited, but more can be collected by shooting magazines left by dead bad guys, and thankfully your crosshair can be controlled by the mouse as well as the joystick.

Level Four is the Mastermind section. You have to input numbers in an attempt to match symbols randomly selected by the computer. Level Five takes you back to Spy Hunter and Level Six is the final level of Operation Thunderbolt, only the pilot and terrorist have been replaced by Anya, the beautiful Russian agent and Stromberg himself.

The Spy Who Loved Me is far from original. However, it gets brownie points for sheer variety and, with the exception of the Xenon 2 section, a high level of playability and addictiveness. However, it is a very short-lived product, and I cannot see it being played over and over again. It is fun while it lasts, though.

Get exercising those eyebrows! Roger Moore is back as James Bond in the 1977 movie. Once again 007 - licensed to kill and do raunchy things with as many women as possible - has to thwart the plans of a megalomaniac and save the world. This particular villain, Karl Stromberg, has an aquatic bent. He has captured two submarines, and intends to use them to nuke Moscow and New York. WWIII will result, leaving Stromberg's undersea empire to rule the world. 007 has been called in to foil the villain, aided by Anya Amasova, the glamorous Soviet agent. They take to the road for the opening 'scenes' (levels) of the journey in the ultimate Q-Mobile.

Steering the Lotus through vertically scrolling roads, a slender map gives an advance warning of obstacles. Traffic cones present no problem but water patches slow you down, oil spins the Lotus and knocking down pedestrians costs 50 points! 'Q' tiles line the route, collected for later use. The Lotus transforms into a speedboat halfway through scene one, where jetties, mooring posts and aggressive boats have to be avoided. Back on dry land for the next scene: heavily-armed vehicles hinder progress but Q's van is at hand, lowering a ramp for you to board it. Weapons can be bought using collected 'Q' tiles: lasers, smoke screens, armour etc.

The most important device is the submersible upgrade, necessary for the next scene - a vertical-scrolling shoot- 'em-up. Divers and subs attack the converted Lotus as it approaches Stromberg's base. Once there, gameplay switches to a single screen Op Wolf-style shootout. Bond slowly makes his way across a gantry to plant a bomb but Stromberg's men have other ideas; you take control of Anya's gunsight to shoot them.

More watery vertical action, this time on jet skis, as Bond pursues the sub Stromberg and his henchmen, Jaws, escape in. Once on board, you look down one of the sub's corridors while Stromberg's men appear from doorways. Shoot them and shortly, Jaws and Stromberg appear, holding Anya hostage. Maim the bad guys and save the girl otherwise the world won't be a nice place and you won't have anyone to go to bed with tonight!