Ask anyone throughout the galaxy what Room Ten is, and they will tell you it's the room in any Galcorp Leisure Complex, reserved for the sport of lowlevel glyding. What do you mean you don't know what glyding is? It's a one or two player game, akin to cross between tennis and squash, but it's played in a completely enclosed room with the players controlling the bats from the outside.

The ball bounces off the walls, ceiling and floor, and this is where the problems start. Since your bat moves very slowly indeed, you have to predict where the ball is going as soon as it leaves your opponent's bat, and then you have to move there.

The transparent bat is quite large, and through this the game is viewed. As the bat is moved the perspective of the room changes, giving a true first person 3D view. The main screen is split into two independent screens, each showing the view from either end of the room.

The angle at which the ball hits the bat plays an important part in the game, so once you have learned the physics, you can bounce the ball off the ceiling and walls, and really confuse your opponent.

Whenever you hit your opponent's wall, five points are scored. The same thing happens to your opponent of you miss the ball. The first person to score thirty five points is declared the winner of the game.

There is a large options menu which allows you to change the parameters of the game, such as the speed of the ball, whether there are one or two players, and the intelligence of the computer opponent if there is only one player. If you want to be a real rebel you can also change the colour scheme of the game and the language of the instructions (parlez vous Francais?).

The gameplay is so awfully sluggish and slow, and it's about as exciting as watching patck benches warp. The graphics are bad, too. The ball wobbles about like a balloon filled with water, and the line drawing is jerky. The sound is also pathetic.

Even on two player mode the game isn't much fun to play because of the speed at which everyhtinh happens. You can't even redefine the keys! Even as a budget game it wouldn't be worth buying - for a tenner it's a joke, and for the punters a sick one at that.

Nearly a tenner for a game of near infinite tedium which - although trying to hide under the guise of Arcade Action - is as slow as it can go. Brilliantly rubbish and sadly pretentious. Room Ten totally destroys any credibility CRL built up on the CBM scene with Tau Ceti. Do not buy this, save your money.

I find it hard to believethat this dull and unoriginal game came from Pete Cooke, the designer of Tau Ceti. Ah well, even gods have their off-days. I think Pete designed Room Ten on the seventh day...