ROLAND RAT, Superstar, renowned for talking the boom off the speed of sound, has forgotten to set his alarm clock. He is late for his regular appearance on TV-AM.

The sewers in which he lives, with buddies Kevin and Errol, are also inhabited by mutant wellie boots which stomp their way up and down the levels, kicking everything out of their way. Roland finds that a pain in the tail, and arms himself with a rubber glue gun, which can be filled with glue pots scattered around the levels. The glue puts the wellies into a sticky situation and he needs gallons of it to get to the studio door.

To open the door and join Nick, Anne and Wincey he has to collect pieces of glow-in-the-dark material, one bit at a time, and fix it to the door. He must then collect the key and fit it into the lock for the grand finale.

To further complicate matters there are two sewer levels. If Roland finds a downward arrow on the first level he can travel to the underground system.

The tubes rattle by frequently but Roland, unperturbed, walks at the side of the track avoiding the danger. If luck is on his side he will find a black door into which the glowing pieces of puzzle can be fitted. He must be fast, however, as the time ticks slowly onward and the show will soon be over.

Finding the pieces is hard work and Roland has had no breakfast. He must get by on a diet of Big Macs and crisps which will boost his energy level.

The game relies heavily on the player's identification with Roland, and those who are not enamoured with the Superstar might find that play can become monotonous after more than 30 minutes, although the C5 trundling across the top of the screen with the other rush hour traffic provides some light relief.

The various screens look deceptively similar, and map-making is essential if Roland is to avoid running around in circles.

The graphics, while not outstanding, are smooth and fast. The scroll from one room to another is particularly impressive.

Roland's Rat Race will be of interest to rat fans everywhere. Although he is not his usual verbal self his rambling computer adventures give a new meaning to cuteness on the arcade screen.

In the final analysis, is it good fun? Yeah!

THE ORDERLY advance of the aliens to destroy civilisation as Slugger would like it to be, is given a new twist in Highway Encounter from Vortex. The aliens stick to the main road, and your job is to ferry the lasertron to their base where it will obliterate the nasties.

The twist is the combination of state-of-the-art Knight Lore graphics with straight shoot-'em-up button bashing. The lasertron is propelled by a chain of five Vortons, dalek-like robots with guns in their heads. You control one Vorton at a time, but the other four will continue to move the lasertron forward if they can, and are thus vulnerable to attack. It seems particularly devious to design a game where you can lose your other lives before you even get to play them.

There are 32 screens of 3D highway to negotiate, each one containing a problem of its own. Some involve moving oil-drums around to prepare the way for the lasertron, others are free-for-all scraps with the aliens. The most difficult involve both.

The aliens have an innocent fury about them. Some look like rejects from a remake of War of the Worlds; others resemble psychotic eggs. Vortex promises staggering effects when the lasertron is finally brought to its destructive goal.

In many respects the game is superior to Knight Lore and Alien 8, in that everything moves faster and in a true eight directions. There is colour in the screens, though not much, and most importantly, the action continues off-screen so you can't hang about for long trying to work out the best tactics. Weaknessess include less variety in the problems, and the lack of a maze - the highway is a simple straight road, easy to wander along to the end, but much more difficult to negotiate with the lasertron in tow.

It is a long time since we last saw a Vortex game - TLL and Cyclone were the last products. Highway Encounter is the best yet, innovative and addictive, and should go down a treat this summer.

A PERPETUAL MADcap struggle has left the pages of America's top cartoon magazine to continue its conflict on the computer screen.

The comic capers of the two secret agents from MAD magazine reappear in Beyond's Spy vs Spy. A unique split-screen approach allows two to play simultaneously.

Ransacking a foreign embassy, the idiotic duo - one white, one black - blunder into each other's traps as they both search for secret documents and a diplomatic bag.

Hidden in the embassy are five objects which must be found before escape can be made in a super-slow and cranky bi-plane. The rooms all look alike so it is not surprising that you are constantly running into your own traps.

Buckets of water placed over doors, springs which send you hurtling across the room, are all part of the fun in trying to outwit your opponent. Those can be accessed through an icon-driven Trapulator and are easy to set once you've got the knack.

The two sleuths constantly cross each other's tracks and battle commences. Clubs magically appear as the two take wild swipes at each other. If you are lucky enough to score seven blows, your opponent ascends to heaven on angel's wings. After a short breathing space - in which the seconds still tick by - he is back for more.

Each time a confrontation occurs, any objects held are lost - either hidden in that room or throughout the building. It is the winner's privilege to search the room and either claim or reclaim articles.

You can play in a six room embassy in which the game is quickly over ideal for practising on - or up to a 36 room layout where the going is slower and an element of cunning strategy is required. A two player game is more fun than playing against the computer - mainly because the computer nearly always wins.

Surprisingly, the game is not compatible with a Kempston single-port interface and will only take joystick interfaces which emulate the keyboard. A dual port interface is needed for two players and though the keyboard can be used, space is cramped.

The instruction book is lengthy, though well presented, and it takes a while to get the hang of the game. Instant play is not possible, but it's worth persevering.

Spy vs Spy will probably be as successful as Shadowfire. Playing against the computer, however, is unexciting and frustrating. A two player game is another matter - it's challenging and there is more fun to be had outwitting a friend than a mere circuit board.

THE SODA BAR is as much an American institution as blueberry pie or Grandma Moses. To judge from Tapper, the latest import from US Gold, the only character who hates it is the guy who serves the soda.

Your job in Tapper is to keep the refreshing fizz flowing as the customers queue for more. There are four bars, with several layers of play in each. First it's the turn of the cowboys, a fairly docile lot. Slide a drink along the counter quickly enough and they'll take it and leave, but if a customer waits too long he'll stay around for another.

And that's where the trouble starts. Obviously impressed with your skill at delivering drinks, the customers tend to hurl the empties back at you. One mistake - a drink too many served, a glass on the floor, or a customer left unattended and you lose a life.

If you manage to satisfy the cowboys, you move to a duel of wits with the Soda Bandit. He swaps around the cans, after shaking all but one. Find the untampered can and you win. Open one of the others and you get a face full of froth.

Then it's on to the senior prom, with jocks and their girls crowding the marquee. Life gets even more hectic when you graduate to a punk bar, although the balding bespectacled boys look more like fifties college wimps. Nice to see the colony still retains a touching innocence about British mores.

The final sequence involves aliens, just as eager for a slow Sarsparilla as anybody else. A lovely touch is the occasional appearance of a tip. Collect the tip and a pair of dancing girls perform on stage. That can be a blessing, as heads will turn and customers stop bothering you for a while. But serve a drink and they won't notice - so you have to be careful.

Tapper is simply delightful to play. It's surely the most addictive game released this year, and its theme is just right for the summer.

Graphics are clear, humorous and simple so that its easy to see what's going on. Problems can occur if the bar gets too crowded, so that two people in the same place create a blur. For once, that adds to the realism.

The action is extremely well-paced against the demands of the game. Its fast, but not fast enough to be impossible. As usual with US Gold products, the choosing of skill levels, joystick selection and so on is made very friendly. Highly complex arcade-adventures are all the rage at present, and it is good to see such a fine, unpretentious classic arcade game released. If your brain has been completely drained by the mysteries of Shadowfire or Gyron of late, take a trip to the soda fountain. It's a refreshing experience.

IT IS EIGHT months late, and Matthew Smith had very little to do with it. Nevertheless, it's here, and Miner Willy rises from the grave in the final part of the Manic Miner trilogy.

If you can clear the clouds of nostalgia for a moment and look at the game objectively, it also seems to be the rip-off of the year. Jet Set Willy II is, in a nutshell, Jet Set Willy with about 70 extra screens.

The plot is the same - Maria the housekeeper won't let Willy go to bed until he's cleaned up the house. Unfortunately, builders have been to work. Rooms are not always where they were.

If you're puzzled by all this, Jet Set Willy was the ultimate ladders and levels game, launched in 1984 and one of the biggest selling games ever.

This expanded version continues in the same vein under the coding of D P Rowson, with rooms such as Maria in Space and Beam me up Spotty. Games attacked include Alien 8, and Tribble Trouble.

Jet Set Willy II is probably as tough as the original. The Banyan Tree is as vile as ever, as is the Wine Cellar. Graphics, which amazed us all at the time, now look dated, and the music does not improve with age. Movement is considerably faster, although the infinite death traps, where you cannot escape losing all your lives in quick succession, have multiplied.

If you already have Jet Set Willy, and have waited for the final game for a year, you'll probably be a little upset. If you never saw the original, then the sequel is the one to buy, and represents very fair value for a one time classic.

EXCLUSIVE

Take your seats for the 12 o'clock service from London Victoria, calling at Clapham Junction, Merstham, Haywards Heath and all stations to Brighton. The Southern Belle, the famous Pullman service of the 1920s, is stoking up for a final run.

Hewson Consultants has attempted to capture the trials of life in the engine cab in a full simulation of one the most elegant trains of all. You must control a 4-6-0 King Arthur Class locomotive, regulating the steam pressure, shovelling coal into the boiler, obeying signals, and even blowing the whistle at the correct times.

The screen display shows the interior of the cab and the features of the track as they pass by. Those include 24 stations, tunnels - including the twin-towered Clayton tunnel - signal boxes, Battersea Power Station, and other landmarks.

Controlling the train is not easy, in spite of a comprehensive booklet including a history of the line. Gradients are included, and to score full points you must make it to Brighton on time, using an economical amount of coal.

There are a number of training modes, where the computer controls many of the functions, and the full run includes weather hazards. There is a high-speed demo as well, but the whole trip is in real-time, so you will not finish in under an hour.

The version we saw was a pre-production copy, with many of the control features not operative. Hewson promises further landmarks and decoration on the screen, as well as information about hazards and signals. Our rating is therefore provisional and may be updated in a later issue.

Train lovers will certainly enjoy a good, solid simulation, and those who are used to flight simulators may find a day's outing on the Southern Belle a refreshing change from airport mayhem.

EXCLUSIVE

SOME simulations are fun, others can be downright boring. Juggernaut fits snuggly into the second category with a trip around town in a container lorry, trying to pick up cargo.

The loads include fruit, veg, timber and coal of which you must take enough to meet targets set by your manager.

Your trip starts at a depot picked at random and shown on your map as a flashing square. Putting the truck into first gear and pressing down the accelerator will give forward movement. Moving too fast may take you into a wall, or through the trees.

The first move should be to find a telephone and make a call using the main icon-driven option. A map appears and you are told where your cargo may be picked up. To load cargo you must back into the docking bay and press the load icon.

Although the simulation bears some resemblance to real life - you may end up with a feeling of road fatigue - the graphics are minimal and the action slow. No wonder CRL did not put any other cars on the road. With their way of handling interrupts on the Spectrum the action would come to an abrupt halt.

As it is, the truck floats along the lonely road bearing a striking resemblance to a Gillette GH razor. If that is vector scan graphics you can keep them.

A lot more thought could have made it an original simulation. At present it is just a bad simulation of a simulation.

MURDER is the only illegal move you are allowed to make in Cluedo, the authorised computer version of Waddington's board game.

As a firm believer in cheating, Leisure Genius left me smarting. What fun is Cluedo, if you cannot hide the identities of your clue cards or make suggestions about locations which you hold in your hand?

Cluedo closely follows the original board game, using exceptional graphics to depict the board and the 3D dice which roll over it. When a player enters a room and makes a clue suggestion a view of that room appears. The switch between displays is incredibly fast and expertly done.

Once chosen, the characters are assigned clue cards which depict locations, suspects and weapons. One card from each of those catagories is chosen by the computer to form the situation for the murder. The characters must then move around the locations asking whether other players have particular cards which, once seen, can be eliminated from their enquiries.

Movement and suggestion phases form the main part of the game and the speed at which those cycles take place can be controlled at the start.

The sound effects slow down play considerably. They introduce players onto the screen as their turns roll around. Music includes Onward Christian Soldiers for the Rev Green, Air on a G String for Mrs White and Land of Hope and Glory for Mrs Peacock.

The grand denouement can come when a player makes an accusation. It is a one-time-affair for that player and it is done using three menus from which the choice is selected. If wrong, the player faces expulsion from the game. The computer can then either take over the play of the loser's cards, the player can keep them but not participate, or the game can be ended.

The big advantage that computer Cluedo has over the board game is that you can play against the computer at any time. You do not need a full complement of friends.

The Spectrum is certainly not a good competitor for all its large memory and logical powers. Cluedo is, therefore, best played with a number of human and a few computer participants.

SLITHERING snakes and clockwork yellow ducks are your enemies in Quackshot.

Your task is to keep everything quiet in the Acme Clockwork Toy Factory. But as you hear strange noises and start to investigate, you are pursued by giant ducks and green snakes and other wacky wind-ups. The only way to escape is to destroy the clockworks with your stun gun and duckbuster bombs.

You have a time limit on each stage, collecting keys and bonuses to transport you to the next phase of your mission and add to your score.

You have to negotiate the maze of corridors, which are obstructed by toys or dead ends. There are 16 screens for you to pass.

The graphics are smooth and as basic as any other maze game. It is reasonably priced if you like this sort of run-of-the-mill game.

ANY CONNECTION between The Covenant, biblical events and good games is totally coincidental.

You must guide your space ship around the caverns, getting out to pick up objects and pieces of covenant which, once fitted together, will save the world from destruction. There is, however, the little problem of the Thingies. They have a sting in their tails which will terminate you instantly.

To destroy the Thingies you must leave your craft, pick up some anaesthetic and hit one of the two creatures. It will then be disabled for a few seconds. Then jump back into the spacecraft and bounce on it to pick it up. Such complex action makes lengthy play impossible.

The Thingies are intelligent and attack as soon as you leave your craft, draining your energy. Getting to the energiser is difficult and once there the Thingies continue their attack.

In the second section you must pass pipes which drip molten lava. There are more Thingies to kill, more covenant to pick up and more sections through which to pass.

Arcade wizards would find it difficult to complete 256 caverns, go through 67 passages and contend with ever-present aliens using just one life.