CUTE is the right word to describe this rather simple but fun game. There are 40 screens to conquer and the objective on every one is exactly the same - to push a floating, iridescent bubble from one side of a room to the other without bursting the fragile sphere in the process.

The bubble-pusher is a small, appropriately dead-white ghost which is guided around the screen by moving your mose in the desired direciton. Pressing the left or right hand mouse button causes the phantom to rotate in a clockwise or anti-clockwise direction Asteroids style.

The only means the ghost has of getting the bubble to move is by huffing at it - a press of the shift or space key causes the spook to puff out its cheeks and exhale. Providing the spook is close enough, the bubble will float away for a short distance, propelled by the ghostly breath.

As you know, ghosts can pass through solid matter and in this case such matter includes the bubble. However, although the ghost is immune from coming to grief on any objects, the bubble is not. Should it touch any solid item, the bubble will pop with a satisfying "Flink".

When this happens the little spook turns to face you, scowls and lets rip with a short burst of angry gibberish. The game is over when you've burst five bubbles - although extra bubbles, can be earned by taking a trickier route.

Each screen represents a room. The bubble is usually positioned on one side of the room with a least one exit at another - another includes the ceiling and floor.

Every room is different and in addition to an increasingly more difficult maze-like configuration of walls and passageways also features a variety of obstacles such as lit candles, electric fans, spikes, retracting needles and assorted pointy objects.

To add to the fun, a timer ticks away - the quicker you get the bubble to the exit, the higher the bonus. Failure to make it to the exit before your time runs out only results in your failing to score any bonus, not the loss of a life.

There are some neat points to the game. The ghost turns bright red and chokes if he puffs away for too long in one go - this temporary seizure is accompanied by the sampled sound of a cough and wheeze.

The ghost can blow other light objects beside the bubble. And trying to manoeuvre the bubble past a moving fan which blows it every which way is a real test of your patience and dexterity.

The title music is pretty good - unfortunately, it is only heard once, immediately after the initial loading - but the other sound effects are few and far between.

The graphics are fairly modest and uninspired and animation quite limited, although the ghost is nicely realised - cute and cuddly, if you like that sort of thing.

Although Bubble Ghost is quite novel and is enjoyable, harmless and ever-so mildly addictive, the fun and challenge per sound sterling does not represent a good long-term investment. Nice, but at this price not that nice.

Deep inside an old, dark castle, the spirit and soul of some nameless deceased have become separated and float aimlessly through the surreal rooms and corridors of the deserted building.

The person's spirit has taken the form of a smiling ghost (perhaps he hasn't realised he's dead yet) of the white-sheet variety, while the soul is encapsulated in a transparant bubble.

For some unexplained reason, the ghost is charged with guiding the bubble around the 34 flickscreen rooms of the castle, and while the ghost may be guided through the variety of obstacles in a suitably ethereal manner, the bubble is extremely fragile and bursts at the slightest contact. Since the ghost cannot actually touch anything, me moves the bubble by blowing it.

A tap on the SHIFT key on the fire button and the ghost puffs ut his little cheeks and the bubbles move accordingly, drifting along slowly until blown in another direction. Blow for too long and the spirit turns red.

As the bubble reaches the exit (a gap in the brickwork) the next screen slithers into view, and the ghost continues in this way until all 34 screens have been negotiated.

As can be seen from the screenshots, the scenery is typically French - i.e., odd! The rooms are full of weird objects, many animated, and are full of little 'gags' which facilitate the need to blow objects to help progress.

Bubble Ghost is a fairly original, if simple concept, but the gameplay is quite addictive. The novel control method is tricky to get to grips with - the 64 version requires the fire button to be used to blow and rotate the ghost by holding it and moving left or right on the joystick.

But it soon becomes second nature, and the bubble can be guided around with amazing precision: it wasn't long before I was whizzing through the screens - in fact, after only a few days' of play I had got through 27 of the 34 screens. This is fine for me, but rather more worrying for those of you contemplating shelling your hard earned on it.

Bubble Ghost is fun - but at a cost: if it had a cheaper price tag it might be a more viable proposition.

A quick haunt around that cosy castle, a nifty screech at its occupants and a bit of telekinesis in a set of spotted designer sheets is all you'd set your heart on. 'It'll be a laugh', you thought to yourself, 'appearing at windows, sticking an axe through my left, carrying my head in my arms, walking around in suits of armour, letting rip with blood-curdling screams - well rad'. As it turns out, a laugh is just about the only thing you didn't get. A shame, because you got a lot more than you bargained for.

When the window you climbed through slammed behind you and the nasty rain was shut out, even your spectral form couldn't form couldn't pass through it again. There was... are you sure you're ready for this? It's not very nice... OK, brace yourself... (da-da-DAAA!) a wickedly nasty, horribly bloodthirsty, incredibly bad (urggggh!) EVIL FORCE living in the haunted castle (boo, hiss)!

Brian the terrible (and he really is terrible, you can't get much more terrible than Brian) has done a job on you good and proper. As if being a right nasty piece of work (and ugly too) isn't enough, he's nicked your eternal soul. Not that he wants to do anything with it: one look and he's totally bored, Brian would much rather tear a chicken limb from limb. In fact, he's just plain cruel (probably tore the legs off spiders when he was a kid) and leaves it bobbing tantalizingly in front of you, suspended in a soap bubble (the rotter!).

You're a ghost (but a very nice one, honest), so you can't exactly grab hold of it: touch it and your hand just goes right through. There's nothing for it - you've got to find another way of taking it with you when (or should that be if?) you escape.

So what can you do? Think, think, think, scratch your head a bit, think a bit more, summon op your guardian spirit... oh no that's in the bubble... eat a banana, take a bath, blow - yeah, that's it - blow the bubble about! Dead (geddit?) easy!

Dead easy my bottom! You have to flip around the bubble, huffing and puffing and puffing and following it about. And you've got to remember - this is the home of an evil spirit (boo, hiss - really loudy this time), so there are plenty of traps littered all over the shop: nasty impaling spikes that pierce the bubble, evil-looking heads (haven't they got any manner staring at you like that?) which block your path, fans to blow you off-course and you know what happens when a bubble crosses a candle flame, don't you?

But don't forget that bubbles aren't the only things that you can blow about (kyak, kyak! Quiet at the back, missus!). After all, what happens to candles when you blow at them?

Let's hope they're non-flammable designer sheets.