Right, let's get the bad jokes out of the way... "This game is about a load of old balls! Haw! Haw!" Well, that's where you're wrong, because Puffy and Puffyn are young balls. One day, while on an excursion, an evil wizard lured them to his castle, turning them from careless young lovers into small bouncing balls.

As if that wasn't enough, he's also trapped them at the bottom of a series of labyrinthian dungeons. Ooh, the rotter. You must guide the young hero or heroine (depending on your choice) through these dungeons so they can crack the spell and return to their natural shape.

This isn't as easy as it sounds, since there are many hazards to watch out for, including spiked floors, electric guns and sticky floors. There are also all manner of strange creatures wandering around the dungeons who have been warped by the wizard's evil mind and are on the hunt for any strangers in their world. Creatures such as snakes just crawl up and down the corridors and are easy to avoid, but other beasts like fire-breathing dragons and ghosts that follow your every move, cause many more problems.

You are not totally defenceless on your quest though, as the spell has also given you the ability to fire a puff of deadly gas from your lungs. This can be made more powerful by picking up power tokes or spells to give you fiery dragon-breath (time for a squirt of mouth freshener).

To finish a dungeon and travel to the next level, Puffy and Puffyn must collect enough 'Goms' to open a portal. These can be either be found lying around on the floor or in chests opened by gold keys. Chests can give spells such as invisibility, speed, immunity or viewing the dungeon using ESP>

GRAPHICS AND SOUND

The overall feel of Super Puffy is very similar to the classic maze game Time Bandit. Many of Bandit's elements have been included, such as weird landscapes and comical characters, with a liberal dash of the old Gauntlet backgrounds. In fact the whole thing looks somewhat dated, being similar in looks and sound to arcade adventures seen on the Amiga two or three years ago.

In that case, why does it work for this kind of game? Mostly because the smaller sprites give the player a feeling of space in the dungeon, leaving the larger and more impressively animated creatures to give a great impact later in the game.

Unfortunately, the sound doesn't match up the standard set by the graphics, consisting of the odd sampled effect in the midst of a whole batch of weak "plip-plip" effects and annoying phrases, particularly the unhelpful "Puffy, you will die!" I KNOW.

LASTING INTEREST

Wandering around the mazes is great fun to start with and the fact that the first couple of levels are easy to solve instils a certain confidence, but the gameplay gets too hard too quickly. After the "obvious route" solutions of the first three levels, the game becomes incredibly hard, throwing things at you from all directions so that you can't even make it around the next corner, never mind the end of the level.

Soon enough, the feeling of frustration takes over the compulsion to see higher levels, especially when you have to sit through the ever-so-slow outro and intro sections - all seven sections of it!

JUDGEMENT

Perhaps the programmers have tried to detract from the lack of game content by going overboard on the peripheral presentation. Well I'm sorry gys, but it doesn't really work! There's a lot of levels to play and they won't be easily beaten but this sort of game looks decidedly dated now.

Enter the world of Puffy and Puffina, possibly two of the cutest things you've ever seen in your life. Sadly their best friends have been captured and it is down to you to rescue them from the castle of the evil Baron Loftus.

To rescue them you have to make your way through a staggeringly large number of Gauntlet-like levels, each populated by all manner of foul beasts such as fire breathing dragons, crocodiles, Pac-man ghosts and evil Puffies.

So what exactly is a Puffy? A Puffy is a small potato-like creature with a big heart and a smile to match. But don't be fooled by its deceptively sweet appearance. Puffy is a ruthless killing machine. It's so vile that before it destroys its adversary, it spits on them, just to rub it in, before chewing it to death.

As Puffy races around the eight-way scrolling levels, destroying everything in his path, he finds lots of other things to help or hinder him besides the enemy creatures. There are keys, useful for opening doors and locked chests, which can contain even more keys, food to boost Puffy's flagging energy level, or bonus weapons, such as bombs, or the ability to breath a limited amount of fire.

The graphics are brilliant. Although small, everything is well designed and full of character. Who knows how many frames of animation have gone into Puffy himself, as he pulls more and more faces in reaction to different situations. See him leap back, eyes wide open with surprise as a wall closes up in front of him, see the look of fear on his face as ghosts pass by. The scrolling is perfectly smooth in all directions, and it's this kind of obvious care and attention to detail that makes a game stand out.

The sound is just as amazing, and contains some of the cutest samples ever heard. Hear Puffy say 'Oooo' as the ghosts come near, hear him squeak 'You gonna burn' as he breathes fire. If you play in two player mode and get into a fight, the loser mutters 'You win' just before it dies. Alternately sweet and sickening. This is what we want.

A brilliant variation on a worn theme. In time it will get boring, but it's still worth buying for the cute factor alone.