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Quite why this game is called Mugsy's Revenge is a mystery to me as the original Mugsy game never made it onto the C64!

Fortunately for C64 owners Mugsy's Revenge is now out and offers you the opportunity to make like a real Chicago gangster.

It's 1919. Prohibition prevents the legal consumption of alcohol across America - and Mugsy and his gang of hoodlums aim to get rich running Canadian moonshine across the border.

Mugsy's Revenge is basically a trading game where you must buy and sell moonshine, nightclubs, hire hoods and pay off the cops - with the computer acting as banker.

But don't get the impression that you can play the game like a good accountant, for there are also random elements built into the program that will thwart you if you are too cautious - like the Feds who are always ready to pounce, and the Organisation who will begin to get jealous if you get too successful.

A trading game may not seem like much to you and to be honest if it weren't for the highly impressive graphics you would have to dismiss the game for lack of playability.

But those graphics are so good they do put it into a higher category. One of these screens shows a pool with a neon sign that plays through a sequence with each letter lighting up one by one until the whole thing flashes, turns off and then begins again. I gazed at this for minutes - it's so pretty!

The gameplay unfolds through scrolling text in windows super-imposed on the gangster-like picture screens. You make most of your entries through fairly simple one-key commands. For example the number of barrels of moonshine you want to buy, or the number of hoods to be hired.

There are also a number of arcade sequences which are shoot-outs with rival gangs. Fairly simple stuff, this - up, down, left, right and space bar for fire using the keyboard to play. I say fairly simple, but these shootouts do come as welcome relief from the business of buying and selling and making money.

It's important to make a profit in Mugsy's Revenge. If you finish the year with less than you started, your "boys" will take over the operation. They don't mince words either. After a particularly bad trading year I was told "you couldn't run a kindergarten".

The gangster-speak is kept up throughout the game. Attention to detail must have also necessitated much study of 1920's fashion as the gangsters are dressed so authentically right down to their spats.

It's a pity that these excellent graphics, and a nice rag-time soundtrack were wasted on Mugsy's Revenge because the truth of the matter is that there isn't a lot to it.