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This Prime Suspect won't get any awards

What is it about racing games? After issue 30's fantastic violation of the laws of time in F17 Challenge, Psygnosis have picked up the gauntlet of ridiculousness and come up with something even more astounding - the amazing moving mountain. In Prime Mover's Japanese racetrack, the hilariously-named 'Nontendo' course, most of the scenery is dominated by a huge snow-capped mountain, looking not at all unlike the legendary Mount Fuji which appears in most Japanese racing-track games. As you crest the long hill coming up to the start/finish line, this imposing peak lies dead in your centre of vision, providing a strangely stirring backdrop to the action.

Until your second lap, that is, when you notice with puzzlement that, as you climb towards the line, Mount Fuji (or, as it's probably actually called in the game, Mount 'Fudgy' or something equally side-splitting) has curiosly and almost iperceptibly shifted a couple of screen inches to the right, leaving it halfway to the edge of the screen. Do another lap, and you'll probably be only partly surprised to discover that several million tons of earth and rock has somehow disappeared from view altogether. Oh dear.

Sadly, that's not the worst flaw in Prime Mover, only the funniest one. For a game that's been about two years in development, there's a stunning lack of almost anything at all in it. It looks like something from 1988 (Super Hang-On, which was more or less the Amiga's first motorbike racer, leaves this a mile behind graphically), there aren't any new or exciting features of any kind, the control is rudimentary skidding around, the sound is the usual drone combined with tuneless music, and the now-ubiquitous weather effects are simply a poor imitation of the ones everybdoy and their dog's already done. You rarely see any opponents after the start, there isn't any indication of where they actually are on the track map, when you smash into a roadside barrier at 140mph and suddenly drop to 50, you don't actually, visually, appear to be going any slower at all, the roaside scenery is the same all the way round most of the courses so there's no way of really learning the track layouts, which is the only way of getting round without hitting things (the incredible shifting scenery hardly helps), and... I could go on, but you'd only get depressed.

The Amiga motorbike-racing game market has long been dominated by two truly excellent titles. Super Hang-On is lovely-looking, arcade-fast and intensely exciting (and right quid), while No Second Prize is beautiful in a different kind of way, equally speedy and thrillingly realistic. Prime Mover isn't fit to wax either of their leathers.

Uppers: It's another motorbike game. And at least you can buy it now and see how rubbish it is. Oh, I give up, I've said all the good points.

Downers: Where are the opponents? Where's Mount Fuji gone? Why did it take so long? Oh, what's the point?

A dismal effort, which doesn't seem to have advanced in any meaningful way on what it was like two years ago. So far behind the current state-of-the-art in the genre that it's just plain embarrassing, and a complete waste of time and money for all concerned.