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Just when good puzzlers seemed to have dried up, they did.

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. It looks like we're finally getting towards the bottom of the barrel as far as these puzzle thingies are concerned. We're not quite there yet perhaps, but recent releases like Logical and (ugh!) Quadrel have looked increasingly ho-hum with each new game released, and while the software publisher's legs aren't exactly sticking out of the top of the container as they poke around inside for more, they do seem to be bending over at quite an alarming angle.

They've bent over quite a long way to bring us Swap, that's for sure - an outrageously simple little puzzler which takes about two minutes to get the hang of, if rather longer to master. Perfectly respectable sounding so far for a puzzler, it's true, but this does lack one important element - any sense of interest or intrigue at all! A good puzzle makes you really want to beat the game, but frustrated that you can't, and I suspect this is where Swap is going to have difficulties.

So what's it all about? Well you're presented with a grid built up of loads of variously coloured shapes. These can be big squares, little squares, hexagonals, triangles - you know the kind of thing. In any one puzzle though, the shapes are all of the same type (and are therefore interlocking).

By clicking on any intersection between two shapes you can flip them around so each takes up the place formerly occupied by the other. You want to keep doing this until two shapes of the same colour meet, at which point - bingo! - they disappear. The object, then, is to clear the board in the shortest possible time, and with the smallest number of swaps.

That's not all though - there are a few little extras to help you along. For example, when you've run out of swapping ideas you can press a button and all the shapes left hanging about loose at the top of the screen will cascade down towards the bottom, landing in new heaps and hopefully offering new opportunities to disintegrate them.

That's not the only piece of help you're offered too - for instance, you're presented with a small selection of extra shapes which you can place on the grid too, thereby cancelling corresponding shapes. (Just take a peek at the screenshots, and you'll get the general idea, okay?) Of course, as you progress through the levels these little extras become a rarity, so working out the best way of swapping shapes becomes mucho important.

However (you knew it was going to come, and yes, I'm afraid it's a pretty huge 'however'), the problem is simply that all this just isn't terrifically captivating. For a start, you're spending so much time swapping shapes that you're making things disappear all the time, and it soon loses the little satisfaction it once held. You also have to remember that one mistakes early in the game can foul things up a treat, and who wants to work out a complete solution to each screen all the time before starting a puzzle? Not me, that's for sure.

The major problem with Swap is that it provides very little reward for quite a lot of work. I have to confess to being more than a little bored of the whole affair after a matter of a few hours, and to glean any extra enjoyment would mean becoming extremely proficient (not a prospect that fills me with excitement).

Even so, it's the kind of game that'll fill a few idle hours, and as a programming job it's at least satisfactory. Not great, not terrible, just a game that would make far more sense at a budget price.

Entirely average shapes and colours puzzlers which could only appeal to die-hard Solitaire types. Strictly for those who've exhausted Puzznic, Plotting, Gem'X et al.