FANCY taking an apache assault helicopter and fighting the might of the terrorist underworld? If so, for £15, you can do just that from the comfort of your armchair with no threat of getting your head blown off.

Operation Air Assualt is a first-person cockpit-view shoot em up and despite fiddly controls is playable with action right from the start.

You'll fly in low over an undisclosed Middle East-style landscape with the intention of checking out various sites rumoured to be active militia hotspots.

Checking out each site which will appear on your radar while avoiding a barrage of rockets and anti-aircraft fire is a tricky prospect but unleashing a couple of hydra rockets at the right moment will quiet their guns.

Remember Desert Strike? Well, this game can be turned into that style by switching to a third-person view. Unfortunately your war machine becomes trickier to control in this mode and lining up targets nigh on impossible.

It doesn't look bad for the money you're paying but the gameplay will very quickly become predictable and, quite possibly, very dull.

I spent 20 minutes circling one target near the start of the game, while it freely fired upon me, desperately trying to get the swine in my sights. After firing off my entire arsenal and not hitting once, I decided it was best to crash into the sea and try again.

However, I encountered the same problem. Midas have come up with a nice idea, a sprawling set of missions to play, an okay-looking game and a good price.

Sadly, you get the feeling that so much more could have been done with Operation Air Assault and with a little more time spent on getting the controls to work better and some tinkering with the movement of your helicopter, Midas could have had a real gem on their hands.

Their last budget-priced game Pacific Warriors II: Dogfight was an airplane-based shoot em up which is still sitting in the charts six months later. I can't see Operation Air Assault doing the same. Back to the drawing board on this one.

Overall: 2.5/5