LEGO Star Wars (PC)

If you do follow the advice of the person for whom it did not work and look at the reviews on Amazon.com, you'll find many people expressing surprise that it doesn't work on their new PCs thanks to 'Pixel Shader 1.1'. The first lesson is: if you're buying games for your PC, remember that even the most simple game is running on a complicated and unstable beast. Make sure you find out the minimum spec and the spec of your computer first. Now, Amazon are poor at telling you what you need. Basically, it's the graphics card that is the problem for most people.

Contrary to many of the reviews, this is not Eidos' fault, some conspiracy to make people buy NVidia graphics cards nor planned obselesance to make you upgrade. Instead, it's part of a wider problem of poor computer construction by large manufacturers. To cut down on prices yet still offer advert-friendly high-speed processors that in reality the average user will never need, manufacturers cut down on, amongst other things, the graphics cards (the unethical nature of this is illustrated by the fact that the only use of the PC that will need such a high-speed processor will need a graphics card to match). In most cases this involves repacking years old technology with a name that makes it hard to tell it apart from current generations - for example, the Geforce 4 MX series is actually a rehashed Geforce 2. This means it will struggle to cope with anything released in the last few years.

If you right-click on your desktop and go to the 'Settings' tab, it will tell you what Graphics card you have. Use Google and do some research on that card, particularly in relation to pixel shaders. If you're not sure, download and play the demo. The Geforce 4 MX cards will not run this game. If you're unfortunate enough to have this card or any other with the same faults, you will either have to buy a new card or not buy this game. Make sure you do your bit to change this scamming of the average consumer by buying your next PC from responsible, local retailers who are not preying on ignorance and selling a PC completely unsuitable for average needs.

If your card can run it, then hurrah! For this is one of the best 'kid's' games ever made - it doesn't patronise or pass off sloppy work just because the developers don't think children will notice. It's fun, fantastic to look at and a barrel of laughs.

If only we had read the customer reviews before purchasing this game from the Amazon site - there was no reference in the Amazon info to requiring a graphics card with "Pixel Shader 1.1" capability - which most users will not have!

Our 10 yr old son was pretty upset on Christmas day when the game initialisation kept failing. After a little research it seems that only THE most current graphics cards are compatible.

However a friend with a 12mth old card has found a solution via the downloadable program "3d Analyzer". Find the site via Google.

On the plus side I've little doubt it is impressive once you can run it, judging by some of the other reviews.