Be very afraid. Paul Chuck the redneck beaver has got his chainsaw out

More beardy weirdy sequential button-bashing from Japan, readers. Only this time, you get to wield an axe...
Steve Bradley

Kick, punch, it's all in the mind...
Hoorah for PaRappa. The young, paper-thin, two-dimensional pup charmed the pants off of many a joypad rapper a couple of years back. The idea was that you watched and listened to a selection of songs and performed a 'repeat-after-me' Simon Says sequence straight afterwards. At the end of the song, you were awarded a mark - be it Cool, Good, Bad or Awful. Who could forget Prince Fleaswallow, that veritable doyen of singing frogs. "I've been working in the flea market so early, ever since my mama was a baby...". And so what if you could finish the whole thing in hours? At least it was different from Need For Speed 14 and FIFA: World Cup Opening Ceremony.

So, Um Jammer Lammy, then...
The game introduces a few new characters, but essentially, it's more of the same. Lammy is a female guitarist (she bears a passing resemblance to Elastica's Donna Matthews, pop fans) and your task is to get her to wield the axe by biffing buttons at the right time. Like you did in PaRappa. Oh, and Lammy's actually a sheep. Sorry Donna...

You're saying it's exactly the same, then?
Um, yup. The same idea, at least. Rather than rapping though, Lammy is a sort of junior Jimmy Hendrix (I was going to say Eric Clapton, but that might have put people off) who whips up a storm with her slick licks.